In this conversation with David Deavel, we take up Newman’s understanding of liberal learning, including the role of interpersonal dialogue, Newman’s distinction between the university principle and the collegiate principle, and common misunderstandings of Newman’s Idea of a University.  Finally, we consider the relation between the Catholic university and the Church and the role of ‘letters’ in forming the imagination of undergraduates.

Links of potential interest:

“25 Years: Logos and My Catholic Life”

Solzhenitsyn and American Culture: The Russian Soul in the West

David Deavel at the Imaginative Conservative:

Trouble with a capital ‘T’

Newman, The Idea of University

Newman, The Grammar of Assent

Paul Shrimpton, The 'Making of Men'. The Idea and Reality of Newman's university in Oxford and Dublin

Christopher O. Blum, “The Promise of Newman’s Collegiate Ideal”