Litany to Saint Edmund by the Society of St. Edmund
"Not only was the power of the Crown opposed to him, with its haughty pretensions and impatience of ecclesiastical control, not only were the rude and overbearing barons bent on defying his authority, but, harder still to be borne, the spirit of the world had invaded the Church herself. Relaxation of discipline had crept into the cloister and was fast undermining the monastic life. Mercenary foreigners, intruded into English benefices, sought only their own gain, instead of feeding the flock of Christ. The people were burdened with heavy taxation, the prelates and clergy being further crippled by the heavy subsidies levied on them to relieve the Pope's necessities.
When a man of Edmund's simple rectitude and elevation of character saw himself face to face with such abuses, he must needs attack and grapple with them. At the time of his elevation to the primacy (1233) Henry III had just escaped from the trammels of a long minority. He loved to surround himself with foreigners, with whom he constantly endeavored to fill every office in Church and State. Although he was far from possessing the ungovernable temper of his grandfather, or the irreligious and sad disposition of his father, he was weak and wilful, and, like them, determined to stretch the royal prerogative, and usurp rights which brought him into conflict with the Church. The Archbishop addressed to him a strong remonstrance on his neglect of his subjects, the preference he showed for aliens, his practice of keeping episcopal sees and benefices vacant, and otherwise despoiling the Church. By a threat of excommunication, he compelled him to dismiss Peter des Roches, his unworthy counselor, together with his adherents.
When the King found that the primate was not to be moved from the attitude he had at the outset assumed of defending the rights of clergy and laity against royal oppression, he took the resolution of asking the Pope to send a legate to England. He rightly calculated that the straits to which the Holy Father was driven by the Emperor Frederick would naturally lead him to conciliate the King of England as much as possible, in order that he might consent to the demand of a tenth of the ecclesiastical revenues which was made on behalf of the see of Rome.
(...)
His chief motive in desiring the Legate to be sent was the idea that his superior ecclesiastical authority would act as a counterpoise to the archbishop's influence, and serve to nullify his opposition to the royal measures. St. Edmund entered an energetic protest against the presence of the Legate. It proved, as he anticipated, no small embarrassment to him. Although the Legate acted with discretion, yet his authority in virtue of his office enabled him to supersede the archbishop's authority, to annul his decisions and revoke his sentences. At one time when the difficulties of his position pressed hard upon St. Edmund, it was said that St. Thomas of Canterbury appeared to him, bidding him be steadfast and act manfully. Taking his hand, he passed it over his head, that he might feel the scar of his fatal wound, bidding Edmund suffer death as he did, rather than relinquish any of the liberties and franchises of Holy Church.
St. Edmund's persistent protests were unavailing. "Seeing," says the Chronicler, Matthew Paris, "the Church in England to be day by day more trodden underfoot, robbed of her possessions, despoiled of her liberties, life became unsupportable to him, and he could not endure to see the evils which were upon the land.' Mortified and baffled on every side; persecuted by the bad; misrepresented by the good; supported by hardly any, even of those who were bound by their sacred office to support him; opposed by the monks, who sought to emancipate themselves from episcopal jurisdiction, and by the bishops, who resisted his attempts to make a visitation of the diocese of London, he presently withdrew from the unequal contest. Like St. Thomas and Stephen Langton, he took refuge within the abbey of Pontigny (France), which thus for the third time opened its hospitable portals to shelter a persecuted archbishop of Canterbury, forced to exile himself from his native land. Death followed quickly on his flight; he expired at Soissy within twelve months after quitting these shores."
A Short History of the Catholic Church in England Bp. William Robert Bernard Brownlow Catholic Truth Society, 1895 page 230
Prayer to Our Lady and St. John by St. Edmund
"O happy and spotless and blessed for ever; O matchless and incomparable virgin, Mother of God, Mary, most acceptable temple of God, sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, gate of the kingdom of Heaven, through whom, after God, the whole world lives; inclines the eyes of thy compassion to my unworthy prayers, and be to me, a sinner, compassionate and helpful in all things. O most blessed John, familiar friend of Christ, who by the same our Lord Jesus Christ was chosen as a virgin and loved by Him above all the rest, who was made partaker, beyond all others, of heavenly secrets, who didst become His glorious apostle and evangelist; I call upon thee also along with Mary, mother of the same Savior, that thou wouldst deign along with her to bestow thine aid on me.
O ye two heavenly jewels, Mary and John together! O ye two luminaries glittering with Divine Splendor in God's presence! by your beams dissipate the mists of my vices. Ye are the twain in whom God the Father, by His only Son built up a house for Himself; in whom also the only-begotten Son of God the Father, out of regard for undefiled virginity, confirmed the special privilege of His love. Whilst hanging on the Cross, He said to the one: "Woman, behold thy son!" Then He said to the other, "Behold thy mother!" In the tenderness of that most holy love whereby, at that time, ye were united together as mother and son, according to the Divine pronouncement, I, a sinner, on this day, commend to you both my body and my soul; that, every hour and every moment, you would deign to be my steadfast protectors within and without, and to be my kind mediators with God. For I firmly believe and undoubtedly confess that your will is God's will; and what you will not, that God does not will. Hence, whatever you ask of God, that you obtain without delay.
Through that most powerful efficacy which belongs to you of right ask for me health of body and soul. Be it your care, I entreat, to obtain for me by your invincible prayers that the sweet Spirit may visit my heart and deign to dwell there; that He may cleanse it from all defilement of sin; that He may adorn it with all virtues; that He would cause me to stand perfect and to persevere in the love of God and my neighbor; and that, after this life's course is run, He would bring me to the joys of His elect. This I ask of the generous Paraclete, the best Bestower of graces, who, consubstantial and co-eternal with Father and Son, with Them and in Them, liveth and reigneth, Almighty God, in the midst of His saints. Amen."
Life of St. Edmund of Canterbury by Rev. Fr. Wilfrid Wallace 1893
