England Rediscovers Christian Persecution

The Catholic Thing

By Auguste Meyrat
The Catholic Church recently celebrated the feast of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales, in which "hundreds of British men and women died for their [Catholic] faith in wake of the dispute between the Pope and King Henry VIII during the 16th century," forty of whom were selected to represent people who made the mistake of contradicting their king's decision to break with the Catholic Church.
Almost all of this had to do with politics, not religion. Because the British king's authority was legitimized and administered by the Catholic Church, Henry treated British Catholics as dissenters from his rule even if they never publicly dissented or rebelled against it. Presumably, Henry believed that imprisoning and beheading Catholics, including his friend and Lord High Chancellor St. Thomas More, would help safeguard his rule.
Instead of a prosperous time of peace, the threat of a Catholic usurpation along with a foreign invasion from a Catholic monarch loomed large in those decades, and a civil war erupted between the Anglican Royalists and non-Anglican Parliamentarians nearly a century later. In brutally suppressing would-be dissenters, Henry cultivated a multitude of actual dissenters who in time really did overthrow the monarchy.
As Joseph Pearce discusses in his excellent history, Faith of Our Fathers: A History of True England, the English Catholic community went underground during this time, yet reemerged under the influence of some of the Church's most eloquent and powerful voices such as John Henry Newman, Ronald Knox, and G.K. Chesterton. As they did in the medieval era, modern British Catholics largely worked to conserve the faith and British culture, not disrupt it or overturn its political order.
This short history of religious persecution and its aftermath illustrates a few key truths. First, murdering and imprisoning Catholics will not make a non-Catholic government stronger, but weaker. Second, the systemic persecution of any community sets a dangerous precedent that inevitably results in more persecution, as happened in Ireland and most of the British colonies. And third, there is no valid reason, moral or political, that justifies the persecution of any Christian community.
Nevertheless, the U.K. is currently in the process of reviving the persecution of Christians (Catholic, Anglican, and every other denomination of "Easter worshippers").
In a recent essay, provocatively titled "She Was Arrested for Praying in Her Head," Madeline Kearns reports that British police are arresting Christians for praying in the vicinity of abortion clinics: "the UK's brand-new 'Safe Access' law, which came into effect September 24 and made it a criminal offense to do anything within 200 meters of an abortion facility that could 'influence' someone's decision to access, provide, or facilitate an abortion."
Rather than address the problem of violent protesters, this law seems tailor-made to target the quiet ones who simply stand nearby and offer a peaceful witness to life.
British legislators and law enforcement may try to compare this law to others that discourage loitering and public intimidation of private citizens, but this comparison is completely false. Pro-lifers who pray are not loitering, but peacefully objecting to abortion. Moreover, they are doing so in the least intimidating way possible, internally appealing to God for redemption and justice.
Contrast these "threats" to public order with the hundreds of thousands of protesters in England supporting Hamas by chanting antisemitic slogans and defacing property. Not only do British authorities largely allow this, but they will even discourage counter-protesters who dare to fly a British or Israeli flag.
This suggests that the real reason for British police arresting people for praying near abortion clinics is not to promote law and order, but to crack down on dissenters. It's not about what they're doing, but about what they are. Thus, much like King Hen...