Not by coincidence, I think, no sooner has the Pope left Britain than
Fr Dermot Fenlon, one of the “Birmingham Three” Oratorians mysteriously
sent into exile, has broken his silence in an article for next month’s Standpoint magazine.
It’s about Newman’s burial and, reading between the lines, I’m guessing
that a bitter dispute about the mortal remains of Blessed John Henry
Newman formed part of this controversy.
Fr Fenlon is disgusted by the myth that Newman wished to be buried
next to Fr Ambrose St John because the latter was his “boyfriend”. (To
be fair, the Catholic authorities reject this myth, too.)
He says Newman
regarded St John, who died in 1875, as a saint worn out by the stress
of defending the Catholic religion and the infallibility of the Pope. It
was St John’s sanctity that led Newman to demand in 1876 that his own
body be buried next to St John and other saintly Fathers of the Oratory.
“Newman wanted permanently to leave a sign … pointing away from
himself, towards his community and under the one Cross,” writes Fr
Fenlon.
What isn’t clear is whether Fr Fenlon thinks the Church did the wrong
thing in attempting to transfer Cardinal Newman’s remains to the
Oratory church. And I say “attempting” because, of course, nothing was
found.
“His mortal remains had returned to dust,” writes Fenlon.
“Those
who were present recorded an awed, inward sentiment of recognition.
There was, so to speak, a revelation of the grave as not, after all, a
final resting place, but a gateway to the resurrection.”
In other words, Newman got his way in the end – even though the Church was able to placed “some shreds of hair and part of his coffin” in a side-chapel at the Oratory.
Is Fr Fenlon trying to send a message to the Catholic world? It’s
hard to conclude otherwise, given that set into the body of his text is a
short article by his Cambridge contemporary and friend Ruth
Dudley Edwards.
She has written before about the mystery of the
“Birmingham Three”, but on this occasion I can’t believe that Standpoint would have printed her piece next to Fenlon’s without his permission.
[Update: Daniel Johnson, Editor of Standpoint,
says in the thread below that Fr Fenlon didn't read Ruth Dudley
Edwards's piece before publication and wasn't involved in the decision
to run it. I'm assuming he didn't object to it, though.]
According to Dudley Edwards, Dermot Fenlon “gave up a glittering
academic career to be a priest” and lived at the Birmingham Oratory for
20 years before being “suddenly ejected [and] banned from the Newman
beatification”. She adds:
Officialdom continued the policy of silence and concealment even as the blogosphere came alive with speculation and protest: a spokesman spoke opaquely of disunity within the community.
Yet Roman Catholic insiders suggest that it was the Birmingham Three’s defence of traditional teachings on sexual morality, and their belief that Church should challenge State, that posed an unwelcome intellectual challenge to the Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols, during his time as Archbishop of Birmingham.
One Oratorian has been transported to South Africa; another has been sent abroad for three years to study; Dermot Fenlon, who is 68 and in frail health, is rumoured to have been banned from his home for five years.
I take some of this with a pinch of salt. Archbishop Nichols may have
failed to grapple with the loony Left “Catholic” Education Service, but
he upholds traditional teachings on sexual morality; he must take much
of the credit for the Pope’s extremely successful visit to Britain, as
should his inspiring successor in Birmingham, Archbishop Bernard
Longley.
Also, I’m certain that this affair involved a spectacular clash
of personalities as well as disputes over theology and/or Newman’s
remains.
On the other hand, given that Fr Fenlon is a distinguished Newman
scholar, long-standing member of the Birmingham Oratory and furthermore
in frail health, it seems mean-spirited indeed to have excluded him from
the beatification and the Holy Father’s visit to his community.
SIC: TC/UK