Thank you for this very interesting piece. Perhaps one of the saddest things in the relationship between Henry VIII and St Thomas More was that More had known him very well when the king was an adolescent. Their parting surely must have been not only terrible for a patriot such as More, but so darkening personally - he literally lost everything in defence of right.
The problem with recasting St Thomas as a modern liberal devoted to “conscience” is that he becomes a hypocrite to moderns when it comes to imposing civil penalties pursuant to ecclesiastical authorities. Another note: in AMFAS play and movie, you can tell when they are using original source material such as Roper and others trial transcripts, because St Thomas is funny and witty in those scenes (as was his hallmark) compared to the somewhat sour man with a modernist bent in the rest of the play/movie. St Thomas More, Ora pro Nobis!
This piece is very important: Thomas More was not a neo-liberal. On the contrary, Dialogue Concerning Heresies, which C. S. Lewis called the wittiest dialogue in the english language, is a strong defence of the English Inquisition. See especially book 4.
Thank you for this very interesting piece. Perhaps one of the saddest things in the relationship between Henry VIII and St Thomas More was that More had known him very well when the king was an adolescent. Their parting surely must have been not only terrible for a patriot such as More, but so darkening personally - he literally lost everything in defence of right.
The problem with recasting St Thomas as a modern liberal devoted to “conscience” is that he becomes a hypocrite to moderns when it comes to imposing civil penalties pursuant to ecclesiastical authorities. Another note: in AMFAS play and movie, you can tell when they are using original source material such as Roper and others trial transcripts, because St Thomas is funny and witty in those scenes (as was his hallmark) compared to the somewhat sour man with a modernist bent in the rest of the play/movie. St Thomas More, Ora pro Nobis!
This piece is very important: Thomas More was not a neo-liberal. On the contrary, Dialogue Concerning Heresies, which C. S. Lewis called the wittiest dialogue in the english language, is a strong defence of the English Inquisition. See especially book 4.