The following is based on a talk given to some Catholic students of the University of Queensland at their retreat earlier this year. 

My purpose today is threefold. First, I want to expose you to some orthodox Catholic thinking. Secondly, I hope to help you get ready for the year ahead. Lastly and most importantly, I want to encourage you in your life as a student and in the faith that you and I share. The title of my presentation today is ‘The Idea of a Student’, which is a play on the title of one of Cardinal John Henry Newman’s works, ‘The Idea of a University’. I intend to draw upon this series of discourses which were delivered to the Catholics of Dublin by our society’s patron in 1852. I will also quote liberally from Frank Sheed’s essay ‘A Ground Plan for Catholic Reading’. 

So, why are we here? For some rest and meditation, sure. To get to know one another a bit better. And, I suppose, to take a moment in the repose of this peaceful valley to try to connect our Catholic faith more intimately to our lives and to absorb it more fully. This last point forms the heart of what I want to communicate with you all. So, let’s begin. 

In his preface, Newman says:  

“ … when the Church founds a University, she is not cherishing talent, genius, or knowledge, for their own sake, but for the sake of her children, with a view to their spiritual welfare and their religious influence and usefulness, with the object of training them to fill their respective posts in life better, and of making them more intelligent, capable, active members of society.” (IU, xii) 

That is to say, University is a place of formation where students are educated, in the hope that their lives will be authentic and human, embracing life in all its dimensions. Before we go too much further, we should remember that Cardinal Newman spent a lot of time at Oxford and that throughout his discourses he is speaking of a Liberal Education, similar to that which Campion College professes to give. Now, most of us are not studying degrees that even approximate a liberal education. However, I am convinced that such a thing is vital for one to be able to lead an intelligent Catholic life, and so if we do not get it at University, it must be gotten in some other form from somewhere else. But more on that later. 

For the moment, listen to what Frank Sheed has to say on the subject:  

“Education fits a man for living. Man exists in a universe. Man is: other things are: successful living means a right relation between man and all else that is. A treatise on education would work this out in relation to all man's faculties and powers — mind, will, imagination, emotions. But this is not a treatise on education, and our only concern here is with education as it affects the mind. Successful living, as we have seen, means a right relation between man and all else that is. The mind's part is to come to the knowledge of that right relation. An educated man is one whose mind is responsive to being, to everything that is. It will be noted that the words "all" and "everything" have kept recurring in this paragraph. This is of the very essence of education. You cannot fully know anything until you know everything: less cryptically, the parts get their significance from their place in the totality. If you know only a part but not the whole, you do not even know the part.” (GP, 5) 

That leads us quite naturally on to another comment from Cardinal Newman:  

“…any secular science, cultivated exclusively, may become dangerous to Religion; and I account for it on this broad principle, that no science whatever, however comprehensive it may be, but will fall largely into error, if it be constituted the sole exponent of all things in heaven and earth, and that, for the simple reason that it is encroaching on territory not its own, and undertaking problems which it has no instruments to solve.” (IU, D IV, p74)  

He says additionally:  

“…if there be Religious Truth at all, we cannot shut our eyes to it without prejudice to truth of every kind, physical, metaphysical, historical, and moral; for it bears upon all truth.” (IU, D III, p52) 

Notice how he says “if there be Religious Truth”. It is interesting to note that neither Newman nor Sheed devotes any of his time to the question of whether God exists. Newman puts together perhaps a two sentence appeal at one point, but apart from that he takes the matter for granted – he constantly insists on it, in fact. Sheed does not even touch the matter at all. And that is for the simple reason that they were speaking and writing for Catholic audiences. No need to preach to the converted, right? So neither will I. 

Sheed goes on to say: 

“Scholarship is necessary to education and an educational system which claims to mould character and neglects learning is charlatanism. Yet a great scholar may fail to achieve that right mental relationship to all that is, which is of the very definition of education. The explanation has already been suggested: he knows an enormous amount about something or other; but he does not see the totality; lacking a view of the whole, he is unbalanced by what he knows of the part. Scholarship is pure gain to the mind which knows the totality: to any other it is, in greater or less degree, an eccentricity. Only the educated mind is at home in the universe.” (GP, 5)  

PhD students beware! But if you are Catholic, you should be alright. This is why: 

“To return to the totality: it will be clear that this is the indispensable element. The man who rightly sees the whole will gain an enormous amount from a mere handful of individual things known. It cannot too often be repeated that the man who knows only the individual things, will not know even them: for he will not know their context.”  

So here we come to the real point of our time together. Sheed says, “…for the total view which education demands one must know God.” For us, the matter may hardly need stating. You could probably see me coming to this point five minutes ago, but bear with me for a moment and consider the simplicity of this statement – God exists; you must know him if you are to have any proper picture of life. And, as we know, this knowledge of God is no small thing – it is absolutely revolutionary. Properly developed, it touches all aspects of our lives, penetrates to the depths of our being, lays claim to all that we are. 

