Dying because he was a priest

By Tony Staley
Compass Editor

	St. Henry Morse When: 1595-1645 Where: England What: Jesuit priest and martyr Feast: Feb. 1 Canonized: 1970

Most of us will never be asked to put our life on the line for our faith. But if we were, how often would we be willing to do it - once, seven times, or seventy times seven times?

St. Henry Morse answered "Yes" every time he was asked, during the state-sponsored persecution of Catholics in the 17th century, until it finally cost him his life.

Henry was born and raised in a Protestant family at Broome, Suffolk, England. He attended Cambridge, then, while studying law, decided to convert to Catholicism. He went to Douai, France, where he enrolled in the seminary. He was ordained a priest after finishing his studies in Rome and returned to England.

Soon after returning to England, he was arrested for being a priest. For the next four years, he was imprisoned in York.

While in Rome, he had decided to become a Jesuit and received permission from the order's superior to join in England. Fortuitously, he was imprisoned with a Jesuit, Fr. John Robinson, so his prison time doubled as a novitiate. After four years, Henry was released under a general amnesty. He returned to France and was chaplain to English soldiers in Flanders serving King Philip IV of Spain.

In 1633, Henry returned to England and, for the next several years, lived in London under the name Cuthbert Claxton, secretly ministering as a priest. During the plague of 1636-37, he regularly visited 400 infected Catholic and Protestant families and three times came down with and recovered from the plague. Because of his unselfish actions he brought several people to the church.

After the plague abated, he was arrested and charged with being a priest and for "perverting 560 of His Majesty's subjects." While he was found not guilty of the second charge, he was found guilty of being a priest.

Queen Marietta of Spain paid his bail, so he could be released from prison. When priests were banished from England in 1641, Henry again worked abroad with English troops.

In 1643, he returned to England. Eighteen months later, he was arrested in Cumberland while on a sick call. He escaped, but was again captured weeks later.

Early in 1645, he was sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered because of his conviction several years earlier. The morning of his execution, he celebrated Mass. Right before his execution, he prayed for himself, his executioners and England. The French, Spanish and Portuguese ambassadors attended his hanging as a protest.