Bl. Richard Gwyn

Richard lived in England when Queen Elizabeth I was the ruler. Queen Elizabeth was trying to get rid of the Catholic Church in England and she treated all Catholics very badly. Richard was not born Catholic but learned about the Catholic faith as an adult. When he heard the Good News about Jesus, he began to believe and was baptized. Once he started to follow the Catholic faith, people tried to catch him to throw him into prison. He was put into prison because of his faith and he was treated very badly. Still, he refused to give up his faith. No matter what the prison guards did to him, he always stood up for his faith in Jesus through the Catholic Church. He wrote beautiful poems, which we can still read today, about his faith and his hope that one day his country of England would accept the Catholic faith again. The Queen’s guards tried to get Richard to tell them who the other Catholics were so that they could also throw them into prison, but Richard refused. He was taken to the Queen’s court and people made up lies about him so that the judge would sentence him to death. He was martyred for his faith and suffered very much, but while he was dying he proclaimed, “Jesus, have mercy on me!” He never gave up on his faith no matter what happened.