English Martyrs gave their live so the Catholicism could be preserved - Homily by Fr Ray Staunton.

Walsingham Catholic TV Feast of the English Martyrs - 4th May 2016
On November 22, 1987, Pope John Paul II beatified Blessed George Haydock and 84 other men who died for their faith in England during the Reformation. The rite of beatification at St. Peter’s in Rome was a notable British celebration. A large delegation from England and Wales was on hand: 32 bishops, 300 priests, and a crowd of layfolk, including blood descendants of 12 of the new “blesseds”.
The beatification crowned a study of the deaths of the 85 candidates that had lasted for 12 years, and had produced seven volumes of information, totaling 2667 pages, about their lives and deaths.
The time of these martyrdoms extended from 1584, when Bl. William Carter, a printer, was hanged, until 1679, when the last of the 85 died on the scaffold – Blessed Charles Meehan, an Irish Franciscan priest. Most of the group were diocesan priests; a few like Blessed Charles belonged to religious orders; and 22 were laymen of various estate: landowners, teachers, a bartender, a stableboy, etc
As they represented every level of society, so they represented every adult age from the 20’s to the 80’s. The government books declared that they had been executed for “treason” or “felony”. What the historical investigation proved was that the priests’ “treason” was simply that they had been ordained as priests and went about Britain fulfilling their priestly duties. A law of 1585 had declared that any Catholic priest who ministered in England was by that fact a traitor, deserving of hanging.
The non-priests of the group were not condemned for treason, but for aiding these “traitors”. They had opened their homes to the Catholics for Mass; they had hidden the priests from the police; they had done them a thousand loyal services to show their devotion and gratitude. They had, so to speak, offered these “apostles” a “cup of cold water”. But this sort of aid to priests was a felony according to the anti-Catholic law; and felony, too, was punishable by death. These laity, therefore, collaborated gladly with the clergy for the glory of God, even to the point of sharing death with them.

–Father Robert F. McNamara