Heythrop college can still be saved

Following the announcement in June that Heythrop College was to be closed in three years’ time, the view has started to crystallise that it is too important an institution to be allowed to go without a fight, and a rescue operation needs to be attempted. More than 30 notable academics from various disciplines, institutions and faith traditions signed a letter to The Times last week calling the proposed closure “a serious blow to theological, religious, and philosophical teaching and research in the UK”. The signatories, including the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, described the college as irreplaceable and a national asset. Clearly its reputation in the fields of philosophy and theology stretches far beyond the Catholic community in England and Wales.

There are also signs that there may be moves within the college itself to salvage something from the wreckage, though the factors that led the Society of Jesus to opt for closure are still formidable. The society has been supporting the college financially as well as providing its accommodation at the site in Kensington Square, west London. A number of Jesuits and members of other religious orders serve or have served on the academic staff at less than market rates of pay, but that hidden subsidy has declined in value as the composition of the academic staff has changed. The modern economics of university life, including the way academic courses are paid for, seem to have made Heythrop College unsustainable as a stand-alone institution. The last attempt to save Heythrop was made by St Mary’s University, Twickenham, which explored the possibilities of some sort of merger. Negotiations ceased when this solution appeared to be unviable.

Yet Heythrop’s success, a reflection of its Jesuit ethos and outlook, has been in showing how Christian theology, and philosophy studied in a Christian context, can be used to build bridges to a wide variety of other interests, from inter-faith relations to politics and the social sciences. One of the reasons for its strengths was the richness of its philosophical tradition which was both critiqued and nourished by its theological expertise. This symbiosis between disciplines made Heythrop almost unique, certainly in the very secular climate of most of the contemporary academic world. It enabled a serious conversation about ideas to be conducted with that secular world, and that is why its disappearance would create such a vacuum.

An important step forward would be for the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales to acknowledge as soon as possible that Heythrop’s existence is a major benefit to the whole community, and not just a problem within one religious order.

St Mary’s was not the only institution approached. Other universities were consulted but these too were unable to find a way forward. Nevertheless the search for potential partners must continue. Nor should it be confined to the United Kingdom – the Catholic “academy” is global. In short, there is all still to play for: it is much too soon to give up.