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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 February 2015
The career of John Carmel Heenan (1905–1975) tends to be remembered for the period of his tenure as Archbishop of Westminster. This was a difficult time for Heenan, who having lived and ministered in an unchanging Church for over sixty years, took up the appointment in September 1963, at a time of rapid and unprecedented change in the Catholic Church in England and Wales following Vatican II. Contemporary commentators naturally gravitated to to the problems he faced in Westminster. Inevitably, in reviews rather than full-scale biographies, historians have concentrated on this later phase of his life. This paper examines one of Heenan's earlier achievements, that of his role of Superior of the Catholic Missionary Society from 1947 to 1951, and shows how his talents were placed at the disposal of the post-war Catholic community in an attempt to recover lapsed Catholics and attract converts to the faith.
1 Hastings, A., A History of English Christianity 1920–1985 (London: Collins, 1986), pp. 561–579.Google Scholar
2 See, for example, Schofield, N. and Skinner, G., The English Cardinals (Oxford: Family Publications, 2007), pp. 211–215.Google Scholar
3 See Arundel to Zabi.
4 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 197–198; Hagerty, J., Cardinal Hinsley: Priest and Patriot (Oxford: Family Publications, 2008), pp. 211–212.Google Scholar Doubleday expressed his concern to Bishop Amigo of Southwark at Hinsley's attempts to take Heenan to Westminster. Doubleday to Amigo, 4 September 1936. Brentwood Diocesan Archives, F3, Heenan, J.
5 See Arundel to Zabi.
6 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 299; For Better and for Worse, pp. 153, 157; Dwyer, J.J., ‘The Catholic Press, 1850–1950’ in The English Catholics, p. 510.Google Scholar
7 The Catholic Who's Who (1940), p. 143.
8 Acta, 25 October 1938.
9 Acta, 18–19 April 1939.
10 Not the Whole Truth, p. 290.
11 Dudley to Marshall, 18 November 1944. Salford Diocesan Archives, Catholic Missionary Society, Box 186.
12 Griffin to Downey, 4 October 1946. Archdiocese of Liverpool Archives, Downey Collection, SI/II/B/74; Not the Whole Truth, p. 290.
13 Acta, 15–16 April 1947.
14 Not the Whole Truth, p. 290–291.
15 The Catholic Gazette, October 1947.
16 Heenan to Dudley, 11 May 1947. AAW, CMS, 41.
17 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 293–294.
18 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 296–297.
19 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 298–299.
20 The Tablet, 14 February 1948.
21 Not the Whole Truth, pp.300–303; Time, 12 June 1950.
22 Catholic Directory (1947), p.754; Gwynn, D., ‘Growth of the Catholic Community’ in The English Catholics, pp. 432–433.Google Scholar
23 Craven to Heenan, 12 December 1947. AAW, CMS, 41.
24 Heenan to parish priests, November 1947. AAW, CMS, 41; Not The Whole Truth, p. 291.
25 The Catholic Gazette, October 1947.
26 Not the Whole Truth, p. 291.
27 Quoted in Kenny, A., A Path From Rome (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1985), p. 55.Google Scholar
28 Not The Whole Truth, pp. 291, 308–309.
29 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 291–292, 304; The Catholic Gazette, November 1947; Arundel to Zabi.
Fr Thompson died in 1948 while still serving with the CMS.
30 The Catholic Gazette, Nov. 1948; For Better and for Worse, pp. 154, 158, 162.
31 The Tablet, 15 November 1975. Taken from Dwyer's panegyric at Heenan's Requiem Mass.
32 See The Catholic Gazette, November 1947 and subsequent issues.
33 Taylor, E.K., ‘The CMS’ in The Clergy Review, vol. xliii (October 1958), p. 603.Google Scholar
34 For Better and for Worse, p. 154.
35 The Catholic Gazette, February 1948.
36 For Better and for Worse, pp. 160–161.
37 The Catholic Gazette, April 1948.
38 The Catholic Gazette, March, May and August 1948.
39 The Catholic Gazette, May 1948.
40 Dudley to Marshall, 18 November 1944. Salford Diocesan Archives, Catholic Missionary Society, Box 186.
41 Catholic Herald, 21 May, 1948.
42 The Catholic Gazette, October 1948 and January 1949.
43 Acta, 19–20 October 1948; The Catholic Gazette, January1949; Not The Whole Truth, p. 309.
44 Not the Whole Truth, p. 311.
45 The Catholic Gazette, November 1949; Not The Whole Truth, pp. 310–311.
46 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 309–310.
