View source for George Tyrrell

{{Short description|Irish Jesuit priest (1861–1909)}}
{{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}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2024}}
{{Infobox Christian leader
| type               = priest
| honorific_prefix   = [[The Reverend]]
| name               = George Tyrrell
| honorific_suffix   = [[Society of Jesus|SJ]]
| image              = George Tyrrell (1861-1909).jpg
| birth_date         = {{Birth date|1861|02|06|df=y}}
| birth_place        = [[Dublin]], [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland]]
| death_date         = {{Death date and age|1909|07|15|1861|02|06|df=y}}
| death_place        = [[Storrington]], United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
| occupation         = {{hlist | Priest | theologian | scholar}}
| ordination         = 1891
| religion           = [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]], [[Latin Church]]
}}

'''George Tyrrell''' {{post-nominals|post-noms=[[Society of Jesus|SJ]]}} (6 February 1861 – 15 July 1909) was an [[Anglo-Irish people|Anglo-Irish]] [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] priest and a highly controversial theologian and scholar.  A convert from [[Anglicanism]], Tyrrell joined the [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit order]] in 1880. His attempts to adapt [[Catholic theology]] to modern culture and science made him a key figure in the controversy over [[modernism in the Catholic Church]] that flared up in the late 19th century. During the anti-modernist crusade led by [[Pope Pius X]], Tyrrell was expelled from the Jesuit Order in 1906 and [[Excommunication|excommunicated]] in 1908.

==Early life==
George Tyrrell was born on 6 February 1861 in the city of [[Dublin]]. His father William Tyrrell, a journalist and sub-editor of the ''[[Dublin Evening Mail]]'', died shortly before George's birth.  The Tyrrells belonged to the [[Protestant Ascendancy]] in [[Ireland]] and were intellectually distinguished.  George was a first cousin of the classicist [[Robert Yelverton Tyrrell]], who became [[Regius Professor of Greek (Dublin)|Regius Professor of Greek]] at [[Trinity College, Dublin]]. A childhood accident resulted in George eventually becoming deaf in the right ear.<ref name=autob>[https://books.google.com/books?id=mJSTWxigFEIC&dq=George+Tyrrell&pg=PA143 Tyrrell, George. ''Autobiography of George Tyrrell, 1861-1884'', Longmans, Green & Company, 1912, p. 33]{{PD-notice}}</ref> The family had to move repeatedly due to the financial straits in which it fell after the death of George's father.

George was brought up as an [[Anglican]] and around 1869 he attended [[Rathmines School]], near Dublin. He was educated from 1873 at [[Midleton College]], an institution affiliated with the [[Church of Ireland]], but his mother had difficulty affording the fees and he left early. In 1876–77, he studied privately in the hopes of earning a scholarship to study [[Hebrew]] at Trinity College, but he failed the required examination twice, much to the distress of his mother.  Around 1877 he met [[Robert Dolling]], an [[Anglo-Catholicism|Anglo-Catholic]] priest who had a strong influence on him. In August 1878, Tyrrell took a teaching post at [[Wexford]] High School, but in October he matriculated at Trinity College, on the advice of Dolling, hoping to train for the Anglican ministry.<ref name=autob/>

==Jesuit==
In the spring of 1879, at Dolling's invitation, Tyrrell went to London to work for the [[Saint Martin's League]], a sort of mission that Dolling was organizing. On [[Palm Sunday]], Tyrrell wandered into [[St Etheldreda's Church, London|St Etheldreda's]], a Catholic church on [[Ely Place]].  He was powerfully struck by the Catholic Mass, about which he would say in his autobiography: "Here was the old business, being carried on by the old firm, in the old ways; here was continuity, that took one back to the catacombs."<ref name=autob/>  He converted and was [[Catholicisation|received into the Catholic Church]] in 1879. He immediately applied to join the [[Society of Jesus]], but the provincial superior advised him to wait a year. He spent the interim teaching at Jesuit schools in [[Cyprus]] and [[Malta]].<ref name=Rafferty>[http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20090706_1.htm Rafferty, Oliver, S.J. "George Tyrrell and Catholic Modernism", ''Thinking Faith'' 6 July 2009]</ref> He joined the Jesuits in 1880 and was sent to the novitiate at [[Parkstead House|Manresa House]].

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.

