Albino Luciani, who became John Paul I, (and was later beatified), shared with St John Henry Newman’s inspiration, St Philip Neri, a very playful approach to preaching the Gospel. The Vatican, after the pope’s death, two months into his reign paid this moving and, in its phrasing, quite unique official tribute, by saying he was “…like a whirling comet…a flash of hope…a marvelous rainbow.” 

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The choice of such analogies would have intrigued Newman – as well as being applauded by him. One of his interests was astronomy, he built an observatory and always championed examples of using the gift of imagination in respect of religion.

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Newman and John Paul I kept their gaze, like St Philip’s own, heavenward. But  all three grounded their spirituality in humility and its linguistic connection to humour – which kept them earthed. The Oratorian watch-word is, after their founder, “love to be unknown”. Newman’s motto ‘heart speaks to heart’ embodies St Philip’s ideal. John Henry also had a great sense of fun too. While John Paul I chose as his papal motto “Humilitas”. He makes explicit the theological links between humour and humility in his first weekly catechetical address to the crowds gathered in Rome:

“When St Thomas Aquinas said Joking and making people smile was a virtue, he was in agreement with the “glad tiding” preached by Christ and the hilaritas recommended by St Augustine.  He overcame pessimism, clothed Christian life in joy and invited us to keep up our courage also with healthy, pure joys, which we meet on our way.” (General Audience, 20th September 1978).

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Newman, who with Aquinas is now the co-patron of education, is characterized by his friend Frederick Rogers, as seeming to have “…an intuitive perception of all that you thought and felt, so that he caught at once, all you meant or were driving at in a sentiment, a philosophical reflection, or a joke”. (Letters of Lord Blatchford, p14-15).

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Newman shares in the same instinctive grasp of holiness and the inner joy that John Paul I experiences when he writes:

Let us pray to be filled with the spirit of love.  Let us come to Church joyfully; let us partake the Holy Communion adoringly; let us pray sincerely; let us work cheerfully; let us suffer thankfully; let us throw our heart into all we think, say, and do; and may it be a spiritual heart! This is to be a new creature in Christ; this is to walk by faith. (Parochial and Plain Sermons V, 12).

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Newman would also agree with John Paul I’s synthesis of what mission means when he says that the principal ecclesial “task of divinizing does not exempt the Church from the task of humanizing.” The coming of Christ as one like us in all things but sin, reveals that God understands us from the inside and communicates with us through our conscience.  Newman taught that this encounter helps us identify right from wrong.  Then, in freedom, he says, we can prudently choose, using practical wisdom, how to apply the Church’s teaching, revealed by the Holy Spirit, to particular situations. By educating our conscience, through prayer and the sacraments, the closer we will unite ourselves with God. And become, more speedily, the most humane person he calls us to be. As Newman, with the energy of Christ-centred zeal, states:

In all circumstances, of joy or sorrow, hope or fear, let us aim at having Him in our inmost heart.  Let us acknowledge Him as enthroned within us at the very springs of thought and affection.  Let us submit ourselves to His guidance and sovereign direction.  Let us come to Him that He may forgive us, cleanse us, change us, guide us and save us. (Parochial and Plain Sermons V, 16).

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Newman’s words direct us to look through the telescope of salvation and locate the constellations of faith, hope and love. We, as the Christmas-Magi and Easter morning star-gazers, are enthused by St John Henry Newman and John Paul I to become what we see.