Sunday, October 28, 2007

Their Wounds Were Swords


In honour of the Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War - some of the words of the great poet Roy Campbell, who witnessed some of the martyrdoms (including the simple parish priest who received him and his wife into the Church) - and barely escaped with his own life.


"Their wounds were swords - how bravely worth/the care the angels took to smith them!

We thought they took their victory with them/but they had brought it down to earth,

For it was from their neighbouring spire/the proud Alcazar caught the fire/Which gave that splendour phoenix-birth."

4 comments:

Shawn Machia said...

Fr. Ben Shawn Machia here. May I have your e-mail? I had an idea I wanted to discuss with you and I also want to tell you a little about how Oxford's going.

Shawn Machia said...

Also, do you have Fr. Boyle's e-mail? He said I could go to his church's website on his blog, but it currently is nothing more than a vast field of royal indigo with some non-functioning links on it.

Shawn Machia said...

You probably didn't see my comment on the shrine in Swanton, but I was totally wowed by it. Its so wonderful when people offer their talents to the church. It reminds me of a documentary I saw on Irish Catholics in the deep south building a church. The locals wondered why they were putting so much time and money into it, and their answer was, "we want God's house to be nicer than our own." It sort of reminds me of David when he found the ark, "I will give no sleep to my eyes, nor enter my house, until I have found a dwelling place for the Lord." (Gross paraphrase)

Kimberly said...

Fr. Ben,
thank you for posting about the spanish martyrs and sharing a little information about them. I had no knowledge till this week of the vast number of Catholics murdered for their faith in Spain in the 20th century! May they be praying for us now as the church continues to be persecuted by our secular society