Fr. Thomas - Campaign for Sainthood
A campaign is under way to have the Catholic priest who stayed on RMS Titanic instead of fleeing on a lifeboat made a saint.
A campaign is under way to have the Catholic priest who stayed
on RMS Titanic instead of fleeing on a lifeboat made a saint.
Father Thomas Byles, of St Helen's Church, Chipping Ongar, Essex,
boarded the ship at Southampton to attend his younger brother's
wedding in New York.
But when it sank in 1912 he twice refused to join a lifeboat and
instead remained with passengers to pray.
The current priest at St Helen's Church said Father Byles should be
canonised.
Father Byles, educated in Fleetwood, Lancashire and Oxford, had
been rector at St Helen's for eight years when he died.
He had celebrated Mass for second and third class passengers on
board the ship, most notably on the morning of the tragedy.
His sermon alluded to prayers and sacraments being spiritual
lifeboats when in danger from the spiritual shipwreck of temptation.
His actions before perishing with 1,500 others aboard the Titanic
were praised by Pope Pius X.
Father Graham Smith, current priest of St Helen's, said: "He's an
extraordinary man who gave his life for others.
"We need, in very old parlance, to raise him to the altar which
means that the Vatican will recognise him as a martyr of the
church.
"We are hoping and praying that he will be recognised as one of
the saints within our canon."
To be canonised - made a saint - at least two miracles must be
attributed to the intercession of a candidate.
A phenomenon is accepted by the Holy See as a miracle once
certified by doctors as having no medical explanation.
Father Smith said: "We hope people around the world will pray to
him if they are in need and, if a miracle occurs, then beatification
and then canonisation can go forward."
