Feast of St Thorlak
Among the more obscure saints of the Advent season is St. Thorlak Thorhallsson (1133-1193), a medieval Icelandic monk and bishop of Skaholt famous for his attempts to reform and purify his nation’s churches and monasteries. His feast day is December 23, which is marked in Iceland by a meal of skate hash, similar to lutefisk, whose plain charms make the Christmas feast more appealing. It is also a day for decorating the Yule tree and shopping for last-minute gifts.
Though Thorlak was well-known in his native country it was not until 1984 that he was canonized by Pope John Paul II and named patron saint of Iceland.
1588
The murder of the Duke de Guise
The French Wars of Religion had raged for nearly 40 years and had divided France into three armed camps, each recognizing someone named Henri as the true ruler. The king was Henri III, of the Valois dynasty, leader of the royalist, moderate Catholic party nicknamed les Politiques, so called because they were said to value political stability above religious truth. He was opposed by Henri of Navarre, the leader of the French Protestants, and Henri, the Duke de Guise, who led the ultra-Catholic League. Guise had driven the king from Paris and allied himself with the Spanish to exterminate Protestantism in western Europe.
On December 23, 1588 Henry III invited his cousin, the Duke de Guise to his palace at Blois under the pretext of discussing a truce. There he was set upon by the royal bodyguard and murdered. The next day, his brother Louis, the Cardinal de Guise, was also assassinated. Henri III did not survive much longer; in August 1589 he was murdered by a young Catholic fanatic disguised as a priest. This left Henri de Navarre, the Protestant claimant, as the last man standing. Realizing the majority of Frenchmen would accept only a Catholic as king, Navarre converted and ended the French Wars of Religion.