After a brief period of pastoral work in Lancashire, Tyrrell returned to Roehampton for his [[Tertianship]]. In 1893, he lived briefly at the Jesuit mission house in Oxford, before taking up pastoral work at [[St Helens, Merseyside|St Helens]], Merseyside, where he was reportedly happiest during his time as a Jesuit. A little over a year later, he was sent to teach philosophy at Stonyhurst.  Tyrrell then began to have serious conflicts with his superiors over the traditional Jesuit approach to teaching philosophy.<ref name=Rafferty/>

[[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 centuries later by Jesuit theologian [[Francisco Suárez]] (see [[Neo-scholasticism]]).

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.

==Modernist controversy==
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>

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

Tyrrel's Jesuit superiors ordered him in 1906 to repudiate his modernist theses.  Tyrrell refused to do so and was consequently dismissed from the Jesuits by [[Superior General of the Society of Jesus|Father General]] [[Franz X. Wernz]]. He was the only Jesuit expelled from the society in the 20th century until a subsequent Father General, [[Pedro Arrupe]], expelled the Dutch priest [[Huub Oosterhuis]] in 1969.

With the explicit condemnation of modernism by [[Pope Pius X]], first in the decree ''[[Lamentabili sane exitu]]'' of July 1907 and then in the encyclical ''[[Pascendi dominici gregis]]'' of September 1907, Tyrrell's fate was sealed.  Tyrrell wrote two letters to ''[[The Times]]'' in which he strongly criticized that encyclical.<ref name=Hurley/>  Tyrrell alleged that the Pope's thinking was based on a [[Philosophy of science|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 [[Scholasticism|Scholastic theology]] and of having a completely naïve view of doctrinal development. He furthermore asserted that the encyclical tried to show that the "modernist" was not a Catholic, but succeeded only in showing that he was not a Scholastic.<ref name=Rafferty/>

For his public rejection of ''Pascendi'', Tyrrell was deprived of the sacraments in what [[Peter Amigo]], the [[Archbishop of Southwark|Bishop of Southwark]], characterized as "a minor [[excommunication]]".<ref>[http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article28830686 "The Pope and Modernism"], Father Tyrrell's Articles, at ''The West Australian'' (Perth, WA), 2 November 1907, p. 2. Also available at [http://newspapers.nl.sg/Digitised/Article/easterndaily19071105-1.2.2.aspx Eastern Daily Mail and Straits Morning Advertiser, 5 November 1907, page 1].</ref>  Unlike his contemporary the French modernist theologian [[Alfred Loisy]], Tyrrell was never tried by the [[Index Librorum Prohibitorum|Congregation of Index]] or by the [[Holy Office of the Inquisition|Holy Office]]. His case was always in the hands of the [[Cardinal Secretary of State]], [[Rafael Merry del Val]], who worked closely with Bishop Amigo.<ref>{{cite book | chapter-url=http://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-239-0/002 | doi=10.30687/978-88-6969-239-0/002 | chapter=Pius X, Merry del Val and the cases of Alfred Loisy and George Tyrrell | title=Le pontificat romain dans l'époque contemporaine &#124; the Papacy in the Contemporary Age | series=Studi di storia | year=2018 | last1=Arnold | first1=Claus | volume=5 | isbn=978-88-6969-256-7 | s2cid=188218619 }}</ref>

==Death==
Tyrrell's last two years were spent mainly in [[Storrington]].  He suffered from chronic [[nephritis]] (known by physicians at the time as "[[Bright's disease]]") and became increasingly ill.  He was given [[extreme unction]] on his deathbed in 1909, but as he refused to abjure his modernist views he was denied burial in a Catholic cemetery.<ref>Fergus Kerr, ''Twentieth-Century Catholic Theologians'' (Blackwell, 2007, p. 5)</ref>  A priest, his friend [[Henri Brémond]], was present at the burial and made a [[sign of the cross]] over Tyrrell's grave, which resulted in Bishop Amigo temporarily suspending Fr. Brémond ''[[interdict|a divinis]]''.<ref>[http://www.sofn.org.uk/DOCTRINE/catholic_modernism.htm SOFN.org] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050429015315/http://www.sofn.org.uk/DOCTRINE/catholic_modernism.htm |date=29 April 2005 }}</ref>

