Publisher's Synopsis
"The Catholic Church has been a part of English history since the arrival of Christian missionaries to Roman Britain in the first century after Christ. England was evangelized in these early centuries to such an extent that, by the time the Romans withdrew in the fifth century, the Celtic population was largely Catholic. Anglo-Saxon England, prior to the Norman Conquest, was a land of saints. From St. Bede, with his history of the early Church, to the holy king St. Edward the Confessor, Saxon England was ablaze with the light of Christ. During the reign of St. Edward, a vision of the Virgin at Walsingham placed the Mother of God on the throne as England's queen, the land being considered her dowry. Even following the Norman Conquest, the Faith continued to flourish and prosper, making its joyful presence felt in what would become known as Merrie England. Then in the sixteenth century, this Catholic heart was ripped from the people of En