Three Falls and Martyrdom

I will be on the Son Rise Morning Show during the first local Cincinnati hour on Sacred Heart Radio this morning a little after 6:45 a.m. Central DST/7:45 a.m. Eastern DST to talk about Blessed John Hambley, one of the 85 Martyrs of England and Wales beatified by Pope St. John Paul II in 1987. The Son Rise Morning Show will then repeat the interview on Wednesday, March 29 during the earlier EWTN hour. March 29 is the date assigned to him on the Roman Martyrology: the date is uncertain but he was executed around Easter 1587 in Salisbury. He offers us a great example of repentance and resolution.

Listen live here today and here tomorrow--and also read my post at the National Catholic Register blog here tomorrow.

Father John Hambley fell three times on his way to the scaffold, denying his faith and even revealing information about who had assisted him and heard Mass when he celebrated it in the English Catholic underground. In my blog post I discuss how Jesus, in the Traditional Stations of the Cross, fell three times on the way to Calvary and Blessed John Henry Newman's interpretation of those three falls:

We are told in Holy Scripture of three falls of Satan, the Evil Spirit. The first was in the beginning; the second, when the Gospel and the Kingdom of Heaven were preached to the world; the third will be at the end of all things. . . .

These three falls--the past, the present, and the future--the Evil Spirit had in mind when he moved Judas to betray Our Lord. This was just his hour. Our Lord, when He was seized, said to His enemies, "This is your hour and the power of darkness." Satan knew his time was short, and thought he might use it to good effect. . . . he smote Him once, he smote Him twice, he smote Him thrice, each successive time a heavier blow.

The picture (c) 2017, Stephanie A. Mann, is of the Ninth Station in the Church of the Blessed Sacrament, Wichita, Kansas.