Martyr's Memorial

Being in Oxford is like stepping into a storybook in some ways. I’ve read about so many of these places and colleges that they feel about as real as something out of Lord of the Rings. Ironically, being here feels like stepping into a legend or myth rather than making everything here come to life and feel real. I would only be slightly surprised if I ran into Gandalf down the street.

One of the exceptions to this is the Martyr’s Memorial. This is the memorial erected in the early 1800’s by the Evangelicals of Oxford, keen to demonstrate the un-English and un-Protestant character of the burgeoning Oxford Movement. The monument was built of three of the key English martyrs of the Reformation, burnt to death for their commitment to the belief that only faith in the Lord Jesus’ death can give us the certain hope we need that the problem of our sins is resolved. These three, Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer stand at the top of the monument with an inscription at the base, and look down over the bustling traffic in one of the busier intersections of Oxford.

I’d read about this monument and seen pictures of it. Read about how it isn’t the actual site of their death but is a few hundred metres from the actual site (in the middle of the road not far from there). Read how it was built in the nest of Oxford Movement churches and other hotbeds of Tractarianism (and still sits just next to a church which religiously says High Mass regularly). Read how important it was in the psyche of the early Evangelical Anglicans as a protest against a movement which stood for all they most feared and hated… I remember reading the service of the opening of the memorial and realising just how important it was in its time for the Evangelical movement.

But when I actually saw it, what struck me the most was the weary, lined faces of Ridley, Latimer and Cranmer. These were old men, not burning with the zeal of youth, like Frith and some of the other martyrs of the time (whose deaths were no less tragic). But Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer were men at the time of their life when they should have been honoured and treated with civility and respect. And I could suddenly think of several men and women I know who would be around their age (or older) and who would make the same choice as Ridley and Latimer, and ultimately Cranmer, if the same history were played out today.
It wouldn’t just be a tragedy for me if these people were killed for their faith; it would be an outrage and a scandal. I couldn’t imagine hearing of their having died for their faith, let alone being part of a crowd watching them being treated so shamefully.

So the men at the top of the memorial are more than mere legend for me. They were real, old men, who probably had aching bones and failing eyesight, and yet valiant hearts and clear minds in the face of death. The memorial to them and their bravery for the cause of Christ is as valuable now as it was in the day it was built. JMB