ENGLISH MARTYRS-DECEMBR 1-5

Bl. Alexander Briant
Feastday: December 1
1581
Missionary and martyr, one of the English priests slain in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. Alexander was born in Somerset, England, circa 1556 , and entered Oxford University at a young age. He was called "the beautiful Oxford youth" because of his handsome appearance and the radiance of his holiness. Alexander converted to Catholicism at Oxford and met Richard Holtby, following Holtby to the English seminary college at Reims, France. He was ordained a priest there on March 29, 1578. Returning to England, Alexander worked in Somerset and was caught up in a search by British authorities in April 1581. Taken to the Tower of London, he was subjected to inhuman tortures but did not reveal the names of other priests. He also wrote to the Jesuit Fathers, asking permission to join. He was accepted. In November 1581, he was condemned to death by an English court. Again Alexander suffered hideous tortures and died on December 1,1581, at the age of twenty-five.

Bl. John Beche
Feastday: December 1
1539
Martyr of England and a friend of St. John Fisher and St. Thomas More. John was abbot of Coichester Abbey. A Benedictine, he received a doctorate from Oxford in 1515 . He took the Oath of Supremacy in 1534 , but then saw his own abbey being plundered. The deaths of Sts. John Fisher and Thomas More horrified him as well. When he refuted King Henry VIII’s right to suppress the English monasteries, he was arrested for treason and hanged, drawn, and quartered at Colchester. John was beatified in 1895.


Bl. Richard Langley
Feastday: December 1
1586
English martyr. A member of the gentry, he was born at Grimthorpe, where he had extensive estates, as he did in Riding. He was arrested for giving shelter to Catholic priests and hanged, drawn, and quartered at York on December 1. He was beatified in 1929.



Bl. Edward Coleman
Feastday: December 3
1678
English martyr, a victim of the Titus Oates Plot. Educated at Cambridge, he convened to the faith and served as secretary to the duchess of Thrk. Condemned falsely of conspiring to restore Catholicism to England, he was executed at Tyburn. He was beatified in 1929.


St. John Almond
Feastday: December 5
1612
One of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales. A native of Allerton, England, he was educated in Ireland and then at Reims and in Rome. After his ordination in 1598, he returned to England as a missionary, and was arrested in 1602. John was imprisoned in 1608 for a time and arrested again in 1612. He was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn.

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