The English Reformation

Podcast Transcript

For centuries, England was one of Europe’s great Catholic kingdoms.

Then, in the span of a single generation, it broke from Rome, closed its monasteries, executed saints and reformers, and created a church unlike any other in Europe.

What began with a king’s marriage crisis became a religious and political revolution that changed England forever.

Learn more about the English Reformation and how it unfolded on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

The single most important player in the English Reformation was King Henry VII, so understanding him is key to understanding the events that unfolded.

Henry VIII was born in 1491 as the second son of King Henry VII. As the spare son, he was seen less as a child and more as a political bargaining chip.

However, this changed after the death of his older brother, Prince Arthur, in 1502. Henry then became the heir apparent, and he was betrothed to his brother’s widow, Catherine of Aragon, the daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, in order to keep the alliance between England and Spain.

The betrothal to Catherine of Aragon was fairly controversial due to a passage in the Bible stating that you cannot have intimate relations with your brother’s wife. However, at this time, to be considered married, you had to have consummated the marriage.

Catherine of Aragon denied ever having done so with Prince Arthur, who died at the age of 15, giving the betrothed couple and their families a reason to argue that they could be married.

After bringing the matter to the Catholic Church, the Pope at the time, Julius II, approved the union by agreeing that Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon were exempt from the rule.

When Henry VIII became king in April 1509 at age 17, he was popular for his athleticism and intelligence, and he married Catherine soon after.

For all intents and purposes, Henry VIII’s early reign was fairly optimistic. He made popular political changes, such as arresting and executing the disliked ministers Edmund Dudley and Richard Empson, and increasing spending.

Like previous English kings, Henry VIII waged costly and unproductive campaigns against the French, in contrast to his father’s thriftier approach. Because he was generous with his money, he had a lavish and popular court.

In the background of Henry VIII’s rule, the ideas of Martin Luther were starting to spread in England.

The Protestant Reformation challenged the Catholic Church and the Pope’s authority, fueled by resentment over the practice of selling indulgences for salvation. Martin Luther contended that salvation was a divine gift rather than a financial transaction, a belief that spurred the rise of new Christian denominations like Lutheranism and Calvinism across Europe.

When these ideas reached England, some people became Protestant, but Henry VIII remained loyal to the Catholic Church. In fact, in 1521, Henry wrote or sponsored a defense of the seven sacraments against Luther, for which Pope Leo X awarded him the title “Defender of the Faith.”

However, there was a problem. Catherine had not produced a male heir.

This was a huge deal, especially for Henry, as his family, the Tudors, had only recently taken power after the War of the Roses, with his father being the first monarch of the Tudor Dynasty.

By 1525, Catherine of Aragon had been pregnant 6 times, with only one resulting in a healthy child, Mary. With Catherine turning 40, she was considered barren, and Henry, at 34, wasn’t getting any younger. He was especially frustrated as he had produced illegitimate sons, leading him to blame the lack of a male heir entirely on Catherine

Desperate for a male heir and to secure the family line, Henry decided he needed to divorce Catherine.

The problem with divorcing Catherine was that, under the Catholic teaching, he was not able to do so. This was especially frustrating because he already had a new wife in mind, Anne Boleyn.

Henry was likely infatuated with Anne Boleyn because of her refusal to become his mistress. He went to Pope Clement VII asking for him to annul his marriage on the grounds that it should’ve never been allowed because she was his brother’s widow.

However, a previous pope went out of his way to approve the marriage, and the Church wasn’t going to completely reverse its position.

This set Henry on a collision course with the Catholic Church.

Henry sent Cardinal Thomas Wolsey to plead his case, but the Pope refused the annulment. Frustrated, Henry had Wolsey arrested.

Henry had hired a new royal advisor, Thomas Cromwell, who went to Parliament to decide how to handle the divorce.

Parliament passed several acts limiting the Catholic Church’s influence over England, leading to religious reforms.

In 1532, two important acts were passed that weakened the Catholic Church’s power in England.

The first was the Act Against Annates. Annates were restricted payments, also known as “first fruits,” which newly appointed bishops had traditionally paid to the pope. This was important because the money being taxed would’ve gone to the Pope. By doing this, the English government was effectively cutting off payments being sent to Rome.

Another act appointed Thomas Cranmer as Archbishop of Canterbury, usurping the Pope’s authority. After approval, Cranmer declared Henry’s marriage to Catherine invalid. Henry and Anne married the next week.

In response to Henry and Anne’s marriage, the Pope excommunicated Henry. The goal in excommunication is for the person to repent until they are rehabilitated and welcomed back into the church.

However, excommunicating Henry did not lead to the result the Pope wanted. Instead of sitting back and thinking about his sins, Henry and Parliament decided to fully break from the Roman Catholic Church.

The 1533 Act in Restraint of Appeals declared that England was an “empire,” meaning a sovereign realm not subject to any foreign jurisdiction. This prevented appeals to Rome in all religious matters.

