Heythrop College

Heythrop was originally a religious foundation, set up in 1614 by the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) to train its own members. It was originally in Louvain but quickly moved to Liège where it remained until 1794 when the College moved to Stonyhurst, Lancashire. A new College was built near St Asaph, in North Wales in 1848. The Society of Jesus acquired Heythrop Hall, Oxfordshire, in 1923. Heythrop College was set up as a 'Collegium Maximum' - a Roman title indicating a college a little short of university status and issued degrees of the Jesuit-run Gregorian University in Rome. It was opened to students, Aug 1926. In the 1960s a proposal was made for the College to become a 'Pontifical Athenaeum', an institution still rather less than a university, but a degree-granting body in its own right. For that purpose it needed to open its doors to students other than Jesuits, including lay people. This it did in 1965, with the approval of the Catholic bishops of England and Wales. Cardinal Heenan, Archbishop of Westminster, was installed as Chancellor of the new entity. Heythrop College became a constituent college of the University of London in October 1970 and moved to a new location in Cavendish Square. This allowed the College full integration within the British university system. With this move the College was self-governing and no longer a Jesuit institution. Nor was it any longer Roman Catholic. Nonetheless a large Jesuit presence remained, and the ethos continued to be Catholic. The College moved from Cavendish Square to Kensington Square in 1993 for financial reasons.