Sheed continues: 

“… unless we rightly see God, we have no true view of the totality; … one who does not believe in God is by that very fact stating the sheer impossibility of a total view and so of education itself. … To omit God, therefore, from your study of things is to omit the one being that explains them: you begin your study of things by making them inexplicable! 

… But the place of God in our view of the totality of things – and so of education – is not simply a matter of recognizing Him as first cause and last end and sustainer in being more intimate to each being than it is to itself; there is also His revelation of the purpose for which He made man – not simply that He made man for Himself but just what this involves in terms of man’s being and action. …You do not even know what is good or bad for a man till you know the purpose of his existence, for this is the only test of goodness or badness – if a thing helps a man in the achievement of the purpose for which he exists, then it is good for him; if not, it is bad. …The Catholic knows that man has a Maker and that the Maker has said what he made man for. Therefore – not of himself but by the revelation of God – the Catholic knows the purpose of human life and if he be an educator he has the answer to this primary question.” (GP 8-10)  

And I would add, if he be a student, he has at a north point for his compass to guide him on his way.  

Cardinal Newman puts it very nicely in the conclusion of his third discourse: “In a word, Religious Truth is not only a portion, but a condition of general knowledge.” (IU, D III, p70) 

I think we all knew these massive truths already, even if only implicitly. But in any case, I hope that laying things before you so plainly today will help you grasp the facts and their importance. 

Let us continue now to observe some consequences of the foundations we have laid thus far… 

“The upshot of all this is that education has as its one indispensable requisite something that only a Catholic can give. This is the strictly educational argument for Catholic education. There are other arguments of a moral and theological order, but the two sets of arguments must be sharply distinguished. A non-Catholic institution may be dangerous to Catholic faith and practice and that is the most serious consideration of all. But my point here is that a non-Catholic institution cannot give an education; it can give a magnificent mass of scholarship and a rich mental training; but in the intellectual order there is one thing necessary, a comprehensive view of the totality of being, and this it cannot give. This does not mean that a Catholic institution will inevitably succeed.” (GP, 12-13)  

“Even the question of the union of Theology with the secular sciences…simple as it is of solution in the abstract, has, according to difference of circumstances, been at different times differently decided. Necessity has no law, and expedience is often one form of necessity…Thus a system of what is called secular Education, in which Theology and the Sciences are taught separately, may, in a particular place or time, be the least of evils.” (IU, D. I, p 8-9)  

And that is what we have. All of us are currently engaged in, or are about to begin, studying a degree of some sort at the University of Queensland. Now, I have never visited the School of History, Philosophy, Religion and Classics at UQ. I have never even heard its name mentioned. But it is safe to say that as a matter of policy, or heredity or whatever it may be, God is not given a place in most of the classrooms at our University. That was one of the most disheartening things I struggled with in my first year of university; I was expecting to attend a grand place of higher education with a proud history and a firm grasp of its role in society, but the communication of this sort of vision and context was left to individual teachers and students. The place was, as far as I could see, entirely godless. 

So, thanks be to God for our families and parishes, for our youth groups, for the Newman Society and all such avenues which provide us with such a vital source of intellectual and spiritual nourishment! But now I want to bring your attention to something that requires caution from us. It will take a little while before I get to the punch line, so listen a few moments while I read from His Eminence: 

“All that exists, as contemplated by the human mind, forms one large system or complex fact, and this of course resolves itself into an indefinite number of particular facts, which, as being portions of a whole, have countless relations of every kind, one towards another. Knowledge is the apprehension of these facts, whether in themselves, or in their mutual positions and bearings. And, as all taken together form one integral subject for contemplation, so there are no natural or real limits between part and part; one is ever running into another; all, as viewed by the mind, are combined together, and possess a correlative character one with another, from the internal mysteries of the Divine Essence down to our own sensations and consciousness, from the most solemn appointments of the Lord of all down to what may be called the accident of the hour, from the most glorious seraph down to the vilest and most noxious of reptiles …  

Now, it is not wonderful that, with all its capabilities, the human mind cannot take in this whole vast fact at a single glance, or gain possession of it at once. Like a short-sighted reader, its eye pores closely, and travels slowly, over the awful volume which lies open for its inspection. Or again, as we deal with some huge structure of many parts and sides, the mind goes round about it, noting down, first one thing, then another, as it best may, and viewing it under different aspects, by way of making progress towards mastering the whole ..  

These various partial views or abstractions, by means of which the mind looks out upon its object, are called sciences, and embrace respectively larger or smaller portions of the field of knowledge.… 

Since then sciences are the results of mental processes about one and the same subject-matter, viewed under its various aspects, and are true results, as far as they go, yet at the same time separate and partial, it follows that on the one hand they need external assistance, one by one, by reason of their incompleteness, and on the other that they are able to afford it to each other, by reason, first, of their independence in themselves, and then of their connexion in their subject-matter... 

