St Thomas Becket
December 29
Thomas, the son of an English nobleman, Gilbert Becket, was born on the feast day of Saint Thomas the Apostle, 21 December 1117, in Southwark, England.
His first employment was in the office of the London police. There he was obliged to learn the various rights of the Church and of the state.
He was later employed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, who sent him on missions to Rome and permitted him to study civil law at the University of Bologna (Italy) for an entire year.
After a few years, witnessing his perfect service, the Archbishop made Thomas his Archdeacon, but his career was to be a stormy one, because while still a archdeacon of Canterbury, Thomas was appointed chancellor of England at the age of 36 against his will, by his friend King Henry II (great grandson of William the Conqueror)
When the Archbishop of Canterbury died, King Henry II, felt it advantageous to make his friend, chancellor Thomas, the archbishop of Canterbury, but Thomas gave King Henry II, a fair warning that he might not accept all of his political interference in Church affairs. Nevertheless, Thomas was made archbishop of Canterbury in 1162, and resigned his chancellorship and reformed his whole way of life!
Troubles began when King Henry II insisted upon usurping Church rights, when the king’s courtiers drew up a list of royal “customs” at Clarendon, where the parliament of the king was assembled, and King Henry obliged all the bishops as well as the lords to sign a promise to uphold these without permitting any restrictions whatsoever. Archbishop Thomas rejected the Constitutions of Clarendon, which would have denied the clergy the right of trial by a Church court and prevented them from making direct appeal to Rome.
Thomas then fled to France for safety and remained in exile for seven years under the protection of the generous King Louis VII, but later decided to returned to England to defend the rights of the Church. When he clearly knew that this would mean certain death, because he had refused to remit censures which he had placed upon bishops favored by King Henry II.
When Archbishop Thomas rebuked the King for persecuting the clergy, King Henry II cried out in a rage, “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest!”, hence Four knights, taking the words of the King as his wish, murdered Thomas in his cathedral at Canterbury on 29th December 1170 A.D.
His last words were: “To God and blessed Mary, to the patron Saint of this Church, and to St. Denis, I commend myself and the cause of the Faith”
A moment later he was struck down and his brain scattered over the pavement.
The reaction to this atrocious deed was immediate & enormous and checked the secularization of the Church for several centuries !
By popular acclaim St. Thomas Becket was immediately venerated as a Martyr, and within two years the martyred Archbishop was canonized by Pope Alexander III on Ash Wednesday, 1173 A.D.
Gloria Dei 
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