Sir/Father Edward Petre, SJ, RIP

Father Edward Petre, SJ was an adviser to King James II. According to the Dictionary of National Biography he was a victim of the Popish Plot but survived:

the second son of Sir Francis Petre, bart., of the Cranham branch of the family, of which the Barons Petre constituted the eldest branch. His mother was Elizabeth, third daughter of Sir John Gage, bart., of Firle Place, Sussex, and grandson of Sir John Gage [q. v.], constable of the Tower under Henry VIII. The story told in ‘Revolution Politicks,’ implying that he was educated at Westminster under Busby, is apocryphal. His family being devout Roman catholics (sic), he was sent in 1649 to study at St. Omer, and three years later he entered the Society of Jesus at Watten, under the name of Spencer, though he was not professed of the four vows until 2 Feb. 1671. He obtained some prominence in the society, not so much for learning as for boldness and address. On the death of his elder brother Frances, at Cranham in Essex, about 1679, he succeeded to the title, and about the same time he received orders from his provincial, and was sent on the English mission. Being rector of the Hampshire district at the time of the popish plot (1679), he was arrested and committed to Newgate; but, as Oates and his satellites produced no specific charges against him, he was released, after a year's confinement, in June 1680. In the following August he became rector of the London district and vice-provincial of England; and, intelligence of this appointment having leaked out, he was promptly rearrested and imprisoned until 6 Feb. 1683. Exactly two years after his liberation James II ascended the throne, and at once summoned Petre to court.

James wanted Father Petre to have a high position in the Catholic Church to serve him, but Pope Innocent XI did not cooperate:

James recognised in him ‘a resolute and undertaking man,’ and resolved to assign him an official place among his advisers. As a preliminary step, it was determined to seek some preferment for him from Innocent XI. In December 1686 Roger Palmer, earl of Castlemaine [q. v.], was sent to Rome to petition the pope to this effect. The first proposal apparently was that the pope should grant Petre a dispensation which would enable him to accept high office in the English church, and Eachard states that the dignity ultimately designed for Petre was the archbishopric of York, a see which was left vacant (from April 1686 to November 1688) for this purpose. The pope, however, who had little fondness for the Jesuits, proved obdurate, both to the original request and to the subsequent proposal which Sunderland had the effrontery to make, that Petre should be made a cardinal. Innocent professed himself utterly unable to comply ‘salva conscientia,’ and added that ‘such a promotion would very much reflect upon his majesty's fame’ (see abstract of the correspondence in Dodd's Church Hist. iii. 424–5; D'Adda Correspondence in Addit. MS. 15396). He shortly afterwards ordered the general of the Jesuits to rebuke Petre for his ambition.

He barely escaped the fall of King James II and the invasion of the William of Orange:

The night before the king's departure he slept at St. James's, whence, making his exit next day by a secret passage, he escaped to Dover in disguise, and succeeded in reaching France before his master. He never saw James again. His rooms at Whitehall were occupied by Jeffreys for a short time after his flight; when Jeffreys himself decamped to Wapping, they were broken into by a protestant mob (cf. Twelve Bad Men, ed. Seccombe, p. 92). Petre spent the next year quietly at St. Omer, unheeding the torrent of abusive pamphlets and broadsides with which he was assailed. In December 1689 he was at Rome, but ‘not much lookt on there’ (Luttrell, i. 616). In 1693 he was appointed rector of the college at St. Omer, where the enlightened attention that he paid to the health and cleanliness of the community made him highly valued (Oliver, Collections). In 1697 he was sent to Watten, where he died on 15 May 1699.
 
As this blog points out, we don't have a reliable portrait of Father Petre; the images we have of him are all caricatures, salacious and suggestive.

The Catholic Encyclopedia reminds us that we have no evidence that Father Petre did anything immoral and that, among his famous recusant family he

fills more space in history than any of his family, owing to the multiplicity of attacks made upon him as a chaplain and adviser of James II. Petre's unpopularity as a Jesuit was so great that it harmed the king's cause; but if we regard his conduct by itself, no serious fault has yet been proved against him. If we cannot yet confidently acquit him of all blame, that is chiefly because first-hand evidence is very deficient; but the nearer we get to first-hand evidence, the better does Petre's conduct appear. Before James's accession (6 Feb., 1685) he had shown good, but not extraordinary virtue and ability, and was then vice-provincial of his order. . . . 

Setting aside prejudiced witnesses (and it will be remembered that there was a party against him, even among Catholics), and studying those in sympathy with the Jesuit, we seem to perceive in him a steadfast, kind-hearted English priest, devoting himself with energy to the opportunities for spiritual good that opened out before him. With little gift for politics, nor paying much heed to them, he was nevertheless severely blamed when things went wrong. He was also regardless, almost callous, as to what was said about him by friend or foe.

Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. Amen.

Image source.

