From Bossuet to Newman

To be asked to write an introduction to one's own book, which was written thirty years ago, is to be set no easy task. An author is aware how much has been written on the same theme since he published his book. He knows of those who agree with him and why they agree, and of those who doubt, and why they doubt. But the book is still cited in the many debates on the theme; the bibliography of the subject lengthens all the time; and people still ask for copies of the book. For the subject of Christian thought, changing in its expression through the movement of history and society, has become far more central to the debate even than it was in 1956–7. The relation of Christianity to history is seen to be entangled with questions about the truth of Christianity, and the various ways in which its faith is formed and formulated.

Catholicism had a special interest in the question; for it was, and is, particularly conscious of Christian continuity through the centuries since the New Testament. Protestants too, are conscious of that continuity. But since the Reformation, they have placed less emphasis upon it, and in very recent times it became a problem also to Protestants. Because Catholicism had a special interest, the figure of John Henry Newman grew in importance.