George Tyrrell: Difference between revisions

{{for-multi|the Union Army Medal of Honor recipient|George William Tyrrell|the British geologist and glaciologist|George Walter Tyrrell|the British mathematician, physicist, radio engineer and parapsychologist|George Nugent Merle Tyrrell}}

{{EngvarB|date=August 2014}}

{{Infobox Christian leader

| type = priest

}}

 

 

==Early life==

 

 

==Jesuit==

 

As early as 1882, his novice master suggested that Tyrrell withdraw from the Jesuits due to a "mental indocility" and a dissatisfaction with a number of Jesuit customs, approaches, and practices. Tyrrell was, however, allowed to remain. He later stated that he believed he was more inclined to the [[Benedictine]] spirituality.

After taking his first vows, Tyrrell was sent to [[Stonyhurst College]] to study philosophy as the first stage in his [[Jesuit formation]]. Having completed his studies at Stonyhurst, he next returned to the Jesuit school in Malta, where he spent three years teaching. He then went to [[St Beuno's Jesuit Spirituality Centre|St Beuno's College]], in Wales, to take up his theological studies. He was [[Holy Orders (Catholic Church)|ordained]] to the [[Priesthood (Catholic Church)|priesthood]] in 1891.

 

 

[[Pope Leo XIII]]'s 1879 encyclical ''[[Aeterni Patris]]'' had promoted the teaching of a [[Scholasticism|Scholastic philosophy]], based on the works of Saint [[Thomas Aquinas]], in Catholic schools and seminaries. Tyrrell admired Aquinas, but he rejected the Scholastic approach as inadequate. He became convinced that the Jesuits were not teaching the work of Aquinas himself, but rather the narrow interpretation of it introduced by Jesuit theologian [[Francisco Suárez]].

In 1896, Tyrrell was transferred to the Jesuit House on Farm Street in London.<ref name=Hurley>[http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20090714_1.htm Hurley, Michael, S.J. "George Tyrrell and John Sullivan: Sinner and Saint?", ''Thinking Faith'', 14 July 2009]</ref> There Tyrrell discovered the work of [[Maurice Blondel]]. He was also influenced by [[Alfred Loisy]]'s biblical scholarship. Tyrrell first met [[Friedrich von Hügel]] in October 1897 and they became close friends. Part of Tyrrell's work while at Farm Street was writing articles for the Jesuit periodical ''[[The Month]]''. He had the occasion to review some works by [[Wilfrid Ward]], and for a time, came to share Ward's view of moderate liberalism.

 

Between 1891 and 1906, Tyrrell published more than twenty articles in Catholic periodicals, many of them in the United States.<ref>[https://www.jstor.org/stable/25154819?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents Portier, William L. "George Tyrrell in America." ''U.S. Catholic Historian'', vol. 20, no. 3, 2002, pp. 69–95. JSTOR]</ref> In 1899 Tyrrell published ''A Perverted Devotion''. The article concerned the concept of [[hell]]. Given "the essential incapacity of finite mind to seize the absolute end which governs and moves everything towards itself",<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=g8Tf1pbnavQC&dq=George+Tyrrell&pg=PA434 Tyrrell, George. ''Life of George Tyrrell from 1884 to 1909'', Longmans, Green & Company, 1912, p. 118]{{PD-notice}}</ref> Tyrrell recognized that some subjects were matters of "faith and mystery". He "preferred to admit that the Christian doctrine of hell as simply a very great mystery, one difficult to reconcile with any just appreciation of the concept of an all-loving God".<ref>[https://archive.org/details/baronfriedrichvo0000barm/page/254 <!-- quote=Friedrich von Hügel. --> Barmann, Lawrence F., ''Baron Friedrich Von Hügel and the Modernist Crisis in England'', CUP Archive, 1972, p. 144] {{ISBN|9780521081788}}</ref> He argued that the rationalist approach of the Scholastics was not applicable to matters of faith. Although reviewed by a number of English Jesuits, including [[Herbert Thurston]], who found no fault with it, the Father General determined that it was "[[Theological censure|offensive to pious ears]]". Tyrrell was assigned to a small mission in [[Richmond, North Yorkshire|Richmond]], where he deeply appreciated the peace and quiet. In January 1901, he declined a re-assignment back to St. Helen's.

