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{{short description|16th-century separation of the Church of England from the Catholic Church}}
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{{Use British English|date=May 2020}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2018}}
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[[File:Henry VIII (1) by Hans Holbein the Younger.jpg|thumb|King Henry VIII initiated the separation of the English Church from the [[Catholic Church]] by declaring himself, not the Pope, the Supreme Head of the [[Church of England]]. Portrait by [[Hans Holbein the Younger]]. [[Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum]], Madrid.]]
{{Reformation}}
{{Anglicanism}}
{{History of the Church of England}}
The '''English Reformation''' began in [[16th-century England]] when the [[Church of England]]  broke away first from the authority of the [[pope]] and bishops [[Oath_of_Supremacy|over the King]] and then from some doctrines and practices of the [[Catholic Church]]. These events were part of the wider European [[Reformation]]: various religious and political movements that affected both the practice of [[Christianity]] in [[Western Europe|Western]] and [[Central Europe]] and relations between church and state.

The English Reformation began as more of a political affair than a theological dispute.{{NoteTag|According to {{harvtxt|Scruton|1996|p=470}}, "The Reformation must not be confused with the changes introduced into the Church of England during the 'Reformation Parliament' of 1529–36, which were of a political rather than a religious nature, designed to unite the secular and religious sources of authority within a single sovereign power: the Anglican Church did not until later make any substantial change in doctrine."}} In 1527 [[Henry VIII]] sought an annulment of his marriage, but [[Pope Clement VII]] refused. In response, the [[English Reformation Parliament|Reformation Parliament]] (1529–1536) passed laws abolishing papal authority in England and declared Henry to be [[Supreme Head of the Church of England|head of the Church of England]]. Final authority in doctrinal disputes now rested with the monarch. Though a religious traditionalist himself, Henry relied on Protestants to support and implement his religious agenda.

Ideologically, the groundwork for the subsequent Reformation was laid by [[Renaissance humanism|Renaissance humanists]] who believed that the [[Bible|Scriptures]] were the best source of Christian [[theology]] and criticised religious practices that they saw as superstitious. By 1520 [[Martin Luther|Martin Luther's]] new ideas were known and debated in England, but [[Protestant]]s were a religious minority and [[heretic]]s under the law. However, historians have noted that activities such as the [[dissolution of the monasteries]] enriched the "Tudor kleptocracy".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Meyer |first=G. J. |title=The Tudors: the complete story of England's most notorious dynasty |date=2011 |publisher=Bantam Books Trade Paperbacks |isbn=978-0385340779 |edition=Bantam Books Trade Paperback |location=New York}}</ref>

The [[theology]] and [[Christian liturgy|liturgy]] of the Church of England became markedly Protestant during the reign of Henry's son [[Edward VI of England|Edward VI]] ({{R.|1547|1553}}) largely along lines laid down by Archbishop [[Thomas Cranmer]]. Under [[Mary I of England|Mary I]] ({{R.|1553|1558}}), [[Roman Catholicism]] was briefly restored. The [[Elizabethan Religious Settlement]] re-established the [[Church of England]]. Nevertheless, disputes over the structure, theology and worship of the Church of England continued for generations.

The English Reformation concluded largely during the reign of [[Elizabeth I]] ({{R.|1558|1603}}) but some scholars refer to a ''[[Long Reformation]]'' stretching into the 17th and 18th centuries. This period includes the violent disputes over religion during the [[Stuart period]], most famously the [[English Civil War]], which resulted in the rule of [[Oliver Cromwell]], a [[Puritans|Puritan]]. After the [[Stuart Restoration]] and the [[Glorious Revolution]], the Church of England remained the [[State religion|established church]], but a number of [[Nonconformist (Protestantism)|nonconformist]] churches now existed whose members suffered various [[civil disabilities]] until these were removed many years later. A substantial but dwindling minority of people from the late-16th to early-19th centuries remained [[Catholic Church in England and Wales|Catholics in England]]—their church organisation remained illegal until the [[Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829]].

