Blessed ROGER CADWALLADOR, Priest, 1610

THE ETERNAL PRIESTHOOD

Biography

A NATIVE of Herefordshire, very learned and a noted Greek scholar, he began his priestly labours in England about 1594, and during sixteen years won many souls to the Church. Apprehended on Easter Day, in the house of Mrs. Winefride Scroope, near Hereford, he acknowledged to the Protestant Bishop that he was a priest, and added that he supposed that this would not be against him with the Bishop, whose special concern it was to maintain the sacerdotal dignity. " For, my Lord, either you must admit yourself to be a priest, or I can prove you to be no Bishop." 

The Bishop, Herbert Westphaling (above) insisted that Christ was the only sacrificing priest of the New Testament, in that sense of the word, which is not common to all Christians, and hoped thus to free himself from being a priest. On which the Martyr replied, " Make that good, I pray you, my Lord, for so you will prove that I am no more a priest than other men, and consequently no traitor or offender against your law"; on which one, Holkins, to cover the Bishop's disgrace, said that the King himself had said that these kind of men were so numerous that he should never have done if he put them all to death.

"But this (Jesus) for that He continueth for ever hath an everlasting priesthood."—HEBR. vii. 24