So why, one should ask, would anyone note this date? One more religious figure from long ago, killed in a long-forgotten dispute.
These things happen. Move on.
OS hopes you pause a moment, and give a few minutes to the old Archbishop. He still has something to teach us, a huge gift to give us, if we will let him.
Cranmer's life really mattered.
It isn't how or when Thomas Cranmer died, or even the particulars of the political intrigues that finally led him to the stake.
It's what he did with the time he was given, and what he left behind for all of us. The PowersThatBe of his day indeed did kill him, but they were unable to kill his words. He, more than any other individual, was responsible for the Book of Common Prayer. His words helped shape a common theology that held England and the English-speaking world together when all else was flying apart, both in his time, and the centuries that followed. His words, indeed, shaped much of the English language as we know it, much as Martin Luther's translation of the Bible into German helped form and unify that language.
Whether you know it or not, Cranmer's words resonate inside your head:
DEERELY beloved frendes, we are gathered together here in the syght of God, and in the face of his congregacion, to joyne together this man and this woman in holy matrimonie, which is an honorable estate instituted of God in paradise, in the time of mannes innocencie, signifying unto us the misticall union that is betwixte Christe and his Churche:
Lyghten our darkenes we beseche thee, O lord, & by thy great mercy defende us from all perilles and daungers of thys nyght, for the love of thy onely sonne, our saviour Jesu Christ. Amen.
Of course, we now read them and hear them in less of a 16th-century usage and spelling. But they are his words nonetheless. Cranmer knew that words have great power, for good or ill, and wished them only to to convey truth. His only regret, as he died, was that at points earlier in his life, he had failed in the right use of words, and prayed for forgiveness.
His murderers, although then in power, are now reviled. Cranmer's words are woven into the fabric of the world's most successful and ubiquitous language.
In these days, when darkness seems to descend, it is good to remember this.
'Lighten our darkness, we beseech thee, oh Lord...'
Here's a short video assembled in honor of Cranmer's words:
And, a big HT to today's Cranmer, the great English wordsmith and blogger.
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