== Competing religious ideas ==
{{History of Christianity in England}}

=== Late medieval Catholicism ===
{{Main|Religion in Medieval England}}

The Medieval English church was part of the larger [[Catholic Church]] led by the [[pope]] in [[Rome]]. The dominant view of [[Salvation in Christianity|salvation]] in the late medieval church taught that [[contrite]] persons should cooperate with [[God in Christianity|God]]'s grace towards their salvation (see [[synergism]]) by performing [[Charity_(Christian_virtue)|charitable acts]], which would [[Merit (Christianity)|merit reward in Heaven]].{{Sfn|MacCulloch|1996|p=210}} God's [[Grace in Christianity|grace]] was ordinarily given through the seven [[sacrament]]s—[[Baptism]], [[Confirmation]], [[Marriage in the Catholic Church|Marriage]], [[Holy orders in the Catholic Church|Holy Orders]], [[Anointing of the Sick in the Catholic Church|Anointing of the Sick]], [[Sacrament of Penance|Penance]] and the [[Eucharist in the Catholic Church|Eucharist]].{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|p=7}} The Eucharist was celebrated during the [[Mass in the Catholic Church|Mass]], the central act of Catholic worship. In this service, a [[Priesthood in the Catholic Church|priest]] consecrated bread and wine to become the [[Body of Christ|body]] and [[blood of Christ]] through [[transubstantiation]]. The church taught that, in the name of the congregation, the priest offered to God the same [[Crucifixion of Jesus|sacrifice of Christ on the cross]] that provided [[Atonement in Christianity|atonement]] for the [[Christian views on sin|sins]] of humanity.{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|pp=8–9}}{{Sfn|Hefling|2021|p=97–98}} 

The Mass was also an offering of prayer by which the living could help [[soul]]s in [[purgatory]].{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2001|pp=1–2}} While genuine penance removed the guilt attached to sin, Catholicism taught that a penalty could remain in the case of [[imperfect contrition]]. It was believed that most people would end their lives with these penalties unsatisfied and would have to spend "time" in purgatory. Time in purgatory could be lessened through [[indulgence]]s and [[prayers for the dead]], which were made possible by the [[communion of saints]].{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|pp=16–17}} Religious [[guild]]s sponsored intercessory Masses for their members through [[chantries]].{{Sfn|Dickens|1989|p=33}} The [[monk]]s and [[nun]]s who lived in [[monasteries]] prayed for souls as well. By popular demand, "prayer for the dead dominated Catholic devotion in much of northern Europe."{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=19}}

English Catholicism was strong and popular in the early 1500s.{{Sfn|Haigh|1993|p=28}} One measure of popular engagement is financial contribution. Besides paying obligatory [[tithe]]s, English people voluntarily donated large amounts of money to their [[parish church]]es.{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=20}}

=== Lollardy ===
{{Main|Lollardy}}

[[Lollardy]] anticipated some Protestant teachings. This [[anticlerical]] movement originated from the teachings of the English theologian [[John Wycliffe]] (c. 1331—1384), and the Catholic Church considered it [[heretical]]. Lollards believed in the [[Prima scriptura|primacy of scripture]] and that the Bible should be available in the [[vernacular]] languages for the benefit of the [[laity]]. They prioritised [[Preacher|preaching]] scripture over the sacraments and did not believe in [[transubstantiation]]. In addition, they condemned prayers for the dead and denied that confession to a priest was necessary for salvation. Lollards believed the Catholic Church was a false church, but they outwardly conformed to Catholicism to evade persecution. When Lollards gathered together, they read the [[Wycliffite Bible]], an English translation of the Latin [[Vulgate]].{{sfn|Brigden|2000|pp=85–89}}{{Sfn|Dickens|1989|p=48}}

In 1401 the [[Parliament of England]] passed the [[De heretico comburendo|Suppression of Heresy Act]], the first English law authorising the [[Death by burning|burning]] of unrepentant or reoffending heretics.{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|pp=21–22}} In reaction to Lollardy, the 1409 [[Constitutions of Oxford]] prohibited vernacular Bible translations unless authorised by the bishops. This effectively became a total ban as the bishops never did authorise an official English translation. At the same time, the Bible was available in most other [[European languages]]. As literacy rates increased, a growing number of orthodox laity who could read English but not Latin resorted to reading the [[Wycliffe's Bible|Wycliffite Bible]].{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=24}}{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=86}}{{Sfn|Dickens|1989|p=32}}

Lollards were forced underground and survived as a tiny movement of peasants and artisans.{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=22}} It "helped to create popular reception-areas for the newly imported [[Lutheranism]]".{{Sfn|Dickens|1989|p=14}}

