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Grounds for Steadfastness in Our Religious Profession, John Henry Newman

Robert Conrad April 27, 2026
Saint Cardinal John Henry Newman
Saint Cardinal John Henry Newman
Grounds for Steadfastness in Our Religious Profession, John Henry Newman
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Grounds for Steadfastness  in our Religious Profession

St John Henry Newman takes as his text the result of an extraordinary conversation between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well in Chapter Four of John’s Gospel. Passing through Samaria from Judea on his way to Galilee, Jesus encounters a woman at a well in the place given to Jacob’s son Joseph. The forbidden conversation itself with the Samaritan woman is remarkable. So is the secret things Jesus knew about her life. More remarkable still is his offer to her of living water, his use of the messianic phrase “I am.”  It causes her to drop her water jar and run into town to tell others.

It is here that Newman picks up the story. The Samaritans in the city of Sychar invite Jesus to stay with them and he does so for two days. Many began to believe in him, saying:

Now we believe, not because of thy (the Samaritan woman) saying; for we have heard Him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the World. (v 42).

We heard ourselves and know that Jesus Chris is our savior. Newman contrasts this true faith, faith within, a continuous conversion, a “beginning again” with “hereditary faith” or a faith based on “the feelings of a moment.” While a faith based on feeling might sprout up quickly, it withers in trial. Not so steadfast faith. It is the product of a lifetime. The steadfast believer knows the record of Scripture –  how God led the Israelites in the Old Testament, and how Jesus represents the fulfillment of all that the prophets and lawmakers have taught.  But he knows as well the inner reality of faith in Christ in his own life.

Looking forward, one sees not the obvious hand of God, for it would not be called “faith” if you knew life’s road ahead of time.  But looking back, oh there, over and over again, the hand of God is shown to the one who has eyes to see. Like St. Polycarp, Newman says, the steadfast believer knows that “Eighty and six years have I served Him and He hath never wronged me.”

It is this steadfast faith that Newman trumpets. Not hereditary faith or feelings in the moment, but lived faith, reflected by the Truth living within.  He suggests seven characteristics associated with this lived faith:

  1. True faith is rooted in one’s self. The truth is within. The doctrine which the believer holds is a reality in his mind and not a mere opinion. It comes to him in power that affects and changes him. He has a conviction that God has been with him, and this is a ground of hope that God will be with him still.
  2. God’s grace is sufficient and his mercies unfathomable. God is present with him in a fulness and depth beyond knowledge.
  3. Despite man’s sense of unworthiness, he has repeated experience of God’s wonderful providences and must say with Jacob: “God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, [has fed] me all my life long unto this day.”
  4. God answers prayer which constitutes a sign and token Christ is real and the very foundation of faith. “Religious men have their prayers answered in a wonderful way, and with sufficient distinctness to be, in addition to other evidences, a ground of confidence to them that God is with them.”
  5. The “awful sacredness” of our Sacraments, tell us that Christ is present. “Lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”
  6. The manifestation of Christ is often seen in the sanctity of the living. “Surely that is a Church visited by the influences of Divine grace which contains in her pale men so saintly in their lives, so heavenly in their hearts and mind, so self-denying, so obedient, as are vouchsafed to her even in this degenerate time.”
  7. The manifestation of Christ often attends on death-beds as a comfort to the dying and a witness to survivors.

These characteristics of steadfast faith suggested here but explored at length by Newman in Sermon #23 offer a ground of hope and confidence and  is meant to suggest the wisdom of a life-long pursuit of holiness urged upon us by St John Henry Newman.

Lord make it so.

Robert J. Conrad jr

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Links to Websites

About Cardinal John Henry Newman

National Institute for Newman Studies

Centro Internazionale degli Amici di Newman

The Oratory, Birmingham

Archdiocese of Birmingham, England

Our Books

About Cardinal John Henry Newman

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A Guide to John Henry Newman will interest educated readers and professors alike, and serve as a text for college seminars for the purpose of studying Newman.