I say, then, that the systematic omission of any one science from the catalogue prejudices the accuracy and completeness of our knowledge altogether, and that, in proportion to its importance… 

I say then, if the various branches of knowledge, which are the matter of teaching in a University, so hang together, that none can be neglected without prejudice to the perfection of the rest, and if Theology be a branch of knowledge, of wide reception, of philosophical structure, of unutterable importance, and of supreme influence, to what conclusion are we brought from these two premises but this? that to withdraw Theology from the public schools is to impair the completeness and to invalidate the trustworthiness of all that is actually taught in them.” (IU, D III,  p 45-47, 51, 69) 

That is a hard hitting conclusion! I urge you to be wary then, of unbalance that may confront you in the lecture theatre, in the tute room, and in the computer lab. But it is not just a secular university that is afflicted by unbalance if God be not acknowledged as a matter of course. Listen to this, from Sheed … 

“But whether he goes to a non-Catholic college or not, the Catholic will find himself soon enough in the largest non-Catholic institution of all – the world of real life. This precisely is the problem for all of us. In papers, movies, novels, in daily conversation, in normal practice we are constantly under the pressure of a different view from our own; no need to particularize; the plain truth is that the Church teaches us one universe and we live in another. If the superiority of the world's view were treated in the world as matter of argument, it would be a help; but it is simply assumed. Argument might stimulate us to defense; indifference soothes us into apathy. The temptation is to accept one set of values by faith but live by another set in daily practice. This temptation must be resisted with all our might. Yet to throw all the burden of resistance upon the will is sheer cruelty: the mind too must be fortified. The fortification of the mind is the total possession of the true view – a possession fundamental and operating as a matter of course in every judgment; to a mind thus fortified, everything serves; falsehood is seen to be false and not given hospitality. Yet every falsehood contains truth or suggests it; and this truth, too, the mind makes its own.” (GP, 13) 

Let me state clearly where we are at. The point is that that truth which has caused rivers of blood to flow in all of history, that truth for which all martyrs die, that truth which we all hold – the existence of the one true God – should affect the way we think about everything. That includes education. However, as Newman has pointed out, secular education may be the most expedient arrangement at one time or another. Expedient or not, it is what we have. Now, I mentioned earlier that I believe that some form of a Liberal Education is essential for all mature Catholics, in greater or less degree, according to each person’s ability. How are we to find such an education? Well, I want to share with you my thoughts on this as a means of stimulating discussion so that I can help you in whatever way. First, being Catholic is a great start. We have already established that. All the truths and teachings of the Catholic Faith cast a heavenly glow over all our earthly existence, colouring it with reality. Next, perhaps try to develop a reflective habit of mind. Frank Sheed illustrates this point in the following paragraph: 

“The object of the mind is to know what is – that is, to know being. Being comes to it through fact, or event, or another man's thought. The mind takes in the fact (of science, say) or event (of history) or thought (of this or that philosopher or poet). This is the mechanics of the educational process – this pushing into the mind of facts and events and the rest of it. All this is simply something done to the mind. Therefore in itself it is not education. Education is something that happens in the mind. What does happen in the mind? Often enough nothing. The fact learnt may lie there – not acting, not acted upon, quite useless – long enough to be written down in an examination; after which it can with impunity be forgotten, leaving the mind as unaffected by its passing as by its entry. In the better case the mind takes hold of it, thinks about it, extracts the kernel of being from it, enriches itself with that. Even if the individual fact or event or set of words in which that speck of being was clothed be forgotten, it is a great thing that the mind should thus have fed upon it.” (GP, 7) 

Well, what else can we do? Acclimatise yourself with reality: frequent the sacraments, hear Mass often; study God from your knees - pray. Also, read good Catholic books when you can. Ask Catholics more knowledgeable than you for suggestions. At the moment I am using Sheed’s ‘Ground Plan for Catholic Reading’ as a guide (it can be obtained fairly easily online). And keep good Catholic company, where you can share life together, form friendships, swap ideas, grow in fellowship, pray for each other. That is why we are here.     

Quotations are taken from Cardinal Newman’s “Idea of a University” and Frank Sheed’s essay on “Reading and Education”. Quotations from Newman are usually designated by (IU, D xx, p zz), where xx and zz indicate the discourse and page numbers respectively. The Idea of a University is available online from http://www.newmanreader.org/works/idea/index.html. Quotations from Sheed are designated by (GP, x), where x designates the page number of the 1954 edition pamphlet of “A Ground Plan for Catholic Reading”, available from http://www.catholicculture.org/library/view.cfm?recnum=7367