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Archbishop Paul Cullen was in Rome for almost a year to participate in the solemn definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. He was also there to defend his pro-government policy against Irish nationalists. While in Rome, he wrote to Newman to warn him to keep the university free of Young Irelandism. Newman did little to acknowledge this warning, rather, he assured Cullen of excluding politics in the institution. Cullen did not reply immediately. Instead, he wrote to Rome complaining of Newman's lack of practicality and wished that Newman not be made bishop until the university was properly established. Newman realised that Cullen blamed him for whatever went wrong in the university. Cullen assumed that Newman would leave the Birmingham Oratory or transfer it to Dublin. By the time Newman returned to Dublin, he had just heard of an alarming new development in the relations between the two Oratories.

John Henry Newman set off for Dublin on February 7, 1854 to start up the Catholic University of Ireland. His objective was to tour Ireland and visit the bishops to make enquiries on the state of the colleges and schools, at the same time advertising the University to potential students and teachers. The Catholic University of Ireland was formally set up on May 18, 1854. The university was established to propagate true learning in Irish Catholics. Newman was eventually installed as Rector by Archbishop Paul Cullen. Newman realised from the beginning that it was important that the professors should be distinguished and well known. This would later transcend in the establishment of a medical school which turned out to be the most successful institution in the University.

On April 15, 1851, Archbishop Paul Cullen of Armagh wrote to Newman for his advice on the appointment of staff for the new Catholic University of Ireland, and also to ask if he “could spare time to give a few lectures on education”. Newman's initial response was non-committal. The origins of the new university started when Sir Robert Peel successfully moved his bill to establish a secular and non-denominational “Queen's University of Ireland”. This would provide an alternative to Anglican Trinity College in Dublin. Only a minority of the Irish bishops approved of the plan for such “mixed-education”. Rome forbade the Irish Church to pursue such a university and insisted on using Louvain in Belgium as the model for establishing a Catholic university. Newman, in turn, proposed that this would be the Catholic University of the English tongue.