Oxford, University of

OXFORD, University of. - In England. It comprises about 7,000 students, of whom 1,500 are women; Catholic students now number about 400 among graduates and candidates (among these about 50 women), whereas in 1911 they did not exceed a hundred.

The University appeared in the second half of the 12th century and grew through the exodus from that of Paris in 1167, when King Henry II recalled his subjects from that seat. The chancellor is mentioned for the first time in 1214, but until 1368 there was also, as papal legate, an official of the episcopal Curia of Lincoln, in whose territory O. was located (today O. belongs to the archdiocese of Birmingham). In 1395 Boniface IX exempted the University from all episcopal visitation; this privilege, removed by John XXIII, was restored by Sixtus IV in 1479.

Houses of study at O. were opened in 1221 by the Dominicans, in 1224 by the Franciscans, followed later, before 1300, by the Carmelites, the Benedictines and the Cistercians. The other students were scattered in various lodgings, causing a lack of discipline and moral disorders. To remedy this, colleges for lay students were instituted, on the model of the religious ones. Thus there arose in 1249 "University College," around 1262 "Balliol"; in 1264 "Merton," transferred from Surrey to O. in 1274; this is the first true college and served as a model for the others that followed, namely "Exeter" in 1314, "Oriel" in 1326,

"Queen's" in 1340, "New College" in 1379, "Lincoln" in 1427 to combat the heresy of Wycliffe; "All Souls" in 1437; "Magdalen" in 1458; "Brasenose" in 1509; "Corpus Christi" in 1516; "Christ Church" in 1525; there were also many "public halls," of which only that of "St. Edmund's" (1269) remains. Under the devout Queen Mary the Cistercian College of St. Bernard was refounded, with the name "St. John's College" (1555), and the Benedictine "Durham College" with the name "Trinity College" (1554). After the apostasy of Queen Elizabeth there were founded "Jesus College" in 1571, principally for the Welsh; "Wadham" in 1613; "Keble" in 1870, always exclusively Anglican. The ancient "Broadgate Hall" became "Pembroke College" (1624); the Benedictine "Gloucester College" was transformed into "Worcester College" (1714); and "Hart Hall" (1284), called "Hertford" in 1740, was suppressed in 1818 and reopened in 1840. Women were admitted to degrees in 1920.

The University was incorporated in 1571 (act of Parliament) and remained exclusively Anglican until 1870, when the religion examination was abolished. Catholics thus returned in 1896, with the approval of the English bishops, but "Campion Hall" was founded at that time; followed in 1897 by "St. Benet's Hall" for Benedictine students.

In the 13th-14th centuries O. had its splendor through professors and pupils such as Robert Grosseteste, Adam Marsh, Alexander of Hales, Roger Bacon, John Peckham (archbishop of Canterbury), Duns Scotus, William of Wykeham, and in the 15th-16th centuries William Waynflete, Wolsey, Lily, Linacre, Grocyn, Colet, Norton, Warham, St. Thomas More, Cardinal Reginald Pole and many others. The period 1220-70 is considered by many to be the golden age of O., just as the period 1485-1525 is illustrious. The apostasy of Henry VIII was disastrous for O., for he prohibited the study of canon law, and under Edward VI (1547-53) some pretentious zealots of the "New Learning" plundered the libraries. Queen Mary (1553-58) did all she could to restore everything; but the Elizabethan persecution expelled the best pupils, as even some Protestants admit, both ancient, such as Peter Martyr (Vermigli), Jewel and Pilkington, and modern, such as Brodrick (1886), Gladstone (1892), etc. Among the exiles for the faith may be remembered William Allen (later cardinal), Robert Parsons, Gregory Martin, Richard Bristow, Thomas Harding, Thomas Stapleton and many others who took refuge at Louvain, Douai and Reims, refuting the Anglican polemical writers. During the Anglican persecution (1534-1681), the University gave the Church 63 martyrs, among them St. Thomas More, the Blessed Edmund Campion, John Storey, Cuthbert Mayne, Ralph Sherwin, John Roberts.

The University Library, established in the 13th century, was refounded by the great book collector Thomas Bodley in 1603 and is therefore known everywhere as "The Bodleian."