47 Time, 9 May 1949.
48 Rockett, J., Held In Trust: Catholic Parishes in England and Wales 1900–1950 (London: The Saint Austin Press, 2001), pp. 149–150.Google Scholar For a history of the Canning Town parish see Johnson, M. and Foster, S., The Catholic Parish of St Margaret and All Saints, Canning Town, London E16, 1859–2009 (Brentwood: Brentwood Diocesan Archives, 2009).Google Scholar On 22 August 1949, Heenan attended the laying of the foundation stone of the new St Helen's Primary School, Canning Town, in the company of the American Mgr (later Archbishop) Fulton Sheen, another prominent evangelist.
49 The Catholic Gazette, March and April 1949.
50 Not the Whole Truth, p. 320; Acta, 18–19 April 1950.
51 The Catholic Gazette, January 1950.
52 The Catholic Gazette, May 1950.
53 As a result of these retreats, Heenan produced his best-selling manual The People's Priest, published in 1951.
54 The Catholic Gazette, January, March and April 1950; Drumm, W., The Old Palace: The Catholic Chaplaincy at Oxford (Dublin: Veritas, 1991), p. 95.Google Scholar
55 Dwyer, J.J., ‘The Catholic Press, 1850–1950’ in The English Catholics, p. 510.Google Scholar
56 Hughes, T.O., Winds Of Change: Roman Catholics and Society in Wales, 1916–1962 (Cardiff: International Books, 1999), p. 47.Google Scholar The Redemptorist Fr James Riordan later told Dwyer that Heenan's open air approach was ‘not the right one’. Riordan to Dwyer, 26 March 1954. AAW, CMS, 41.
57 Riordan to Dwyer, 26 March 1954. AAW, CMS, 41.
58 The Catholic Gazette, May 1949.
59 The Catholic Gazette, March 1951.
60 The Tablet, 23 September 1950.
61 The Catholic Who's Who (1952), p. 388; Ripley, F.J., ‘The Conversion of England’ in The Clergy Review, New Series, vol. xxxvii, no. 4, April 1952.Google Scholar
62 Beck, G.A., ‘Today and Tomorrow’ in The English Catholics, p. 611.Google Scholar
63 The Catholic Gazette, September 1948.
64 Ripley, ‘The Conversion of England’ in The Clergy Review, New Series, vol. xxxvii, no. 4, April 1952.
65 Catholic Herald, 16 April 1948
66 The Universe, 31 January 1948.
67 The Tablet, 5 February 1949.
68 The Catholic Gazette, February 1949.
69 The Tablet, 2 July 1949.
70 The Catholic Gazette, June 1949.
71 Holland, T., ‘The Council Comes of Age’ in Stacpoole, A. (ed.), Vatican II by Those Who Were There (London: Continuum, 1986), pp. 52, 60.Google Scholar See also Bliss, F., Anglicans in Rome, (Norwich: Canterbury Press, 2006), p. 34.Google Scholar Frs Willebrands and Boyer were to become prominent in the developing ecumenical movement.
72 Not the Whole Truth, pp. 323–324.
73 The Catholic Gazette, March 1951.
74 Heenan, J.C., A Crown of Thorns (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1994), pp. 12–14.Google Scholar
75 Heenan, A Crown of Thorns, pp. 15–16.
76 See, for example, Aspden, K., Fortress Church (Leominster: Gracewing, 2002), p. 262.Google Scholar Aspden makes no mention of the CMS.
77 Not the Whole Truth, p. 320.
78 See Arundel to Zabi. Five of the Hierarchy—Griffin, Masterson, Ellis, Grimshaw and Rudderham—together with Archbishop Godfrey were alumni of the English College, Rome.
79 The Catholic Gazette, March 1951.
80 The Universe, 16 February 1951.
81 Statistics taken from the Catholic Directory (1948–1952)
82 Fr Osmund Jackson OSB of Ampleforth Abbey ascribed his choice of the monastic life to his attendance at the CMS retreat given by Heenan at Oxford University in 1950. Jackson was a recent convert. See www.plantata.org.uk
In 2003 the Catholic Missionary Society was disbanded and its assets transferred to the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales. It became the Catholic Agency to Support Evangelization and took over the work of the Catholic Enquiry Office.