Good Friday Pilgrimage: Tower to Tyburn

St Etheldreda's

Young pilgrims journeyed in the footsteps of the Catholic martyrs of England on Good Friday, by walking from the Tower of London to the site of the Tyburn gallows, where more than 350 met their grisly end during the Reformation.

There was something particularly poignant about journeying in the footsteps of martyrs on Good Friday: their execution at the hands of a fiercely anti-Catholic English state is very reminiscent of the cruel execution of Our Lord Jesus Christ on Calvary at the hands of the ruthless Roman imperial authorities.

The martyrs at Tyburn range from the Carthusian monks who were hung, drawn and quartered there in 1535, to the last one, St Oliver Plunkett, Archbishop of Armagh, executed there in 1681.

Other martyrs of note include St Edmund Campion, a Jesuit missionary and subject of a biography by Evelyn Waugh, and St Robert Southwell, noted for his devotional verse.

The pilgrimage was mainly aimed at the 18-35 age group as part of the Jesuit Fathers' Young Adult Ministries and it was inspiring to see groups of young Catholics (albeit in groups of no more than six, compliant with the latest Coronavirus regulations) make this walk with such enthusiasm and devotion.

There were seven stopping points on the route, one for each of the seven last words of Christ, where a meditation and a prayer was read.

Some of the stopping points were chosen merely for convenience's sake, but some of them also had a spiritual and historical significance, relating to the rich heritage of English Catholicism.

Along the route we stopped at the Old Bailey, which stands on the site of Newgate Gaol, where the martyrs were imprisoned in the final days before their execution.

St Etheldreda's in Ely Place was another stop. Built in the 13th century as a chapel for the Bishops of Ely, it was restored to the Catholic Church in 1874, making it the oldest extant Catholic church in England. It is now in the care of the Rosminian Fathers (Institute of Charity) and has a reputation for its fine choral tradition.

St Giles in the Fields was the penultimate stopping point, significant for being the burial place of St Oliver Plunkett and various Jesuit martyrs. A plaque in the church reads:

"Remember before God the lives of all those laid to rest in this churchyard and among them those priests who died for the Catholic faith at Tyburn and were buried here including in 1679 the Jesuits William Barrow, John Fenwick, John Gavan, William Ireland, Anthony Turner, Thomas Whitbread, and in 1681, Oliver Plunkett."

Finally, we arrived at the site of Tyburn gallows at Marble Arch, marked by a plaque on the ground which would be easily missed by those not looking for it. The final meditation was read here, followed by a prayer taken from Ludolf of Saxony's Life of Christ:

"Lord Jesus Christ, as night fell you desired that your weeping mother and your other friends should anoint and embalm you with perfume, wrap you in a shroud and other cloths and carry you to the sepulchre to bury you. Grant that I should anoint you with the perfume of fervent devotion and a holy life; that I may wrap you with the shroud of pure love and a clear conscience. May I weep for you with tears of repentance and compassion; may I carry you in my arms by loving and humble action; may I bury you in my heart by remembering you frequently, so that I too, buried with you, may reach the glory of your resurrection, with you who are Christ our Lord. Amen."

The pilgrimage concluded with the Good Friday service at the Jesuit church in Farm Street, a beautiful Victorian neo-Gothic church which is well worth a visit - a fitting place to conclude our pilgrimage, given the fact that so many of our English martyrs were Jesuits.