On repeated trips to London, I had the privilege of tracking down various sites sacred to the memory of St. Thomas More. This was one of them, in the Chelsea area. He's always been a favorite in my family because he was a regular guy - a husband, a dad, a lawyer, a guy who liked animals, a man who liked to sit around with his friends after a good dinner and discuss religion, philosophy and politics. But he came to a point in his life, as one conservative radio host put it, when "It's time to admit what you believe and stand up for it."

I found the church were his family worshipped (partially destroyed in the Blitz and rebuilt), where he studied law, where he worked, where he was sentenced to death (giving the final speech immortalized in the Oscar-winning movie "A Man for All Seasons"), where he was imprisoned, and where he was executed. I traveled to Canterbury and visited St. Dunstan's, where his daughter Meg lovingly buried his head in the Roper vault.

But did he ever feel fear? Did he ever feel uncertainty? Did he ever wonder, when his second wife pleaded with him to do what the king wanted, if he was doing the right thing? Again, he was a regular guy, doing his duty in the little things so that when he was asked to do his duty in a big matter, he was ready. He must have sometimes felt afraid! After his condemnation to death for upholding Catholic doctrine, he wrote:

"Good Lord, give me the grace in all my fear and agony to have recourse to that great fear and wonderful agony that Thou, my sweet Saviour, hadst at the Mount of Olivet before Thy most bitter Passion, and in the meditation thereof to conceive ghostly [spiritual] comfort and consolation profitable for my soul."


May we find strength in meditation on the life of Our Lord, in the trials of our own lives!


This last picture shows a poster for the live performance of "A Man for All Seasons" starring Martin Shaw, at the Haymarket Theater in London...what a great experience! I cried when he said goodbye to his family...