Summary
The first events of the English Reformation occurred Alongside Henry
VIII's sensational divorce proceedings. Henry himself was not a
Protestant, and the great majority of the English people, though
they may have been somewhat anti-clerical, were, at the time, piously
devoted to the Catholic Church. In the 1520s, Lutheranism had made
some inroads at the university of Cambridge, and the leading English
Protestant of that decade, William Tyndale, had created some sensation
when he fled England in 1524 to translate the bible into English
and conduct a pamphlet war with Sir Thomas More. Henry himself
was very much opposed to the spread of Lutheran and other Protestant
doctrines, his 1534 break with Rome notwithstanding
In July 1536, Henry's government issued the Ten Articles,
which upheld traditional Catholic teachings on the sacraments of
the altar, penance, and baptism. In 1537, the other four traditional
sacraments of confirmation, holy matrimony, holy orders, and extreme unction
were defended in an official primer called The Institutions of
a Christian Man, also known as "The Bishops' Book." Henry demonstrated
a more firm commitment to Catholic theology with the 1539 passage
through Parliament of the Six Articles. These articles stated that
the Church of England upheld the traditional doctrines of Transubstantiation,
celibacy for priests, the inviolability of monastic vows, the legality
of private masses, and the necessity for oral confessions to a
priest. Parliament next passed a statute that appointed penalties
for violations of the Six Articles.
At the same time, obedience to the authority of the Roman Church
was made treason, punishable by death. Sir Thomas More, who had
resigned the chancellorship in 1532 because he could no longer
support conscientiously Henry's schismatic actions, was executed
for treason in June 1535. Bishop John Fisher was also executed
that summer, along with six monks and several other priests who
would not swear loyalty to the new regime. Catholics looked upon
these men as saintly martyrs. Henry later proved equally cruel to
Protestants, having a number of them burned at the stake for heresy.
1536 brought the dissolution of Catholic monastaries throughout
England. Henry ordered that the vast tracts of land owned by Catholic
bishops and by the religious communities be taken over by the new
regime, and the lands were handed over both to members of the nobility
and other loyal laymen, as well as to conforming clergymen who
embraced the new order and renounced their allegiance to the pope.
Many of the old monastic buildings were destroyed, along with some
libraries and works of art–depictions of Catholic saints and of
Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, were targetted particularly.
In 1538, Henry ordered a campaign against relics–preserved body
parts of saints and other objects considered to be holy by Catholics–and
the 350-year-old tomb of Thomas Becket of Canterbury, medieval
England's most beloved saint, was destroyed.
Aside from individual opposition by monks and men such
as More and Fisher, Henry's newly named Church of England saw one major
movement against it while Henry reigned as king. In October 1536,
there was an uprising under a man named Robert Aske in northern
England. The rebels called the movement the Pilgrimage of Grace,
and among them were groups of Catholic monks. Henry sent his able
general Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk to quash the uprising. The
rebels were executed for treason in 1537. To further establish
the supremacy of the Church of England and to control more eficiently
places such as the northern counties which were far from London
and the primary seat of the Church at Canterbury, Henry established
six new episcopal sees–Oxford, Chester, Gloucester, Bristol, Peterborough,
and Westminster.
Analysis
A primary point of contention among English Reformation
scholars is the nature of Henry's break with Rome. They debate
whether it was a political and jurisdictional separation from the
Papacy or a doctrinal reform that paved the way for Protestant
Christianity? The issue is complicated by both Henry's known commitment
to orthodox Catholic theology and his simultaneous elevation and
loyal, long-term support of the Protestant-minded Archbishop Thomas
Cranmer.