William Chillingworth and Father John Fisher, SJ

William Chillingworth was born just six months before Elizabeth I died, on October 12, 1602. He would have an eventful life, including a brief conversion to Catholicism:

. . . the son of a citizen of Oxford, was born in 1602; Laud, then a Fellow of St. John’s, was his godfather. Entered at Trinity College in 1618, he graduated two years later, and, in 1628, he was elected a Fellow of his College. He took from the first an active part in the “Romish” controversy, which then agitated the University, frequently meeting in debate one John Fisher, a Jesuit, who ultimately convinced him that the only refuge from distracting religious conflict was in the bosom of the infallible Roman Catholic Church. Chillingworth went to Douay in 1630, but returned to Oxford in the following year, and, three years later, declared himself to be again a Protestant, though not yet an Anglican. It was not till after the publication of his great work, The Religion of Protestants a safe way to Salvation, that he consented to subscribe the Articles, and accept the Chancellorship of Salisbury. Chillingworth was a close friend of Lord Falkland, and with him took the side of Charles the First against the Parliament. He was taken prisoner on the fall of Arundel Castle, where he had lain ill during the siege, and was almost literally talked to death in January 1644 by Francis Cheynell, a Puritan minister, who attended his funeral, and buried his “corrupt rotten book” with him.

"John Fisher" was the alias of Father John Percy, SJ--and choosing the name of the great Bishop of Rochester and martyr, John Fisher, was a great gesture of honor and admiration for a Catholic hero--and Father Percy/Fisher was much involved in the Jesuit mission to England:

Born at Holmeside, Durham, 27 Sep., 1569; died at London, 3 Dec., 1641. Converted when only fourteen years, he went first to Reims, in 1586, then to the English College, Rome, 1589-94. Returning to Belgium, he entered the Jesuit novitiate, 2 May, 1594, and then set out for England in 1596. He was, however, arrested by the Dutch, tortured, and sent prisoner to London. He managed to escape, and became the companion of Father Gerard in several adventures. He was seized at Harrowden (November, 1605) at the time of the Gunpowder Plot, but was eventually banished at the request of the Spanish ambassador (1606). Retiring to Belgium he was for a time head of the English Jesuits, then professor of Scripture at Louvain, after which he returned again to England, and was again imprisoned and condemned to death (1610): He had already begun to write on current controversies, and when James I desired a series of disputations in 1622, Percy, who was then in a prison in London, was required to defend the Catholic side. In these disputations King James himself and Laud took a leading part. As a result of these disputations, Mary Countess of Buckingham, and Chillingworth became converts to the Church. These controversies were afterwards printed and discussed by Percy and Floyd on the Catholic side, and by Laud, Francis White, John White, Featley, and Wotton on the Protestant. Percy was eventually released in 1625 and ordered to banishment in 1635, but he was suffered to remain in London till his death.

For more information about Father John Floyd, SJ, with whom Father Fisher worked, see the Catholic Encyclopedia entry. That Chillingworth was not prosecuted for his conversion, and that Father Fisher was never executed, but in fact asked/commanded to engage in theological disputation, exiled twice, and shown mercy, demonstrates at least some of the leniency toward Catholics that we find in James I's reign. 

Rome and the Counter-Reformation in England

This book is on my wish list for later--I have at least four upcoming projects (three presentations and one article) before I can even think of reading it--but I know that Father Philip Hughes is an excellent historian and will teach something I need to know about this era that fascinates me so. From the publisher:

One can find many of Fr. Hughes works on the Reformation reprinted. Still, one that is lacking his is great study of the Reformation in England. He admits at the outset that the conclusion is already known by the reader before he picks up the book, that the counter-reformation failed in England. What the reader may not know is why.

To that purpose, Fr. Hughes begins his study with the accession of Queen Mary and the appointment of Cardinal Reginald Pole to England as Cardinal Legate. Then he begins the study of how they refashioned the Church to be so strong that the episcopacy universally resisted Elizabeth. He also explores the condition of the average cleric, layman and other things from official documents and primary source texts.

In the next phase, he examines in detail the rise of Protestantism again under Elizabeth, and the projects of St. Pius V and Gregory XIII to help Englishmen depose Elizabeth. The importance of this study is that in the English Protestant historical tradition, Pius V and Gregory, along with the Jesuits and others, are accused of plotting the murder and assassination of Elizabeth. Fr. Hughes, by examining official papers, shows why this was not true, albeit also offering criticism of the official policy in these years. What he shows is that Rome never really had an accurate story on what was going on in England, and as a result committed many blunders in the period when the counter-reformation might have succeeded.

Following the scene to the eventual failure, Fr. Hughes also answers the pivotal questions: Were the English martyrs really traitors to the crown, as official history maintains? Were Cardinal Allen, the founder of Douay College, or Fr. Persons of the Jesuits, active tools of Spanish policy in England? Or did they rather believe the Spaniards would help the Catholic cause? Did St. Pius V try to assassinate Elizabeth?

In all this Fr. Hughes uses primary sources, letters, and reason to paint for us the picture of the counter-reformation’s failures. If one wants to know what Catholic action and life were like in England during the Marian Restoration and the Elizabethan imposition of Protestantism, this is the work.

This article at catholicism.org is partially based on Father Hughes's book, detailing stages in the Counter-Reformation in England from the reign of Mary I through Elizabeth I.