==Selected writings==
* ''Nova et Vetera: Informal Meditations'', 1897
* [https://archive.org/details/hardsayings00tyrruoft ''Hard Sayings: A Selection of Meditations and Studies''], Longmans, Green & Co., 1898
* [https://archive.org/details/externalreligion00tyrruoft ''External Religion: Its Use and Abuse''], B. Herder, 1899
* ''The Faith of the Millions'' 1901
* ''Lex Orandi: or, Prayer & Creed'', Longmans, Green & Co., 1903
* ''Lex Credendi: A Sequel to Lex Orandi'', Longmans, Green & Co., 1906
* [https://archive.org/details/throughscyllacha00tyrriala ''Through Scylla and Charybdis: or, The Old Theology and the New''], Longmans, Green & Co., 1907<ref>{{cite journal|journal=The Athenaeum|date=5 October 1907|issue=4171|title=Review of ''Through Scylla and Charybdis: or, the Old Theology and the New'' by George Tyrrell|pages=395–396|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=__I_PcOFSw8C&pg=PA395}}</ref>
* [https://archive.org/details/muchabusedletter00tyrr ''A Much-Abused Letter''], Longmans, Green, and Co., 1907
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=yKwzAQAAIAAJ ''Medievalism: A Reply to Cardinal Mercier''], Longmans, Green, and Co. 1908
* ''The Church and the Future'', The Priory Press, 1910
* ''Christianity at the Cross-Roads'', Longmans, Green and Co., 1910
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=mJSTWxigFEIC ''Autobiography and Life of George Tyrrell''], Edward Arnold, 1912<ref>{{cite journal|title=Review of ''Autobiography and Life of George Tyrrell''|journal=The Athenaeum |issue=4436|date=2 November 1912|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=px9Y0BOY-QMC&pg=PA509|pages=509–510}}</ref>
* ''Essays on Faith and Immortality'', Edward Arnold, 1914

'''Articles'''
* [http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=chi.74886816;view=1up;seq=169 "The Clergy and the Social Problem,"] ''The American Catholic Quarterly Review'', Vol. XXII, 1897.
* [http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=chi.74886816;view=1up;seq=648 "The Old Faith and the New Woman"], ''The American Catholic Quarterly Review'', Vol. XXII, 1897.
* [http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=chi.74886878;view=1up;seq=566 "The Church and Scholasticism"], ''The American Catholic Quarterly Review'', Vol. XXIII, 1898.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Chappell, Jonathan W. (2018). "Beyond 'The Warfare of Science with Theology': George Tyrrell's Plea for Epistemic Humility," ''Science and Christian Belief'', Vol 30, No 1., pp.&nbsp;3–37.
*{{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.
* [[William Inge (priest, born 1860)|Inge, William Ralph]] (1919). [https://archive.org/stream/outspokenessaysf00ingeuoft#page/136/mode/2up "Roman Catholic Modernism."] In: ''Outspoken Essays.'' London: Longmans, Green & Co., pp.&nbsp;137–171.
* [[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.
* May, J. Lewis (1932). ''Father Tyrrell and the Modernist Movement''. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode.
* 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.
* Rafferty, Oliver P. (ed.) (2010). ''George Tyrrell and Catholic Modernism''. Dublin: Four Courts Press, {{ISBN|978-1-846-82236-0}}.
* 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}}
* Root, John D. (1977). "English Catholic Modernism and Science: The Case of George Tyrrell," ''The Heythrop Journal,'' Vol. XVIII, No. 3, pp.&nbsp;271–288.
* 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}}
* Savage, Allan (2012). ''The "Avant-Garde" Theology of George Tyrrell: Its Philosophical Roots Changed My Theological Thinking''. (CreateSpace.com)
* 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.
* Wells, David F. (1979). ''The Prophetic Theology of George Tyrrell''. Chico, CA: Scholars Press.
* Utz, Richard (2010). "Pi(o)us Medievalism vs. Catholic Modernism: The Case Of George Tyrell." In: ''The Year's Work in Medievalism'', Vol. XXV. Eugene, Or.: Wipf & Stock Publishers, pp.&nbsp;6–11.

==External links==
{{commons category|George Tyrrell}}
* {{Gutenberg author |id=3326| name=George Tyrrell}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=George Tyrrell}}

{{Modernism in the Catholic Church}}
{{History of Catholic theology}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tyrrell, George}}
[[Category:1861 births]]
[[Category:1909 deaths]]
[[Category:Catholicism-related controversies]]
[[Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism]]
[[Category:Dissident Roman Catholic theologians]]
[[Category:Former Jesuits]]
[[Category:Irish Anglicans]]
[[Category:19th-century Irish Roman Catholic theologians]]
[[Category:Christian clergy from Dublin (city)]]
[[Category:19th-century Irish Jesuits]]
[[Category:People educated at Midleton College]]
[[Category:People excommunicated by the Catholic Church]]
[[Category:Modernism in the Catholic Church]]
[[Category:People from Storrington]]
[[Category:20th-century Irish Roman Catholic theologians]]