FROM THE ARCHIVE
50 YEARS AGO
While university – not to mention grammar,
public and comprehensive – education has
been much in the public eye of late, five
educational establishments have been quietly but sturdily growing, away from the
limelight though none the worse for that.
These are the five residential working men’s
and women’s colleges, which have just
launched a big appeal. Founded at the end
of the last century and the beginning of
this, they were led by Ruskin, the working
men’s college at Oxford, which was inaugurated in 1899: this was followed by the
Fircroft College for Men in Birmingham
(1909), Hillcroft College for Women at
Surbiton in 1920, the Catholic Workers’
College at Oxford in 1920, and Coleg
Harlech in Wales in 1927. Though the total
number of students attending these colleges, where one- and two-year courses are
the general rule, is a modest 500 at the
moment, this is a great increase on former
numbers, and the successes are far more
numerous than the numbers might warrant. This is put down to the fact that the
tuition in all the colleges is very good. In
fact some people hold that they give the
best liberal arts courses in Britain, because
their tutorial system enables students to
get more individual attention than in most
universities: each student receives one
hour’s tutorial on his own each week.
The Tablet, 14 March 1964
100 YEARS AGO
Letter from W.F. Arbuthnot:
I venture to trespass on your hospitality to
air a grievance affecting a large number of
Catholics employed in our hotels. These –
whether waiters, chambermaids or kitchen
hands – are rarely able to hear Mass on
Sundays. Managers may be willing that
Catholic members of their staffs should
attend Mass more regularly: but the chief
hindrance, I gather, is that the employees
themselves hesitate to ask permission, lest
inconvenience may be caused to their fellow
workers, or dismissal for themselves ensue.
Would it not be possible to approach hotel
managers and urge them to give express
permission that such members of their staff
as are Catholics may attend Mass on
Sundays, and allow the exhibition of printed
cards in the staff quarters, giving this permission and stating the hours of the Sunday
Masses at the nearest church? To inaugurate the work, it would be well to hold a
meeting of hotel managers to discuss this
problem and suggest the best means of
dealing with it. I hope, however, the publicity which your paper kindly affords will
bring some useful suggestions before such
a meeting is convened; for hotel managers
are busy men and have not time to waste.
The Tablet, 14 March 1914
38
| THE TABLET |
15 March 2014
Obituary
Daniel J. Harrington SJ
W
hen asked once what got him out slow of tongue”) and thought, if God helped
of bed every morning, Daniel (Dan) Moses, maybe God would help him. Through
Harrington answered: “The Bible!” training Harrington’s speech became more
Through his writing and teaching, fluid, but whenever he would stutter his
Harrington, who died last month, made it thoughts returned immediately to Moses and
his mission to share the fruits of his research. to that moment when he began to believe
Preaching to 800 mourners at his funeral on through the Scriptures that he could be a priest
12 February, Thomas Stegman SJ, associate and a teacher. When he became sick and was
professor of the New Testament at Boston less and less able to write, he still taught. Even
College, Massachusetts, said: “It is no exag- as he was dying, he Skyped two final lectures
geration to say he knew more about what to a class of graduate students transfixed by
goes on in New Testament studies than any- his dedication and extraordinary talent.
one in the world.”
Four basic concerns often accompanied
As editor of Boston College’s publication Harrington’s teaching of the Bible. He wanted
New Testament Abstracts, a post he held from us to appreciate the Jewish context of the
1972 until three months before his death, New Testament and to see that Scripture had
Harrington wrote a phenomenal 50,000 sum- to be the foundation of all aspects of theology.
maries of articles related to New Testament But he also wanted both his students to witstudies and another 20,000 book reviews. He ness to the collaborative nature of biblical
was also the general editor of the Sacra Pagina, scholarship and his colleagues to recognise
the first full-scale Catholic biblical commentary the importance of building bridges between
in English, comprising 18 volumes.
scholarly and more popular interpretations
As chronicler and editor he was also author of Scripture.
of more than 60 books and several hundred
I was a student at Weston and later returned
articles. For 50 years, biblical theologians and there to teach. About 15 years ago, Harrington
their students worldwide would come to know taught a course on New Testament Ethics
through Harrington’s work who was respond- and midway through the semester, he dropped
ing to Dei Verbum’s summons that “access to by my office to hand me his syllabus and asked
sacred Scriptures ought to be open wide to what article I would add to his reading list.
the Christian faithful” (22).
I suggested an article by the social
More than his writing,
historian Peter Brown, on how
Harrington is best remembered
early Christians received and lived
for his teaching and preaching.
the Scriptures. Harrington liked
He taught at Weston Jesuit School
the suggestion and invited me to
of Theology in Cambridge,
teach with him in the future: he
Massachusetts, from 1972-2008
would provide the exegesis and I
and then at the School of Theology
would speculate about the ethical
and Ministry at Boston College
application to ordinary life.
from 2008 to 2013. His classes
Over the course of 15 years we
‘His classes
were always large and extraordifirst taught the Synoptic Gospels
were always and virtue ethics, then Paul and
narily popular: he made the
Scriptures and their commenpopular: he virtue ethics, and last spring, for
taries accessible. He presided at
the first time, John and virtue
made the
the Sunday 5 p.m. Mass in his
ethics. Through the years I worked
Scriptures
home parish, St Agnes in
with a simple, humble, brilliant,
Arlington, for 43 years and the
dedicated man. Like the many who
and their
Sunday noon Mass at St Peter’s commentaries mourn him, I will miss him dearly.
in Cambridge for 22 years.
James Keenan
accessible’
In an interview in 2009,
Harrington recalled a childhood
Fr Daniel Harrington SJ, New
memory when a number of family friends Testament scholar, born Arlington,
were at his home one evening, talking about Massachusetts, 19 July 1940; died Weston,
the Bible, and his mother kindly reminded Massachusetts, 7 February, 2014.
her guests that as Roman Catholics they did
not read it. Nevertheless, Harrington began ■ James F. Keenan SJ is Founders Professor
to read the Bible at an early age.
of Theology at Boston College. Together
In a recently published oral history inter- with Daniel Harrington he wrote: Jesus and
view, Harrington he tells the story of how he Virtue Ethics: building bridges between New
had a stutter as a boy and, because of it, Testament studies and moral theology
thought that he could never become a priest (Rowman and Littlefield, 2002); Paul and
or a teacher. Then one day he read in the news- Virtue Ethics: building bridges between New
paper that Moses had a stutter as well. He Testament studies and moral theology
found Exodus 4:10 (“I am slow of speech and (Rowman and Littlefield, 2010).