 St Alban’s Episcopal Church Bolivar, Missouri Thursday, December 29, 2022 5th Day of Christmas Feast of Thomas a Becket – 1170 What make a saint? Well, for sure it isn’t perfection of thought, word or deed. It isn’t even necessarily maturity or emotional balance or wisdom. The saints we know and name are simply our ancestors in faith who were as intentional as they knew how to be about loving God and living out their commitment to God. Thomas a Becket (1120-1170) was someone like that. As a young man he worked hard and became eventually chancellor to King Henry II and archdeacon. He was as irreligious as the king himself, it seems, with no particular desire to be a holy man. Headstrong and ambitious, wealthy and popular with the king he defended the rights of the crown over the Church. However, he demurred when Henry wanted him to become Archbishop of Canterbury in 1162. Henry expected Thomas to go along with all his plans and programs, especially his intention to enforce the authority of the king over the church. However, as Thomas had warned, once he became archbishop, he took his religious responsibilities seriously, as well as his vowed loyalty to the Church. He seems to have actually begin to follow the Lord Christ rather than the Lord King. Was he foolish to argue with the king, to pressure him in unreasonable ways, who had been his close friend? Maybe. Was the king foolish to assume Thomas would retain primary loyalty to him when he appointed him to the highest religious position in the country? Probably. The story is long and convoluted. But on December 29, 1170, Thomas was murdered in his Church by friends of the king who took literally his frustrated outburst, “Who will rid me of this troublesome monk?”   |
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