 

Tyrrell was critical both of the Catholic neo-Scholasticism and of the [[Liberal Christianity|Liberal Protestant]] scholarship of the day. In an often quoted attack on [[Adolf von Harnack]]'s approach to [[Biblical criticism]], Tyrrell wrote that "the Christ that Harnack sees, looking back through nineteen centuries of 'Catholic darkness', is only the reflection of a Liberal Protestant face, seen at the bottom of a deep well."<ref>George Tyrrell, ''Christianity at the Crossroads'' (1913 ed.), pg. 44</ref> On the other hand, Tyrrell advocated "the right of each age to adjust the historico-philosophical expression of [[Christianity]] to contemporary certainties, and thus to put an end to this utterly needless conflict between [[Faith in Christianity|faith]] and [[science]] which is a mere theological bogey."{{citation needed|date=August 2013}} In Tyrrell's view, the pope should not act as an autocrat but a "spokesman for the mind of the [[Holy Spirit (Christianity)|Holy Spirit]] in the Church".<ref name="Saunders 2011 p. 47">{{cite book | last=Saunders | first=F.S. | title=The Woman Who Shot Mussolini: A Biography | publisher=Henry Holt and Company | year=2011 | isbn=978-1-4299-3508-1 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2ZwGwBXd86UC&pg=PA47 | access-date=16 April 2018 | page=47}}</ref>

 

[[File:GeorgeTyrrell's gravestone.jpg|thumb|The stone erected at the grave of George Tyrrell]]

 

Asked in 1906 to repudiate his theories, Tyrrell declined and was dismissed from the Jesuits by [[Superior General of the Society of Jesus|Father General]] [[Franz X. Wernz]]. He was the only Jesuit to be expelled from the society in the twentieth century until a subsequent Father General, [[Pedro Arrupe]], expelled the Dutch priest [[Huub Oosterhuis]] in 1969. Modernism played a major role in both cases.

 

 

In his rebuttal of Pius X's encyclical, Tyrrell alleged that the Church's thinking was based on a [[theory of science]] and on a [[psychology]] that seemed as strange as [[astrology]] to the modern mind. Tyrrell accused ''Pascendi'' of equating Catholic doctrine with [[Scholastic theology]] and of having a completely naïve view of doctrinal development. He furthermore asserted that the encyclical tried to show the "modernist" that he was not a Catholic, but succeeded only in showing that he was not a Scholastic.<ref name=Rafferty/>

 

 

==Death==

 

 

==Selected writings==

* ''The Church and the Future'', The Priory Press, 1910

* ''Christianity at the Cross-Roads'', Longmans, Green and Co., 1910

* ''Essays on Faith and Immortality'', Edward Arnold, 1914

 

*{{cite EB1911|wstitle=Tyrrell, George|volume=27|pages=550–551}}

* Davies, Michael (1983). "The Sad Story of George Tyrrell", Ch. 13 of ''Partisans of Error: St. Pius X Against the Modernists''. Long Prairie, Minnesota: The Neumann Press.

* [[Ellen Leonard|Leonard, Ellen]] (1982) ''George Tyrrell and the Catholic Tradition'' New York: Paulist Press. {{ISBN|0809124246}}

* Maher, Anthony M. (2018). 'The Forgotten Jesuit of Catholic Modernism: George Tyrrell's Prophetic Theology.' Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press.

* Moore, J.F. (1920). [https://archive.org/stream/n1universitymag19mcgiuoft#page/172/mode/2up "The Meaning of Modernism,"] ''The University Magazine,'' Vol. XIX, No. 2, pp.&nbsp;172–178.

* [[Maude Petre|Petre, Maude]] (1912). ''Autobiography and Life of George Tyrrell''. London: E. Arnold.

* Ratté, John (1967). ''Three Modernists: Alfred Loisy, George Tyrrell, William L. Sullivan''. New York: Sheed & Ward.

*{{cite DNB12|wstitle=Tyrrell, George|first=James McMullen |last=Rigg}}

* Sagovsky, Nicholas (1990). ''On God's Side: A Life of George Tyrrell''. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

*{{cite ODNB|first=Nicholas|last=Sagovsky|title=Tyrrell, George (1861–1909)|id=36606}}

* Schultenover, David G. (1981). ''George Tyrrell: In Search of Catholicism''. Shepherdstown, West Virginia: Patmos Press.

* [[David F. Wells|Wells, David F.]] (1972). "The Pope as Antichrist: The Substance of George Tyrrell's Polemic," ''Harvard Theological Review,'' Vol. LXV, No. 2, pp.&nbsp;271–283.

==External links==

{{commons category|George Tyrrell}}

* {{Internet Archive author |sname=George Tyrrell}}