John Southworth (priest)
John Southworth (born around 1592 in Samlesbury Hall near Preston , Lancashire , † June 28, 1654 in Tyburn ) was an English Catholic priest , martyr and is a saint of the Catholic Church.
Live and act
He came from a long-established Catholic family in Lancashire and wanted to be a priest. Since at that time the Catholic religion and its practice were strictly forbidden in England, he entered the English exile seminary founded by Cardinal William Allen ("Collège des Anglais") in Douai , which at that time was not part of France but of the Spanish Netherlands belonged. Here he was ordained a priest in April 1618.
John Southworth returned to his home country in December of that year to serve as a pastor. In 1626 he was sentenced to death in Lancashire and imprisoned in Lancaster Castle from 1627 . St Edmund Arrowsmith was his fellow prisoner there. Before his execution he was able to give him absolution here in 1628 . In 1630 Southworth was transferred to London. In 1636 he was released from Gatehouse Prison as an outdoor prisoner, after which he stayed in the Clerkenwell district . Here Southworth worked diligently as a clergyman and also took special care of the sick from a plague epidemic in Westminster at the time . He was arrested again at the end of 1637. Until 1654, periods of imprisonment and freedom alternated with one another. The priest always remained under the control of the authorities, but continued to work as a pastor, both in prison and among the Londoners.
He was finally arrested on June 19, 1654. Under Oliver Cromwell he was tried at the Old Bailey Court , in which he openly confessed to being a Catholic priest. He was sentenced to death by hanging and then quartering . The judgment was carried out on June 28, 1654 at the London Place of execution at Tyburn ; before that, John Southworth gave a long speech to those present. Today, in memory of him and many Catholics who died there as martyrs, the Tyburn Convent is located here , with an altar in the shape of the historic three-legged Tyburn gallows ("Tyburn Tree").
Posthumous adoration
The Spanish ambassador Alonso de Cárdenas bought Southworth's body for 40 guineas , had it embalmed and reassembled; then he took him out of the country and he was buried in 1655 in the seminary of Douai. Adoration of the martyr was already developing here. For example, in 1656 the recovery of Francis Howard, son of Henry Howard, 22nd Earl of Arundel and brother of Cardinal Philip Thomas Howard , was attributed to his advocacy.
In 1793, at the time of the French Revolution , the body of John Southworth was buried in a soldered coffin under the seminary's farm buildings. This was dissolved and converted into barracks in 1834. After the restoration of the Catholic hierarchy in England , Nicholas Wiseman , the first Catholic cardinal and archbishop after the Reformation , researched the relics of the martyr that remained in France in 1863. However, the excavations in Douai were unsuccessful.
In the course of the city expansion of Douai, the old seminar building was torn down in 1926 and in 1927 the lead coffin with the well-preserved body of John Southworth was found. Nearby was a buried metal box with a shirt of St. Thomas Becket and the biretta of St. Charles Borromeo .
On December 15, 1929, Pope Pius XI spoke . 136 British reformation martyrs blessed , including John Southworth. From 1930, his body was exhibited for veneration in Westminster Cathedral, London, in a glass coffin. The face and hands are covered with a silver cover. Pope Paul VI On October 25, 1970, forty of these blessed became saints, among them again John Southworth. They are venerated in the Catholic Church on the feast day of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales (May 4th).
In Nelson, Lancashire , a school is named after Saint John Southworth. Small relics can also be found in the Saint-Pierre collegiate church in Douai. A memorial was dedicated to the martyr here.
literature
- Michael Archer: St. John Southworth, Priest and Martyr . CTS Publications, London 2010, ISBN 978-1-86082-668-9 .
- Joseph Spillmann : History of the persecution of Catholics in England from 1535 to 1681 , Volume 4: The martyrs under James I, Charles I and the Commonwealth . Herder Verlag, Freiburg 1905, p. 220 and p. 335-340.
Web links
- St John Southworth website in the portal of Westminster Cathedral
- Biographical website
- Website with historical photos of the body found in 1927
Individual evidence
- ^ Biographical webpage on St. Edmund Arrowsmith
- ^ Article on English Catholic policy, with mention of the ambassador's purchase
- ^ School website with biography of the saint
- ^ Website of the Saint-Pierre collegiate church in Douai, with a photo of the memorial and the reliquary
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Southworth, John |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English Catholic priest, martyr and saint of the Catholic Church |
| DATE OF BIRTH | around 1592 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Samlesbury Hall at Preston , Lancashire |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 28, 1654 |
| Place of death | Tyburn |