Question

In your response, be sure to address all parts of the question. Use complete sentences; an outline or bulleted list alone is not acceptable.

a) Describe one cause of the Protestant Reformation in England during the reign of Henry VIII (1509–1547).

Answer 1

In England, the Reformation originated from King Henry VIII's urge to set aside his aunt, Catherine of Aragon (1485-1536) for not having given him a male heir. In 1533 Henry married Anne Boleyn (1507-1536), whom he had made pregnant; the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer (1489-1556), annulled the union with Catherine. When annulment was unconstitutional, Henry's response was the 1534 Act of Supremacy, which made England's King supreme head of the church.

Henry VIII did not believe himself to be a Protestant. In his eyes the Church of England founded by the Supremacy Act was a Catholic body. Henry wanted to preserve Catholic traditions and practices, doing little more than abolishing monasteries, and rejecting the role of the pope as head of the English church. Inevitably, his policies provoked resistance, in part from English Roman Catholics who deeply resented the break with Rome, and even more from conservative Protestants, who began to incorporate within the Church of England such Protestant rituals as the marriage of the clergy, the use of English rather than Latin in the rite, and the abolition of confession to priests and the invocation of saints.

Henry used intimidation against the Catholic opposition and had some of his members killed. Instead he sought to stem the Catholic tide by making an appeal to Parliament. Parliament adopted the law of the Six Articles at Henry's behest in 1539, reaffirming transubstantiation, celibacy of the clergy, obedience to the priests, among certain Catholic teachings and practices, and rendering their rejection heresy. Yet there were far too many heretics now to be reprimanded. England was to become a great center of theological diversity and experimentation; the Anglican church was a sort of central national heart, far more Protestant than Henry had expected. While he most certainly thought of himself as his preserver, Henry was the Church of England's real founder.