Review by Catherine Maybanks
(Catholic Herald, April 1, 2023)

Review by Serenheed James
(Antiphon, April 2023)

 This book is being currently considered for reprinting, all enquiries to the Sales Team general@alivepublishing.co.uk
 

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Endorsement by Neyra Blanco (Amazon)
I bought this book for my son and he loved it, he wrote this review and urged my to submitted: “I think this book has a very beautiful message, because it shows how the young Newman was so determined to achieve his dream of becoming a priest, but even after his dream he continued to work in the church with passion until the day he died, it’s so admirable that even Newman so old and so weak still had that urge to continued his work of being a priest. And the book is well written with words not too complicated with very enjoyable texts and well illustrated pictures. I highly recommend this book for a 5th grader.  

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What is a Classical Liberal Arts Education? Why is it so important for the development of a person?

Fr. Juan R. Vélez answers these and more questions you might have about University Education in the 21st century. This book is aimed for parents, prospective University students, and educators. It will help you discern why adding Liberal Arts electives to your education will help it form it better, and help the student learn to reason, and not just learn.

He also explains how many Universities have changed the true meaning of Liberal Arts, and the subjects, and gives advise on how to choose College Campus, Subjects, and Teachers.

A wonderful book that every parent should also read way before your children are College bound. A Liberal Arts education can start earlier in life, even from home.

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Endorsement by Christopher Moellering (Goodreads, September 14, 2019)
In Passion for Truth Fr. Vélez gave us an outstanding biography of Cardinal Newman. In this work, he provides a concise overview of his thought and his devotion. This is a great work for someone who, perhaps hearing of Newman for the first time because of his beatification 13 October, 2019, wants to know more about this English saint.Vélez is a wonderful writer in his own right, and the frequent quotations from Newman round out the work nicely. I especially appreciated the frequent citing of Newman’s Meditations and Devotions, which show a different side of his spirituality than his more well-known works, Development of Christian Doctrine and the Grammar of Assent.

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Review by Gregory J. Sullivan (Amazon, May 25, 2012)

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Take Five: Meditations with John Henry Newman, endorsement by Illow M. Roque (Amazon, September 3, 2010)
“There is a time to put direct inquiry on hold and give ourselves to prayer and practical duties.” Sound advice from one of the earlier, thought-provoking reminders in this sparkling gem of a book: Take Five | Meditations with John Henry Newman, written by Mike Aquilina and Fr. Juan R. Vélez and published by Our Sunday Visitor. This particular paragraph, referenced above, which begins with a direct quote from soon-to-be canonized priest, cardinal and poet, John Henry Newman: “Study is good, but it gets us only so far . . .” is actually the 15th in a series of 76 concise, logically organized meditations moving from the elementary to the sublime. Each meditation–one per page–is built upon the great man’s writings and remarkably rich spirituality. Whether taken whole in one reading or in part page-by-page over a course of weeks and months, these wonderfully insightful meditations will open up, even to the busiest reader in the midst of the world, a unique pathway into prayer and contemplation. My advice to spiritual inquirers at all levels, from the novice to the spiritually adept, is to follow the authors’ recommendation to use this book as a guide for daily prayer and meditation. The structure of the book itself is ideal: first, the authors introduce us to Cardinal Newman, the man, where we are given the opportunity to get to know him through a brief sketch of his life and spirituality at the beginning of the book. This is something readers will likely find themselves referring to again and again, prompting many, I suspect, to even wider explorations of this most gifted Christian leader. Then comes the meditations, consisting of a short summary of Newman’s thoughts on subjects taken, as the authors explain, from various salient points for which Newman is justly remembered: The pursuit of objective religious truth; Teaching on the Virtues; Defense of the Catholic Church; A devout spiritual and moral life; and Generosity and loyalty in his friendships, which sets the topic and tone for each meditation to follow. Each meditation consists of an excerpt taken from Newman’s thirty-plus volumes of writings and diaries. Next comes three brief and extremely useful sections entitled: “Think About It,” which establishes a prayerfully resonant tone throughout the book; “Just Imagine,” which provides a vivid, prayerful experience of the Scriptures that tie in, and finally, “Remember,” a pithy summation which the authors suggest may be used as a daily aspiration. Each meditation is given its own page, which makes it ideal for daily reflection for readers on the go. This book is a must have for every serious Catholic who wants to take their faith to the next level, which is to respond appropriately to the universal call to holiness and seek interior union with God.
Meditations and Devotions
David Warren

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The word piety has a negative connotation for many people today. The word is associated with people who are only outwardly righteous, overly-religious or even pharisaical. That’s a shame, because piety is really about living as a child of God, and children are normally guileless.

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David Warren June 5, 2026
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