Before the Mayflower: Pilgrims and Priests

. . . G.K. Chesterton once famously remarked, “In America, they have a feast to celebrate the arrival of the Pilgrims. Here in England, we should have a feast to celebrate their departure.” Despite their disdain for Catholicism, it is one of the great ironies of American history that the Mayflower's Puritan Pilgrims owe their very survival in the New World – indirectly at least - to the Catholic Church. It’s a reality that would have made the pilgrims wince, but there would have been no Thanksgiving without Pope Paul III and a group of Spanish Jesuit priests. It's a complicated story, but it's worth telling. . . .