Story
Saint Alban.
The martyr Alban is honored as the first martyr of the island of Britain. His feast is celebrated in England and Wales on the 22nd of the month of June.
His Early Life
He was a pagan, raised in the city of Verulamium, now the city of St Albans, in Hertfordshire.
Though he was a pagan, when the fires of persecution were kindled in the days of the Emperor Diocletian and his co-regent Maximian, he opened his house to a Christian priest to shelter him there.
Alban met the priest and was greatly moved by him, and received instruction from him and was baptized.
His Martyrdom:
The governor heard that the preacher of the Christian religion who was sought for arrest was hidden in Alban's house, so he sent some of the soldiers. When Alban saw them from afar, he exchanged garments with the priest, so that the latter might flee and escape from their hands. As for Alban, he gave himself up to the soldiers, who brought him before the governor and found him standing before a pagan altar offering a sacrifice.
Alban took off the priestly garments, and his true identity was revealed, a thing which greatly angered the governor. So he demanded that he offer sacrifice to the idols or be put to death, saying to him: "Since you have chosen to conceal a man who profanes the sacred things and a blasphemer, the one whom you ought to have handed over to the guard I had sent, you shall receive the punishment unless you join with us in our worship."
And when the man refused to join in, he asked him his name, and he answered: "Why do you ask about my family? If you wish to know my religion, I am a Christian." And when he asked him again for his name, he said: "My father called me Alban."
The judge bade him not to waste his time, but to offer to the idols; and he refused, and the two entered into a debate together.
The ruler ordered him to be scourged, in the hope that he might be deterred; and seeing him face the lashes with joy, he ordered him to be put to death.
The multitudes heard of this, and all of them set out, of both sexes and of every age, to cross over a bridge to the other side where he was to be martyred. And because the numbers were so vast, the martyr found no opportunity to cross over with the soldiers. The saint, longing for this to be accomplished quickly, asked the soldiers to set out toward the river (a watercourse called the Ver, which still flows between his present church and the area of Verulam). It is told in his biography that he lifted up his eyes to heaven to dry up a path for them so that he might cross, and with him thousands of the multitudes setting out toward a hill facing the city. There the executioner cast his sword upon the ground, declaring that he was a Christian; so one of the soldiers struck them both with the sword, that they might receive the crown of martyrdom