Why is Thomas Becket's shrine at Canterbury?

Answer 1

Thomas Becket was Arch bishop of Canterbury from 1162 to 1170. He was murdered in 1170 and is considered a saint and a martyr by Roman Catholic church for standing up against King Henry II of England for rights and privileges of the church.

Answer 2

There were probably a number of reasons for the shrine of Thomas Becket becoming important.

One was that people of that time liked going on pilgrimages. And since not everyone could go to the Holy Land, and later practically no one could go there, people went to other places. Going to a shrine closer to home was far more convenient, especially since travel was so slow.

People liked having a saint of their own nation.

Clearly some people, and this applied especially to anyone who was neither a king nor likely to become one (in other words, practically everyone) liked the idea of having a saint to stood up to the king.

For historical reasons, it would be important if only to be the destination of the pilgrims in Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales.

People like to take off work, and having a pilgrim destination gave them a way to do it. Since Canterbury was close to London, it was a good place to go. Pilgrims from the North and much of the West, could use the pilgrimage as an excuse to go there.

Some of the people who went there wanted to venerate the saint for not other reason than that he was a saint.

Answer 3

Henry VIII wanted to permanently end the Catholic religion throughout England and confiscate all church property, land and wealth for himself. He wanted all centres of Catholicism such as monasteries "put beyond use" (meaning destroyed) and all ordinary centres of worship brought under his personal control.

One of the results of this policy is that almost every Holy shrine in England was destroyed, since (1) these were the shrines of Saints created by the Catholic Church and they were the centres of pilgrimage for huge numbers of people; and (2) they included enormous quantities of treasure, both set into the shrines themselves and in the form of money and goods donated to the shrine by pilgrims.

St Thomas Becket's shrine was the most important, largest and most valuable shrine in England, so it became the focus of a policy of royal destruction, vandalism and theft which extended across the whole country.