The University remained loyal under King Charles I, but suffered much during the civil wars (1641-49) and under the Commonwealth (1649-60). Under the Catholic king James II (1685-88) Holy Mass was freely celebrated in "University College," but when the King wished to introduce a Catholic president into "Magdalen College" the Anglican usurpers cried out against tyranny. After the revolution of 1688 the University went into decline; Christian indifference then reigned, though somewhat interrupted in the 18th century by the Methodism of John Wesley. In 1833 the O. Movement began, followed by many conversions to the Catholic Church. Lay students now have their chapel (oratory) with a resident chaplain (the present one is Mons.

V. Elwes; one of his predecessors was Mons. R. Knox). Among the illustrious converts of O. after 1870 may be remembered the Benedictines J. H. Chapman and Bede Camm, the Jesuit father G. G. Martindale, the laymen J. S. Phillimore and C. Dawson, Mons. R. Knox. Among Catholics may be remembered H. Belloc, Fr. Urquhart, Fr. de Zulueta. The University is rich in treasures of architecture, literature and manuscripts; although there is full liberty for Catholics, the tone of the University is secular.

Enrico G. Rope

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT

This is the name given to the attempt made in the 19th century at a Catholic revival within Anglicanism. Toward the end of the 18th century, the social and intellectual aristocracy of England, with very few exceptions, felt nothing but contempt for the Catholic religion. In such an environment, the Roman Church across the Channel was called "the little Italian mission" or "the little Irish mission." The cry "no popery" (no Pope) was common among the English of that time; as late as 1770, armed bands, fanaticized by that cry, had sacked and burned Catholic chapels. A few villages, in Sussex and along the coast, and some castles still preserved intact the faith of the period before the so-called Reformation.

In 1792 some bishops, 800 French priests and 600 nuns abandoned their own land, in which the Revolution had broken out, and sought hospitality in England. The welcome was unexpected: Anglican pastors and people gave the refugees proofs of exquisite charity and even had breviaries and Catholic Bibles printed for their use. The French priests spread throughout the Island and devoted themselves to the most varied works: they became tutors, opened schools, founded missions. The English and Irish Catholic priests seized the occasion to widen the range of their apostolic action. The example of the immigrant French clergy helped to bring down many prejudices. After the Concordat, most of them returned to their homeland, but some remained in England. In 1811, when J. H. Newman, a London boy of barely 10 years, arrived at the school of Ealing, there was still a French priest among the teachers. The influence of the immigrant clergy, the return of the intellectual part of the English clergy to the study of the Fathers of the Church as well as to scientific exegesis, and also the disgust that the Anglican clergy itself began to feel for the government's interference in spiritual matters, for incipient German criticism and the progressive weakening of religious life, all helped to prepare the movement of O., the Catholic renaissance within Anglicanism.

July 14 is, in Newman's own judgment, the birthday of this movement. It is the day on which John Keble, the most eminent of the fellows of Oriel College, delivered in St. Mary's at O., the Anglican church of the University, his discourse on national apostasy. It was a true cry of alarm that penetrated to the depths of souls and aroused an echo in the best part of the University of O. On Sept. 9 an anonymous writing of 3 pages was circulated among the public; it began thus: "To my brethren in the sacred ministry, priests and deacons of the Church of Christ in England." The writing was by Newman: "I must speak to you because these are sad times and no one raises his voice against them." This call to arms is the first of the Tracts for the Times, which then followed one another uninterruptedly for 12 years: from them derived the name "Tractarian" given at the beginning to the movement of O. The purpose of these anonymous writings was to restore to honor the Catholic dogmas and morals betrayed by Anglicanism. Their effect was prodigious. In 1835 Pusey devoted himself to them with great commitment: the Tracts became longer and more nourished with learning. Tract 90, the last, was published on Feb. 27, 1841. In it Newman demonstrated that the 39 Articles of Elizabeth, the Creed of the Anglican Church, although "the product of an anti-Catholic era, were in God's providential plan not entirely anti-Catholic, and indeed did not contradict the Council of Trent" and "could therefore be subscribed by those who aspired to Catholicism." On Oct. 9, 1845, Newman, in the solitude of Littlemore, returned to the true Church at the hands of Fr. Dominic of the Mother of God, Passionist. Of this conversion Disraeli later said: "It has given England such a shock that the whole of it still trembles."

