We had Mass in St. George’s Chapel at the Cathedral. Mass at these small side chapels is always more spiritually redolent. There can be no greater contrast between the lives of St. Thomas and St. John and that of Cardinal Newman [see below]. I could put up with Newman’s martyrdom of small disappointments, but I just know that in 1535 I would have gone with the flow and obeyed the king like everyone else. But are not the heroes of history crashing bores, impossible individuals, or just heroic?

Perhaps that’s why today’s gospel is particularly difficult for me.

Anyone who prefers Father or Mother to me is not worthy of me.
(Matt. 10:34-39)

There was also a meeting of the Catholic Union today, which I attended. The discussion of matters of public interest was good, but what really caught my attention was a paper circulating about the Pope’s visit and the life of Cardinal Newman. Newman’s life was one of lost friendships because of his conversion and constant disappointments. Most of his projects, such as a Catholic university, fell through. He once he of all people, asked himself if he had really ever achieved anything as a Catholic. So his life is valuable not just for the writings and his works which lend us a kindly light, but for his disappointments.