Today's program is the last in the series and I plan to address some historical details about the 20th century and some very recent events:
1) More converts, following the Oxford Movement pattern: from Gerard Manley Hopkins to J.R.R. Tolkien;
2) Beatifications and Canonizations of the English Catholic Martyrs: 1935, 1970 and 1987
3) Papal Visits: Blessed John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI
4) Newman's Beatification and the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham
But, more importantly, I want to address the meaning and lessons of the English Reformation and what Catholics endured in its long aftermath--again, citing its relevance to us today. Why do we need to know about this story--how can we apply it to the situation of religious freedom and, even more generally, to living our Catholic lives today? In this new Year of Faith, the Catholic martyrs of the 16th and 17th centuries are great examples of giving all for the faith, but the people who lived and died in the Faith, struggling, paying fines, enduring imprisonment, etc, are great confessors of the Faith, too. That's just one example--I'll have more!
If you have comments about what the history of the English Reformation means to us today, please call in to the program at 1-866-333-6279 or submit them to me on my facebook page for Supremacy and Survival: How Catholics Endured the English Reformation. Thanks for listening!
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