ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN MARCH
Saints celebrated on the 21st March
Prayer to the Angels and the Saints
Heavenly Father, in praising Your Angels and Saints we praise Your glory, for by honouring them we honour You, their Creator. Their splendour shows us Your greatness, which infinitely surpasses that of all creation.
In Your loving providence, You saw fit to send Your Angels to watch over us. Grant that we may always be under their protection and one day enjoy their company in heaven.
Heavenly Father, You are glorified in Your Saints, for their glory is the crowning of Your gifts. You provide an example for us by their lives on earth, You give us their friendship by our communion with them, You grant us strength and protection through their prayer for the Church, and You spur us on to victory over evil and the prize of eternal glory by this great company of witnesses.
Grant that we who aspire to take part in their joy may be filled with the Spirit that blessed their lives, so that, after sharing their faith on earth, we may also experience their peace in heaven. Amen.
BL. MATTHEW FLATHERS, PRIEST AND MARTYR
(Alias Major) He was an English priest and martyr; born probably c.1580 at Weston, Yorkshire, England; he died at York, March 21, 1607. He was educated at Douai, and ordained at Arras, March 25, 1606. Three months later he was sent to English mission, but was discovered almost immediately by the emissaries of the Government, who, after the Gunpowder Plot, had redoubled their vigilance in hunting down the priests of the proscribed religion.
HE RETURNED TO THE MISSION
He was brought to trial, under the statute of 27 Elizabeth, on the charge of receiving orders abroad, and condemned to death. By an act of unusual clemency, this sentence was commuted to banishment for life; but after a brief exile, the undaunted priest returned to England in order to fulfill his mission, and, after ministering for a short time to his oppressed coreligionists in Yorkshire was again apprehended.
HE WAS CONDEMNED TO DEATH
Brought to trial at York on the charge of being ordained abroad and exercising priestly functions in England, Fr Flathers was offered his life on condition that he take the recently enacted Oath of Allegiance.
On his refusal, he was condemned to death and taken to the common place of execution outside Micklegate Bar, York. The usual punishment of hanging, drawing, and quartering seems to have been carried out in a peculiarly brutal manner, and eyewitnesses relate how the tragic spectacle excited the commiseration of the crowds of Protestant spectators.
(From Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913)
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