On Sept. 29, 1850 Pius IX re-established the English Catholic hierarchy and named Wiseman (v.) cardinal archbishop of Westminster. On his arrival in London a riot was staged. But Wiseman's personal qualities served to transform hostile opinion in his own favor. In March 1851 Manning (v.) was converted, an Anglican pastor, a graduate of O. and an old friend of Newman. On Wiseman's death, he succeeded him as archbishop of Westminster.

Pusey, whose erudition was extraordinary, became more and more the center of the movement of O.: he showed himself opposed to individual conversions, made thus hastily, but was favorable to corporate union with Rome, which was the ultimate goal of the movement. Tractarianism was becoming Puseyism. In 1856, Dr. Lee, an Anglican clergyman, a graduate of O., shaken by Pusey's ideas, launched a journal with the title The union. It set out to favor union with the Holy See. The following year, Lee founded the Association for the promotion of the union of Christendom. Some Catholics joined this crusade of prayer. Lockhart distinguished himself in it and above all Ambrose Philipps. Despite the sympathy shown by Card. Wiseman, on Sept. 16, 1864, following certain incidents, the Holy Office condemned the A.P.U.C.; on Nov. 8, 1865, in response to the letter sent by 198 Anglican unionists, a second rescript of the Holy Office ratified the condemnation. The Association then remained composed of Anglicans only. From it, in 1877, came the Order of corporate reunion, founded by Dr. F. G. Lee. The latter requested episcopal consecration from Old Catholic bishops who undoubtedly possessed the apostolic succession. Two members of the O. C. R., the Rev. Moseman and Dr. Seccombe (some also add the name of G. Leycester Lyne) joined Lee and likewise received episcopal consecration from the same bishops. Lee and Moseman entered the Catholic Church shortly before their deaths. In Sept. 1865 Pusey had issued a writing entitled Eirenicon, the Church of England, part of the one, holy, catholic Church of Christ, and a means of re-establishing visible unity; in 1869 he published a second Eirenicon and a third in 1870. Unfortunately the definitions of the Vatican Council are presented in it to Anglicans in an exaggerated and inexact manner. Pusey too had to renounce any hope of union. He later wrote: "The majority of the Council has broken me; since then I have not touched any book of Roman controversy." Furthermore: "The Vatican Council has been the greatest sorrow of my life."

From 1870 to 1894 the Catholic revival continued across the Channel; but it is only in 1894 that a new concrete orientation toward union between Rome and Canterbury took shape, the supreme goal of the movement of O., which took from day to day the name of Anglo-Catholic movement. This concrete orientation, born from the meeting that took place in 1890 between a French Lazarist priest, M. Portal, and Lord Halifax, president of the English Church Union, after having aroused great hopes, despite the tenacious opposition of Card. Vaughan, had to suffer a halt in 1896. On Sept. 13 of the same year Leo XIII issued the bull Apostolicae curae on the invalidity of Anglican ordinations. The movement of O. did not however cease. In particular the reflowering of monastic life and the developments of scientific exegesis reached in Anglicanism, in the first half of the 20th century, a great development.

On 8 Aug. 1920 the English press published the Lambeth Appeal, signed by all the Anglican bishops, for the union of the Churches. Lord Halifax saw his dearest hopes reborn: with the help of the tireless M. Portal and under the direction of Card. Mercier he organized the Malines Conversations (v.) which took place from 9 Dec. 1921 to 12 Oct. 1926: a new attempt at rapprochement between Rome and Canterbury. On 1 Oct. 1933, in preparation for the centenary of the O. movement, 51 of the leaders of the contemporary Anglo-Catholic movement signed a Manifeste. From Feb. 1933 more than 359 new adhesions of Anglican clergymen came to be added to the previous ones. The purpose of the Manifeste was to draw attention to the deviation of Anglo-Catholicism and to retrace the true path marked out by Keble and Pusey in order to lead back those who had strayed from it.

Giacomo de Bivort de la Saudée