The resistance to the crowned monster Henry VIII, by the London Carthusians, an order famed and loved for its service to the poor of London, rings down through the centuries. Blessed Richard Bere is one of seven of their number who were chained to posts standing and left to starve to death in Newgate prison. A word by them would have gained them release from their dreadful human fate. That word was not given. Blessed Richard Bere died on August 9, 1537. Think of him the next time you sing these lines:
Our Fathers, chained in prisons dark,
Were still in heart and conscience free:
How sweet would be their children’s fate,
If they, like them, could die for thee!
