St Augustine's Church

SS THOMAS MORE AND JOHN FISHER Monday is the feast of Ss Thomas More and John Fisher, both great humanist scholars who refused to accept Henry VIII’s break with Rome and his claim to be Supreme Head of the Church in England. 22nd June marks the anniversary of the execution of John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, who was beheaded in 1535. Fisher was named after St John the Baptist and conscious of public outrage which saw the parallel between the two executions, Henry ordered that the execution should be carried out before the feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist (24th June). In May 1535 Pope Paul III had made Fisher a cardinal hoping to persuade Henry not to pursue the prosecution. Historian Eamon Duffy writes, “Catholic piety conventionally explains the scarlet robes that Cardinals wear as a sign of their readiness to shed their blood for the sake of the Christian gospel. This is an edifying thought: but as a matter of fact, in the whole millenium-long history of the cardinalate, only one member of the Sacred College has actually ever suffered martyrdom. That man was John Fisher.”

Illustration: Hans Holbein drew More and Fisher during his time in Henry’s court in 1526.