=== Humanism ===
Some [[Renaissance humanists]], such as [[Erasmus]] (who lived in England for a time), [[John Colet]] and [[Thomas More]], called for a return ''[[ad fontes]]'' ("back to the sources") of Christian faith—the scriptures as understood through textual, linguistic, classical and patristic scholarship{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|pp=29–32}}—and wanted to make the Bible available in the vernacular. Humanists criticised so-called [[superstitious]] practices and clerical corruption, while emphasising inward piety over religious ritual. Some of the early Protestant leaders went through a humanist phase before embracing the new movement.{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=69}} A notable early use of the English word ''reformation'' came in 1512, when the English bishops were called together by Henry, notionally to discuss the extirpation of the rump Lollard heresy. John Colet (then working with Erasmus on the establishment of his school) gave a [[John_Colet#Colet's_convocation_sermon_(1512)|notoriously confrontational sermon]] on [[Romans 12:2]] ("Be ye not conformed to this world, but be ye reformed in the newness of your minds") saying that the first to reform must be the bishops themselves, then the clergy, and only then the laity.<ref name="Seebohm">{{Cite book |last=Seebohm |first=Frederic |url=https://reformationchurch.org.uk/book_oxford-reformers_seebohm.php |title=The Oxford Reformers. John Colet, Erasmus and Thomas More |date=1869 |publisher=Longmans, Green and Co |edition=3rd}}</ref>{{rp|250}}

=== Lutheranism ===
The [[Reformation|Protestant Reformation]] was initiated by [[Martin Luther]], a German [[friar]]. By the early 1520s, Luther's views were known and disputed in England.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|1996|p=27}} The main plank of [[Theology of Martin Luther|Luther's theology]] was [[sola fide|justification by faith alone]] rather than by faith with good works. In other words, justification is a gift from God received through [[Faith in Christianity|faith]].{{Sfn|Hefling|2021|p=96}}

If Luther was correct, then the Mass, the sacraments, charitable acts, [[Prayer to saints|prayers to saints]], prayers for the dead, [[Christian pilgrimage|pilgrimage]], and the veneration of [[relic]]s do not mediate divine favour. To believe otherwise would be superstition at best and [[idolatry]] at worst.{{Sfn|Hefling|2021|p=97}}{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 126}} Early Protestants portrayed Catholic practices such as confession to priests, [[Clerical celibacy (Catholic Church)|clerical celibacy]], and requirements to [[Fasting and abstinence in the Catholic Church|fast]] and keep [[Religious vows|vows]] as burdensome and spiritually oppressive. Not only did purgatory lack any biblical basis according to Protestants, but the clergy were also accused of leveraging the fear of purgatory to make money from prayers and masses. The Catholics countered that justification by faith alone was a "licence to sin".{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|p=146}}

[[File:Tyndale Bible Stevage.jpeg|right|thumb|The Tyndale Bible was the basis for later English translations.]]

The publication of [[William Tyndale]]'s English [[New Testament]] in 1526 helped to spread Protestant ideas. Printed abroad and smuggled into the country, the [[Tyndale Bible]] was the first English Bible to be mass-produced; there were probably 16,000 copies in England by 1536. Tyndale's translation was highly influential, forming the basis of all subsequent English translations until the 20th century.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=203}} An attack on traditional religion, Tyndale's translation included an epilogue explaining Luther's theology of justification by faith, and many translation choices were designed to undermine traditional Catholic teachings. Tyndale translated the Greek word ''charis'' as ''favour'' rather than ''grace'' to de-emphasise the role of grace-giving sacraments. His choice of ''love'' rather than ''charity'' to translate ''[[agape]]'' de-emphasised good works. When rendering the Greek verb ''[[Metanoia (theology)|metanoeite]]'' into English, Tyndale used ''[[Repentance (Christianity)|repent]]'' rather than ''do penance''. The former word indicated an internal turning to God, while the latter translation supported the sacrament of confession.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 132}}

The Protestant ideas were popular among some parts of the English population, especially among academics and merchants with connections to continental Europe.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|pp=202–203}} Protestant thought was better received at the [[University of Cambridge]] than at the [[University of Oxford]].{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=69}} A group of reform-minded Cambridge students (known by the moniker "Little Germany") met at the White Horse tavern from the mid-1520s. Its members included [[Robert Barnes (martyr)|Robert Barnes]], [[Hugh Latimer]], [[John Frith (martyr)|John Frith]], [[Thomas Bilney]], [[George Joye]], and [[Thomas Arthur (dramatist)|Thomas Arthur]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 58}}

