The Marian Turn in Newman's Idea of History

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This essay examines the degree to which Newman's gradual assent to Marian dogma strengthened the aesthetic and spiritual dimensions of his philosophy of history from the 1840s, onward. Derivatively, it considers how the most fitting place to discern Newman's meditative idea of history is in his literary and devotional writings and not only in his expositions on doctrine and catechesis. The essay concludes by proposing that Newman's meditative approach to the question of history is saturated by the Marian habit of attention, of pondering the things of life in the heart, and stands in marked (and redressive) contrast to the emerging philosophies of power politics that have come to characterize late modernity.