The Martyrs of Gorkum

Deus, qui beatorum martyrum tuorum Joannis et sociorum ejus, gloriosum pro fide tua certamen æternitatis laurea decorasti: concede propitius, ut eorum meritis et imitatione certantes in terris, cum ipsis coronari mereamur in cælis.  Per eumdem...

O God, Who adorned with the laurel of immortality the glorious battle of Thy blessed martyrs John and his companions for the Faith: graciously grant, that by their merits and exampledoing battle on earth, with them we may deserve to be crowned in heaven.  Through the same...

— Collect, St John of Cologne and Companions, MM (Dominican Rite)

It is only and ever through the Prince of Martyrs, the Faithful Witness, the Firstborn from the dead, by Whose Blood we are washed from our sins, Christ Jesus our Lord, that we may fight the good fight of the Faith.  By His grace we are compassed about by a great cloud of witnesses, who have now run the race before us, and by faith conquered; as they triumphed over pain and death in Him, so we may hope to finish the course.

To-morrow, Friday the 9th of July, marks the 438th anniversary of the martyrdom of St John of Cologne and eighteen companions, captured in and around Gorkum, most cruelly tortured, abused and finally hanged by Dutch Calvinists in the town of Brielle, which has been ever since a place of pilgrimage in honour of their witness unto death to our most holy Faith: for they refused to renounce their belief in the Blessed Sacrament and the Papal supremacy, and for this they were hanged out of devilish fanatical hatred.

Hæresum surgunt nova monstra, "New monstrosities of heresies arose", begins the hymn at Matins of this feast.  What good ever came of the blasphemies of Calvin, his hellish perversion of Christianity into a religion of fear, not of love?  Only the white-robed army of martyrs sent to heaven by the bloodstained hands of its sectaries!  Whose was the "total depravity"?  His and theirs who refused belief in sacramental regeneration, and made God into a monster worse than sinful men, a deceiving distortion of the Lord into what the ancient heretic, Marcion, misrepresented as the vengeful deity of the Old Testament.

Of the witnesses for Jesus who stood against such wicked folly, the larger part of this saintly company were Franciscans, nine priests and two lay brothers, but also four secular priests, two Norbertines, an Augustinian, and the Dominican, John, mentioned above - who, having heard of the incarceration of the first fifteen, hastened to bring them the sacraments and was himself captured, tormented and slain with the rest.  Greater love hath no man...

"Behold how they are numbered among the children of God, and their lot is among the saints."

– Wisdom v, 5 (Communion)

The Postcommunion for this feast in the Dominican Missal addresses Our Lord thus:

Deus, virtutis auctor ac largitor, per sanctorum martyrum tuorum fidem et constantiam concede, ut nos ad sacrum convivium accedentes, eodem accendamur ardore, quo ipsi pro veritate corporis et sanguinis tui, vitam tibi in holocaustum obtulere.  Qui vivis et regnas...

O God, the author and giver of strength, for the sake of Thy holy martyrs' faith and steadfastness, bestow on us who draw near this hallowed banquet the same enkindling flame wherewith they gave their life as a holocaust to Thee, for the truth of Thy Body and Blood: Who livest and reignest...