The Injustices of the Protestant Revolt Continue: Richard III to be Buried in Protestant Church

Richard III
From Wiki, public domain.

Edit: The current story of the finding of Richard III at BBC, the Telegraph,  is a story of forensics.  Many are no doubt interested, for the fascination which is history, to find out if the body which has been exhumed is indeed that of the last English King slain in battle, but it's also a forensic question of religion.   The church itself, which is Greyfriars church in Leicester, was destroyed during the Protestant Revolt. Richard III was himself not a protestant, and had he lived to see the Protestant Revolt which disturbed his final resting place and lost his bones to posterity in the first place, it is very possible he would have reacted quite differently than his successors of the family which usurped him by keeping England in the proper religion.

As one reader informs us, since Leicester was a Dominican establishment, it's unclear why local Dominicans haven't raised any objections, but things being as they are in the Catholic Church these days, it's perhaps not surprising.  They do say the Immemorial Mass of All Ages, which is a Mass Richard III would have recognized.

While waiting for a confirmation as to whether or not the recently discovered remains are indeed those of the English Monarch, Richard III, there is at least the confirmation that he will be interred in Leicester Cathedral, an Anglican Settlement.

Earlier, in September, before anyone else, we suggested that the King should not be interred in a Protestant church with their rites, which Richard III would likely not have approved or wanted to participate in as a Roman Catholic.  In any case, given the growing influence of the Catholic Church in the UK and the increasing insignificance of the Anglican Church, it would be a wonderful ecumenical gesture on the part of the Church of England to allow us to bury one of our own, however villainous he might have been.

Moreover, there is still a Bishop who is familiar with the Sarum Rite, who is capable of performing the Mass.  His Lordship, Bishop Conti, is certainly available for such a service and has said the ancient and disused Rite before.  There were suggestions about a York Rite, but there is no one alive who is familiar with it.

Indeed, since aboriginals receive preferential consideration when it comes to these questions, shouldn't Catholics, who've been so brutally persecuted in English history, also receive some due consideration? It's unlikely that this will sway anyone's mind, but at least it serves to point out the hypocrisy.

It's also the case, if any are concerned of such things in the Catholic hierarchy in England, that since Richard III is a Catholic, his body being christened, his forehead being sealed with confession, his lips uttering our holy prayers, and his knees bent in veneration to our Saints.  It was perhaps as he died, that he may have uttered an act of contrition for his sins.

It would also be an interesting point, since Richard III was a Catholic, that the Sarum Rite, which was widely the use of his time and how he was buried, be revived to accommodate him.   It is of course, in such a Mass, that prayers, getting back to the idea of forensics, could be recited for this Catholic King, which might serve for his salvation, which is, after all, what the Church is for.

Reinterring the King according to the Rite he knew, in his own religion is not only just in purely human terms, but it is also the right thing to do in God's own time.