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Two Men for All Seasons: St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More

Associate Pastor's Column

Sunday, June 18, 2006, Solemnity of Corpus Christi

            On Thursday of this week, June 22, we will be remembering two great saints on one same day. These saints are St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More. Occasionally in my bulletin articles, I like to suggest to the Gentle Reader’s thoughts and prayers the lives of the saints. There is so much we can learn, and so much motivational strength, which we can glean from the lives of these great men and women.

            Both of these saints, both of these scholars, both of these martyrs lived under the reign of King Henry VIII of England, and both were killed by him (1535) because they would not assent to the King’s dissent from Rome, nor to the schism he caused, nor to the new church he established. It took great courage for both of these men to adhere to the Catholic Church in such difficult days in England.

            John Fisher (born 1469) eventually became the bishop of Rochester, England. He lived a very penitential life, and frequently visited the souls entrusted to his pastoral care.

            St. Thomas more (born 1477) studied at Oxford. He married, and then was blessed by God with one son and three daughters, all of whom he educated with admirable paternal love and solicitude. He became the Chancellor of England and worked in the King’s “cabinet.” His penitential practices included the use of a hairshirt, which we wore every day of his life even as Chancellor. He wrote many praiseworthy works, among them, Utopia. He was a politician, a businessman, a husband, a father, a scholar, a saint, and a martyr.

            These saints offer us many great lessons for our own lives.

            For example, in these days when the Church has been stressing that the laity are called to holiness, are called to the apostolate, and have a unique and irreplaceable role in the Church and in the world, what better example than St. Thomas More, who was blessed with a family, and engaged the intellectual, business and political world of his own day with divine wisdom.

            When the Tower of London held only one bishop, that is, St. John Fisher, it really should have been full of English bishops. What a marvelous lesson for anyone, laity, deacon, priest or bishop, to learn: it is better to die for the Church than to take sides with the enemies of the Church.

            These enemies are those who don’t embrace her faith and try to convince others to do the same; those who sacrifice the principles of Catholic life and teaching out of false prudence, human respect or just plain “politics”; and those who criticize the Church, or even murder others due to their faith in Christ, which happens even to our day in places like the Sudan.

            We can be tempted to take sides with those who hate the Church by just “giving in” because it is easier. St. John Fisher and St. Thomas more teach us to be more courageous than that, and adhere to Jesus Christ and the Church he gave us with unconditional fidelity.

Picture: Thomas More by Hans Holbein from 1527. Oil on wood, 74.2 x 59cm, thanks to tudorhistory.org