Those who held Protestant sympathies remained a religious minority until political events intervened.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 20,28}} As heretics in the eyes of church and state, early Protestants were persecuted. Between 1530 and 1533, [[Thomas Hitton]] (England's first Protestant [[martyr]]), Thomas Bilney, [[Richard Bayfield]], [[John Tewkesbury]], [[James Bainham]], [[Thomas Benet (martyr)|Thomas Benet]], [[Thomas Harding]], John Frith, and Andrew Hewet were burned to death.{{Sfn | Marshall | 2017 | p = 186}} [[William Tracy (JP)|William Tracy]] was posthumously convicted of heresy for denying purgatory and affirming justification by faith, and his corpse was disinterred and burned.{{Sfn | Marshall | 2017 | p = 188}}

==Henrician Reformation==
[[Henry VIII]] acceded to the English throne in 1509 at the age of 17. He made a dynastic marriage with [[Catherine of Aragon]], the widow of his brother [[Arthur, Prince of Wales|Arthur]], in June 1509, just before [[Coronation of Henry VIII and Catherine|his coronation]] on [[Midsummer|Midsummer's Day]]. Unlike his father, who was secretive and conservative, young Henry appeared the epitome of chivalry and sociability. An observant Catholic, he heard up to five masses a day (except during the hunting-season).{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} 

As with many of his contemporary monarchs, Henry felt his prerogatives were not recognised or were threatened by the Popes, and ''vice versa''. In the period 1513 to 1519, he contended with Pope [[Leo X]] to remove the bishop of [[Tournai]], the region of modern-day Belgium which Henry had then personally conquered, and developed increasingly [[imperialist]] and [[absolute monarchy|absolutist]] justifications.{{NoteTag|Historian T. F. Mayer reads Henry's correspondence with the Pope as including a direct threat to assassinate the Pope, if he did not respect Henry's sovereignty.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Mayer |first=T. F. |date=1991 |title=Tournai and Tyranny: Imperial Kingship and Critical Humanism |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2639498 |journal=The Historical Journal |volume=34 |issue=2 |pages=257–277 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X00014138 |jstor=2639498 |issn=0018-246X}}</ref>}}

===Annulment controversy===
[[File:Catalina de Aragón, por un artista anónimo.jpg|thumb|right|[[Catherine of Aragon]], Henry VIII's first wife. Attributed to [[Joannes Corvus]], [[National Portrait Gallery, London]].]]

Henry was regarded as having a "powerful but unoriginal mind"; he let himself be influenced by his advisors, from whom he was never apart, by night or day. He was thus susceptible to whoever had his ear.{{NoteTag|{{harvtxt| Brigden | 2000 | p = 103}} writes, "He ... believed he that he could keep his own secrets ... but he was often deceived and he deceived himself."}}

This contributed to a state of hostility between his young contemporaries and the [[Lord Chancellor]], Cardinal [[Thomas Wolsey]]. As long as Wolsey had his ear, Henry's Catholicism was secure: in 1521, he had defended the Catholic Church from Martin Luther's accusations of heresy in a book he wrote—probably with considerable help from the conservative [[Bishop of Rochester]] [[John Fisher]]{{Sfn|Ryrie | 2017 | p = 87}}—entitled ''The [[Defence of the Seven Sacraments]]'', for which he was awarded the title "Defender of the Faith" (''[[Fidei Defensor]]'') by [[Pope Leo X]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=O'Donovan |first=Louis |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hDq-DwAAQBAJ |title=The Defence of the Seven Sacraments |date=5 November 2019 |publisher=Dalcassian Publishing Company |isbn=9781538092026}}</ref> (Successive English and British monarchs have retained this title to the present, even after the Anglican Church broke away from Catholicism, in part because the title was re-conferred by Parliament in 1544, after the split.) Wolsey's enemies at court included those who had been influenced by [[Lutheran]] ideas,{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=111}} among whom was attractive, charismatic [[Anne Boleyn]].{{Citation needed|date=November 2023}}

Anne arrived at court in 1522 as [[maid of honour]] to Queen Catherine, having spent some years in France being educated by [[Queen Claude]]. She was a woman of "charm, style and wit, with will and savagery which made her a match for Henry".{{NoteTag|{{harvtxt|Brigden|2000|p=111}} notes that Anne's music book contained an illustration of a [[falcon]] pecking at a [[pomegranate]]: the falcon was her badge, the pomegranate, that of Granada, Catherine's badge.}} Anne was a distinguished French conversationalist, singer, and dancer. She was cultured and is the disputed author of several songs and poems.{{Sfn|Warnicke | 1983 | p = 38}} By 1527, Henry wanted his marriage to Catherine [[Declaration of nullity|annulled]].{{NoteTag|According to {{harvtxt|Marshall | 2017 | p = 164}}, "Henry wanted an annulment—a formal and legal declaration of the marriage's invalidity. Yet the word contemporaries used, divorce, captures better the legal and emotional turmoil."}} She had not produced a male heir who survived longer than two months, and Henry wanted a son to secure the [[Tudor dynasty]]. Before Henry's father ([[Henry VII of England|Henry VII]]) acceded to the throne, England had been beset by [[Wars of the Roses|civil warfare]] over rival claims to the English crown. Henry wanted to avoid a similar uncertainty over the succession.{{Sfn|Lacey | 1972 | p = 70}} Catherine of Aragon's only surviving child was [[Mary I of England|Princess Mary]].{{Citation needed|date=November 2023}}

