Margaret H. Turnham in her Catholic Faith and Practice in England 1779-1992 charts approximately 200 years of the diocese of Middlesbrough’s Catholic history that moves, she claims, from a Catholicism of ‘limited visibility’ to, by 1992, a ‘major denominational force’ (p. ix) with a ‘thriving network of school and churches’ (p. 1). This latter somewhat dubious claim, along with Turnham’s misleading title (this is a history of Middlesbrough diocese, not England) was a rather disconcerting beginning to a volume I had eagerly looked forward to reading. Turnham’s comprehensive study of Middlesbrough diocese is divided into five chronological sections: ‘A Quiet Faith’ (1778-1850); Faith and the Victorian City (1850-1878), Faith, Vision and the Mission (1879-1929), A Faith Secure? (1929-1963) and ending with the (inevitably it seems) ‘Faith in the Age of Doubt’ (1963-1992). It is a history grounded in the prism of Catholic devotion with the themes of ‘evangelicalism’, ‘revivalism’ and ‘renewal’ emphasised in each chapter. There is a comparative element, as part of the argument is evangelicalism was not just reserved for Protestants. This is a convincing argument though on occasion some assertions seem more based on personal opinion than historical evidence. For example Turnham notes Catholic singing of the hymn O Bread of Heaven ‘allowed Catholics to sing with as much passion and fervour as their Methodist neighbours sang the hymns of Charles Wesley’ (p. 79). How can we know this?

This is very much an institutional history of devotion, using primarily the rich Middlesbrough Diocesan Archives and thus, given the sources it is a top down approach which highlights instructions and intent rather than reception. It offers an important examination of a diocese, and its valuable primary sources such as visitation returns, correspondence, pastoral letters, almanacs and yearbooks which are amply cited. However, it is strangely under referenced with respect to secondary material. For example, Turnham includes a section on ‘Juvenile Holiness’ but does not cite John Sharp’s work, though it is included in the bibliography (p. 77). There are also general statements that seem based on supposition rather than historical evidence. Turnham writes that it was ‘self-evident’ that a ‘very aged priest’ would lead to ‘less devotional activity’ (p. 75), a rather unpersuasive statement given the influence of Pope Francis.

Given the diocesan sources, this is unsurprisingly a clergy-centred history, often crediting priests with the creation of evangelical and devotional culture. ‘Without a doubt’, Turnham notes, ‘priests were the most important resource that bishops had at their disposal’ (p. 90). In Hull, Englishman Reverend Michael Trappes (parish priest from 1848 to 1873) is recognised for making ‘the Catholic population in Hull an accepted and respected part of the community.’ (p. 64) Religious congregations are credited with being ‘catalysts for change’ (p. 67) but mostly as providers of institutional welfare or educators as Turnham claims they ‘did not have any direct influence on the provision of worship and devotion’ (p. 70). Though I appreciate the reasoning which causes Turnham to define devotions as being ‘derived from the Mass’ (p. 120), the work of Susan O’Brien and others have established that women religious played a vibrant, direct role in initiating devotional practices and evangelisation.

Turnham does reference Mary Heimann’s influential work on Catholic devotions, and highlights, as Heimann does, that revivalism and evangelicalism are useful to understanding devotions. However, she does not seem to engage directly with Heimann’s main premise: that devotions linked ‘Irish and English, old Catholics and converts, ultramontanes and liberals, effectively provid[ing] a common language’. Instead, for much of the book, Turnham seems to use these traditional categories to differentiate the separate strands of devotional culture in England. She consistently highlights ‘native’ English Catholicism with Ultramontane practices and Irish devotional practices. Then suddenly, in Chapter 3 Turnham acknowledges a devotional life that was a ‘synthesis of Old English Catholic, Ultramontane and old Irish practice’ (193), only to return in Chapter 4, to a focus on an ‘Irish form of Catholicism’ (194) that she argues dominates during and after the episcopate of Thomas Shine. This seems to indicate a reversal of this devotional synthesis in the twentieth century, for Middlesbrough, and by default, given the title of the book, for England also. Such an important point needs to be engaged with more explicitly.

Perhaps most problematic is the argument that only ‘native’ clergy understood the ‘native’ population. Turnham suggests that only English priests were appropriate for the English church. Foreign priests, be they Belgian, French or Irish, were ‘strangers’ to the diocese, ‘trained for a different situation’ (p. 91). Irish-born Bishop Richard Lacy (bishop 1879-1929) seems to be an exception as he was ‘not particularly interested in Catholicism being associated with Irishness’. Instead his focus was Catholicism as ‘the universal faith that it was’. Turnham applauds him for wanting priests to ‘emerge from the people’ (p. 91). It seems ‘the people’ were English, despite a large Irish Catholic population. The next Bishop of Middlesbrough, Irishman Thomas Shine (bishop 1929-1955) is unfavourably contrasted to Lacy as being one who ‘took his lead from Ireland rather than local and English tradition’ (p. 115). We are told his Irish seminary education and his immediate deployment to England indicated he was second-best as ‘the best’ remained in Ireland (p. 124). Irish Catholicism is depicted negatively: ‘by its nature [it] has always contained a strong puritanical element often described as Jansenist’ (p. 125). Shine’s Irishness, Turnham argues, spurred a change in devotional practice that prioritised the Irish population of Middlesbrough diocese (p. 123). Turnham critiques his importation of Catholic priests from Ireland as they received ‘limited training in the Irish seminaries’ leaving many ‘only able to catechise thereby leading to an atmosphere that was somewhat repressive’ (p. 152). He also promoted excessive (and unnecessary) church-building. Turnham argues Shine’s rejection of Englishness and England was especially evident when he chose to build churches in the Hiberno-Romanesque style (p. 134). These critiques of Irishness are troublesome on several levels. Turnham attributes devotional change to Shine’s Irishness, but we get no sense of how his practices compare with other dioceses or England as a whole. More problematically, throughout this monograph, but particularly in Chapter Four, there are uncomfortable inferences regarding the nature of Irish Catholicism that do not sit well with me.

Despite these reservations, Turnham does convincingly argue that evangelical zeal for the revitalisation of the Catholic faith was at the heart of focus of the diocese of Middlesbrough. The strength of this monograph is in the detailed chronicling of devotional culture. There is a need for more research into Catholic history that identifies place as a category of analysis. Though there is always a trade-off between a broad historical scope and analysis of micro-level situations, a longue durée focus can demonstrate continuities or discontinuities that are important to our understanding of the changing nature of Catholicism.