Shortly after this act, two more followed in 1534, the Act of the Submission of the Clergy and the Act of Succession. They essentially stated that the King was the Supreme Head of the Church of England.

After separating from the Pope, loyal Catholic clergy and faithful had to choose between the King and faith. Refusal meant possible execution.

The wealth of the monasteries was transferred to the crown, but much of the land was quickly sold or granted to nobles and gentry. This created a powerful class of landowners with a vested interest in the Reformation settlement. Once monastic property had passed into private hands, restoring the old Church would become much harder.

Many of these decisions were likely influenced by Anne Boleyn, who is often considered to have been a Protestant even before the marriage. Because of this status, she is often believed to have influenced Henry’s appointment of new Bishops and to have spread Lutheran ideas.

You would think that after going through all of that effort to marry, the couple would be happy together, but the reality proved very different. Their partnership quickly became tumultuous.

The country’s break with the Catholic Church, peasant disapproval, and court division added to the couple’s poor relationship.

Anne was opinionated and independent. She did not give Henry a son, but instead a daughter, Elizabeth.

At the same time, England was in chaos, as a peasant rebellion against Henry’s religious reforms broke out in 1536, known as the Pilgrimage of Grace. Between 20,000 and 40,000 people rebelled against the King.

When Henry confronted the group, he promised them a pardon and thanked them for bringing their issues to his attention. In reality, Henry quickly went back on his promise and had hundreds of the rebels executed, creating more fear in the country.

The religious tension with the country was strong, but Henry had another problem. He wanted to end his relationship with Anne Boleyn and enter into a new union with one of his mistresses, Jane Seymour.

However, Henry couldn’t just divorce her, as he had quite literally changed the entire religious foundation of all of England to divorce Catherine to marry Anne. If he had divorced Anne, he would have effectively undermined his religious reforms.

This led to Henry accusing Anne of committing adultery, which was treason against the King. He also used the technicality that, because Anne’s sister had previously been one of his mistresses, their marriage should be annulled. This worked; their marriage ended, and Anne was beheaded for treason.

Henry had four more wives. Because of the new legal basis within England, Henry was able to circumvent the Catholic Church and marry and leave these women as he saw fit. Although none of these marriages technically ended in divorce, his separation from each of these women was made far easier by controlling the church.

A large portion of the religious reforms within England occurred between Henry’s divorce of Catherine and the beheading of Anne.

In many ways, England’s new religion under Henry was superficially similar to Catholicism, with the main differences being that Henry was now the Head of the Church of England and that they severed the connection with Rome.

However, true transformation in the Church of England began only after Henry’s son by Jane Seymour, Edward VI, ascended the throne and began implementing more significant religious reforms in 1547.

Despite Edward being just nine years old when he ascended the throne, he, or more accurately, his advisors, began building his own church with Protestant ideals.

The first major change came about in 1548 with the Order of the Communion. This series shaped England’s new theology, in which masses and prayers had a more Protestant orientation. One of the most notable of these ideas was that Confessions no longer had to be said only to a Priest and could instead be said with the entire Congregation.

Additionally, in 1549, the Book of Common Prayer was authorized, translating worship from Latin into English, allowing common folk in England to understand their prayers.

However, before Edward could enact more reforms, he fell ill and died at the age of 15.

This led to his sister, Catherine’s daughter, Mary, taking over as Queen of England.

Mary was a devout Catholic, so during her five-year reign between 1553 and 1558, she worked to reverse Edward and Henry’s policies and shift the country back towards Catholicism.

Masses were returned to Latin, and Mary began punishing anyone who did not embrace the Catholic Church. This led to many Protestants being executed for heresy during her reign, earning her the nickname “Bloody Mary.”

Despite Protestant pushback, Mary’s restoration of the Catholic church was fairly successful, although short-lived. There were too many parties in England at this point with a vested interest in protestantism.

After Mary died in 1558, her sister and Anne Boleyn’s daughter, Elizabeth, became Queen.

Elizabeth was restored to the line of succession after she took a vow to embrace the Catholic faith during Mary’s reign. Despite this vow, Elizabeth was a Protestant and ruled accordingly, appointing Protestants to the court.

Additionally, shortly after Elizabeth came into power, Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy, re-establishing England’s independence from Rome. As a result, Elizabeth became the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, rather than the Supreme Head, a word choice that was carefully chosen.

With this power, Elizabeth revised the Book of Common Prayer to appeal more to Lutherans and Catholics. She also made sure to outline the Church’s power in greater detail. Many of her changes kept both groups relatively content.

In 1570, Pope Pius V excommunicated Elizabeth and declared her illegitimate. This was a turning point. It made English Catholic loyalty suspect in the eyes of the government. If the pope said Elizabeth was not the rightful queen, then Catholics could be seen not merely as religious dissenters, but as potential traitors.

What separated the English Reformation from the Protestant Reformation in Continental Europe was the extent to which it was intertwined with power. There certainly was a theological underpinning, but the ultimate driver was the king’s control over the church. If Catherine had a son, or if Henry were content with a daughter, history would have unfolded very differently.