When the Titanic began to sink, a priest refused a lifeboat.
He stayed on deck, hearing confessions until the very last second.
Who was Fr. Thomas Byles, and what did he say before vanishing beneath the waves?
The Last Mass on the Titanic – a🧵✝️
Fr. Thomas Byles was an English Catholic priest, bound for New York to celebrate his brother’s wedding.
Born in Yorkshire the oldest of seven children, Thomas was the son of a Congregationalist minister. At Oxford while studying theology, he converted to the Church of England.
Later, like his younger brother William, he became a Roman Catholic and received the name Thomas.
When William invited his brother to come to New York City to officiate at his wedding 1912, Father Thomas planned to sail there.
His parishioners, who loved and appreciated him, helped pay for his trip with the White Star Line. At the last minute that trip was cancelled, and he was transferred to a new ship, the RMS Titanic.
It was April 10, 1912, when he boarded the RMS Titanic, carrying his breviary, his rosary and his personal belongings
On the morning of Divine Mercy Sunday (the week after Easter), Father Thomas celebrated Mass for the second-class passengers and then the third-class passengers.
The readings were about resurrection. Ironically, Father’s sermon was about spiritual shipwreck in times of temptation.
He said that prayer and the sacraments were like a spiritual lifeboat.
At 11:40 PM, the Titanic struck the iceberg. Chaos began. For the next two hours and forty minutes as the ship sank, he encouraged and comforted people.
He helped third-class passengers up to the lifeboats. It’s said that he refused to board a lifeboat two times.
Fr. Byles refused all offers to escape, moving instead between decks, hearing confessions, praying the Rosary, and calming the panicked.
Survivors recalled him standing on deck, surrounded by Catholics and non-Catholics alike, leading prayers in English, French, and Latin.
His calm voice rose above the cries and the storm: "Be calm, my good people!"
After all the lifeboats were launched, Father Thomas prayed the Rosary and other prayers, heard confessions, and absolved more than a hundred people who were trapped on the ship’s stern.
As the stern of the Titanic lifted into the night sky, witnesses saw him still at work, granting absolution, leading the Rosary, and commending souls to God.
His last words were a call to repentance and faith.
When the sea finally claimed the ship, Fr. Byles disappeared with his flock into the dark waters of the North Atlantic.
He was 42 years old.
Father perished with more than 1500 others.
Pope St. Pius X later called him a “martyr of the Church”
Today, his cause for canonization is open.
In the words of one survivor:
"We saw no fear in his face, only the light of Heaven. He was our lifeboat."
Father Thomas Byles, pray for us!
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