St Edward

the Confessor King (1004 -1066)

Saint of the day October 13

young Edward the son of King Etheired II and Queen Emma  and his half-brother Alfred lived in exile with their uncle, the Duke of Normandy, during the reign of the Dane Canute. Alfred was murdered by the latter’s illegitimate son, Harold, when he returned to England in 1036, but when King Hardicanute died seven years later, Edward was acclaimed the rightful king. A saintly, conscientious man of 40, much given to prayer and works of mercy, his early misfortunes taught him to deprecate all earthly ambitions, and he now concentrated fully on governing his people with Christian gentleness, justice and prudence. Long abandoned monasteries were restored, and in the interest of better education it was decreed that schoolmasters, like clerics, were to be regarded as inviolable. Except for the occasion when Edward gave aid to Malcolm II of Scotland against usurper Macbeth, and another when he repelled a Welsh invasion, his 23-year reign was one of peace and prosperity.

Edward had the Mercian, the West Saxon and the Danish laws, which applied to their respective parts of his kingdom, codified and combined into one single system, and this became universal to the realm, forming the basis of English common law. It is interesting to note that the system of trial by jury originated and was developed under the Anglo-Saxon Kings. Their country courts were jointly presided over by the Bishop and the Sheriff, who exercised ecclesiastical and civil jurisdiction together. Penalties for crimes were moderate, and first-time offenders were usually let off with a mere fine. Capital punishment was rare. King Edward also abolished the odious “Danegelt” tax, which had oppressed his people for 38 years; he was able to maintain his reign out of his own patrimony without the imposition of any taxes on his subjects. Little wonder then that he was the idol of the common people and was long remembered with affection as “Good King Edward”.

Edward was the first English King to touch and heal scrofulous sores, “the King’s Evil”, with his ring a power which had been conferred originally on the Kings of France by St Remi. Edward’s famous death-bed vision of his country’s future has seen remarkable fulfilment: “when the measure of wickedness will have become full, then will God in his wrath send wicked spirits among the English people, and they will punish and afflict them with great severity by separating the green branch from the parent trunk for the space of three furlongs; but in the end, through the compassionate mercy of God, and without any governmental assistance, this same branch will return to its original fruit, will flourish anew and bear abundant fruit.” The period of time from Henry Viii’s break with Rome in 1534 and the rule of the Protestant innovators until 1850 when Pope Pius IX re-established the Catholic hierarchy in England, is in fact slightly more than three centuries. .

St Edward died on 5 January 1066 and was buried in St Peter’s Church, now Westminster Abbey, which he had magnificently restored. He was canonized by Pope Alexander III in 1161.