Joseph Pearce
Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie ;;;fot.
The Forty Martyrs of England and Wales were canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1970. Although they laid down their lives for the Faith over a period of almost 150 years, the first being executed under Henry VIII in 1535 and the last under Charles II in 1679, very few of them are household names, even in England.
Perhaps the only one who is widely known is Edmund Campion. In this sense, each of these martyrs deserves a place among the unsung heroes of Christendom. We will focus, however, on the three women in their number, one of whom might be almost as well-known as Edmund Campion, whereas the other two will probably be unknown even to devout Catholics.
Let’s begin with Margaret Clitherow, the best known of the three. Born in the ancient city of York sometime between 1553 and 1556, she became the wife of a wealthy butcher and the mother of three children. As early as 1576, she was imprisoned for her refusal to attend the services of the state-imposed Anglican religion. The records indicate that she was pregnant at the time.
For the next ten years, she would provide a safe refuge for priests in her home in the knowledge that harboring a priest was punishable by death. Years later, awaiting her execution, she would show that resolution that was the hallmark of the English Martyrs. “I confess death is fearful and flesh is frail,” she said, “yet I mind by God’s assistance to spend my blood in this faith as willingly as ever I put my paps into my children’s mouths.”
The slow and tortuously cruel death by hanging, drawing, and quartering—the fate of most of England’s martyrs—was not felt appropriate as a punishment for women. Instead, Margaret Clitherow was sentenced to death by “pressing.” The exact details of this “milder” form of execution were given by the judge in his sentencing of her:
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https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2024/10/hidden-pearls-great-price-joseph-pearce.html