From: rich <
richarra@gmail.com>
August 27th ' St. David Lewis, SJ
(1616-1679)
David Lewis was a Welshman of good family, born in Abergavenny,
Monmouthshire, in 1616. His father Morgan Lewis belonged to an old
Catholic family, but had become a Protestant. His mother, Margaret
Prichard, was Catholic, however, and all but one of their nine
children were raised Catholics except David himself.
After attending the Royal Grammar School at Abergavenny, David, then
aged 16, was sent to London to study law at the Middle Temple. Three
years later he lost interest in the legal profession and went to
France as tutor of the son of one Count Savage. Probably he was
reconciled to the Catholic Church while living in Paris. He then went
back to Wales for a couple of years, but in 1638 he set out for Rome
to study for the priesthood at the Venerable English College. Ordained
a secular priest in 1642, he entered the Jesuits two years later. The
Jesuit superiors sent him as a missionary to Wales in 1646 but
recalled him soon afterward to be spiritual director of the English
College.
In 1648 he was sent back to Wales, and there he was to remain for
good. He was assigned to a remote farmhouse at the Cwm, where the
Jesuits maintained their western center, called the College of St.
Francis Xavier. For some 50 years this spot was the hideout of Jesuits
and other hunted priests from miles around. During the next 31 years
Father David worked the Welsh-English borderlands where there were
many recusants (Catholics who refused to conform to Anglicanism). He
was most zealous in the care he gave to both their spiritual and
bodily needs. They called him =E2=80=9Ctad v tlodion=E2=80=9D, =E2=80=9CFat= her of the Poor=E2=80=9D.
In 1678 the Infamous Titus Oates claimed to have discovered an
international plot to kill King Charles II and force England back into
the Roman fold. Oates was a total rascal, but the very rumor of such a
plot was enough to stir up a new persecution of Catholics. Royal
officials pounced on Cwm College, and the Jesuits there barely
escaped.
Father Lewis went into hiding elsewhere in Wales, but he was not safe
for long. Dorothy James, wife of a former servant of Fr. David, had
tried to get some money from him under false pretenses. Now she and
her husband both apostatized, and she was going about swearing that =E2=80=9Cshe would wash her hands in Mr. Lewis's blood, and would h=
ave his
head to make porridge of, as a sheep's head.=E2=80=9D She managed t=
o discover
the Jesuit's hiding place, and she set the soldiery on his trail. S=
ix
dragoons arrested him on November 17, 1678, just as he was going to
celebrate Mass. Three magistrates locked him up in Monmouth jail,
where he remained for two months. He was tried at the March assizes.
The judge condemned him to being hanged, drawn and quartered. There
was an interlude during which he was taken up to London to be examined
by the Privy Council on the Titus Oates Plot. He could give them no
information because there was none to give, and he refused what was
apparently an offer of forgiveness if he would conform to the Anglican
Church.
Brought back to Usk, he was hanged there on August 27, 1679. The
gallows was set up by a bungling convict who was offered his freedom
for playing hangman. (The official executioner and his assistants had
fled; so, too; had the amateur, who finally ran off when threatened by
the crowd with stoning. A blacksmith was finally bribed to carry out
the death sentence, but after he did so, nobody in the area would give
him any business. Lewis was apparently too well thought of in the
neighborhood for his execution to be popular!)
According to custom, Father Lewis was allowed to give a farewell
speech from the scaffold. The address, which he wrote while in jail,
has been preserved, and it was a rousing one. He said that while his
flesh and blood urged him to demand revenge, the Gospel commanded
forgiveness of enemies, and he would obey the Gospel. He urged all his listeners to fear God, honor the King, stand firm in the faith and
avoid mortal sin.
=E2=80=9CHere is a numerous assembly,=E2=80=9D he continued, =E2=80=9Cmay t=
he great Saviour of
the world save every soul of you all. =E2=80=A6 My religion is the Roman Catholic. =E2=80=A6 If all the good things of the world were offered me to renounce it, all should not remove me one hair's breadth from my Ro=
man
Catholic faith. A Roman Catholic I am, a Roman Catholic priest I am, a
Roman Catholic priest of=E2=80=A6 the Society of Jesus I am, and I bless Go=
d
who first called me. I was condemned for reading Mass, hearing
confessions, and administering the sacraments =E2=80=A6 and therefore, dyin=
g
for this I die for religion!=E2=80=9D
David Lewis was canonized by Pope Paul VI on October 25, 1970, as one
of the =E2=80=9CForty Martyrs of England and Wales.=E2=80=9D
'Fr. Robert
Saint Quote:
Our Lady's love is like a stream that has its source in the Eternal
Fountains, quenches the thirst of all, can never be drained, and ever
flows back to its Source.
-- St. Marguerite Bourgeoys
Bible Quote:
But the fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace, patience,
benignity, goodness, longanimity, Mildness, faith, modesty,
continency, chastity. Against such there is no law.=C2 (Gal 5:22-23) DRB
<><><><>
The Holy Spirit's Work In Us
Hippolytus, a second century Christian writer, explains the
significance of the Holy Spirit's work in us: =E2=80=9CThis is the =
water of
the Spirit: It refreshes paradise, enriches the earth, gives life to
living things. It is the water of Christ's baptism; it is our life.=
If
you go with faith to this renewing fountain, you renounce Satan your
enemy and confess Christ your God. You cease to be a slave and become
an adopted son; you come forth radiant as the sun and brilliant with
justice; you come forth a son of God and fellow-heir with Christ.=E2=80=9D (From a sermon, On the Epiphany)
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