Newman named co-patron of Catholic education alongside St Thomas Aquinas

The Vatican has announced that Englishman Saint Cardinal John Henry Newman will join the great medieval theologian St Thomas Aquinas as an official co-patron of the Church’s educational mission.

The move coincides with the forthcoming proclamation that Newman will become the 38th Doctor of the Church, to be formally declared at the closing Mass of the Jubilee of the World of Education on 1 November.

The cardinal prefect of the Dicastery for Culture and Education revealed at a press conference that “the Pope will name St John Henry Newman ‘co-patron of the Church’s educational mission, alongside St Thomas Aquinas’.”

A papal document will also be published on 28 October to mark the 60th anniversary of the Second Vatican Council’s declaration Gravissimum Educationis on Christian education.

According to the announcement, the text honours a “spiritual and pedagogical heritage” that remains relevant in today’s world and warns that “history challenges us with a new urgency … rapid and profound changes expose children, adolescents, and young people to unprecedented vulnerabilities.”

The Pope adds that “it is not enough to preserve: we must relaunch” and calls on educators to “recompose knowledge and meaning, competence and responsibility, faith and life.”

The Jubilee itself runs from 27 October to 1 November and will gather around 20,000 pilgrims, culminating on the solemnity of All Saints when Newman is to be declared Doctor of the Church.

The Vatican estimates that Catholic schools and universities across 171 countries serve almost 72 million students. According to figures shared at the press conference, there are 230,000 Catholic universities and schools worldwide. The choice of Newman highlights his enduring influence on the philosophy of education, curricular development, and the integration of faith and reason.

Since St Thomas Aquinas was declared patron of all Catholic educational establishments by Pope Leo XIII in 1880, Newman’s appointment marks the first time in almost a century and a half that a new patron has been named.

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