Jan Huss was ordained a priest in the first year of the fifteenth century—not an easy time to be a devout Christian. The church at the time was riddled with corruption. Huss was a university professor and preacher, and he became known as someone who would not hesitate to speak his mind. For a while he worked for the archbishop investigating miracle claims, but sadly he determined that most of the reported events were fraudulent get-rich-quick schemes. Could anyone be trusted? Everything was political in those days, with Huss’s homeland of Bohemia walking a tightrope of independence between the church and the Holy Roman Empire. For a while there were two popes, then three, with all of them excommunicating one another. Huss tried to stay neutral, focusing on the authority of Scripture rather than any pope. Finally Huss was called before a church council, and the authorities claimed that his teachings were heretical. Given a chance to renounce his words, Huss replied, “I would not, for a chapel full of gold, recede from the truth.” So Jan Huss was burned at the stake in 1415. Shortly before his death, he recited Psalm 53, an appropriate text for a good man in the midst of a corrupt generation.
from the: "One Year Book of Psalm"