[[File:Anne boleyn.jpg|thumb|right|[[Anne Boleyn]], Henry VIII's second wife, by an unknown artist. National Portrait Gallery, London.]]

Henry claimed that this lack of a male heir was because his marriage was "blighted in the eyes of God".{{Sfn| Phillips | 1991 | p = 20}} Catherine had been his [[Arthur, Prince of Wales|late brother]]'s wife, and it was therefore [[Affinity (Catholic canon law)#Mosaic law|against biblical teachings]] for Henry to have married her ([[Leviticus]] 20:21); a special [[dispensation (Catholic Church)|dispensation]] from [[Pope Julius II]] had been needed to allow the wedding in the first place.{{Sfn|Lacey | 1972 | p = 17}} Henry argued the marriage was never valid because the biblical prohibition was part of unbreakable divine law, and even popes could not dispense with it.{{NoteTag|{{harvtxt| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 166–167}} points out that "[i]nconveniently for Henry, another Old Testament verse ([[Yibbum|Deut. 25:5]]) seemingly qualified the Levitical prohibition, commanding a man to take to wife his deceased brother's widow, if there had been no child."}} In 1527, Henry asked [[Pope Clement VII]] to annul the marriage, but the Pope refused. According to [[Canon law (Catholic Church)|canon law]], the Pope could not annul a marriage on the basis of a [[canonical impediment]] previously dispensed. Clement also feared the wrath of Catherine's nephew, [[Holy Roman Emperor]] [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles V]], [[Sack of Rome (1527)|whose troops earlier that year had sacked Rome]] and briefly taken the Pope prisoner.{{Sfn|Morris | 1998 | p = 166}}

The combination of Henry's "scruple of conscience" and his captivation by Anne Boleyn made his desire to rid himself of his queen compelling.{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=114}} The indictment of his chancellor Cardinal Wolsey in 1529 for [[praemunire]] (taking the authority of the papacy above the Crown) and Wolsey's subsequent death in November 1530 on his way to London to answer a charge of high treason left Henry open to both the influences of the supporters of the queen and the opposing influences of those who sanctioned the abandonment of the Roman allegiance, for whom an annulment was but an opportunity.{{Sfn|Haigh | 1993 | pp = 93–94}}

===Actions against clergy===
In 1529 Henry summoned the [[Parliament of England]] to deal with the annulment and other grievances against the church. The Catholic Church was a powerful institution in England with a number of privileges. The King could not tax or sue clergy in civil courts. The church could also grant fugitives [[Sanctuary#Church sanctuary|sanctuary]], and many areas of the law—such as family law—were controlled by the church. For centuries, kings had attempted to reduce the church's power, and the English Reformation was a continuation of this power struggle.{{Sfn| Shagan | 2017 | p = 29}}

The [[English Reformation Parliament|Reformation Parliament]] sat from 1529 to 1536 and brought together those who wanted reform but who disagreed what form it should take. There were common lawyers who resented the privileges of the clergy to summon [[laity]] to their [[ecclesiastical court]]s,{{Sfn| Haigh |1993| p = 73}} and there were those who had been influenced by Lutheranism and were hostile to the theology of Rome. Henry's chancellor, [[Thomas More]], successor to Wolsey, also wanted reform: he wanted new laws against heresy.{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=116}} The lawyer and member of Parliament [[Thomas Cromwell]] saw how Parliament could be used to advance royal supremacy over the church and further Protestant beliefs.{{Sfn|MacCulloch | 2003 | p = 199}}

[[File:Cromwell,Thomas(1EEssex)01.jpg|thumb|[[Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex]] ({{Circa|1485}}–1540), Henry VIII's chief minister (1532–1540).]]

Initially, Parliament passed minor legislation to control ecclesiastical fees, [[clerical pluralism]], and sanctuary.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 89, 98}} In the matter of the annulment, no progress seemed possible. The Pope seemed more afraid of Emperor Charles V than of Henry. Anne, Cromwell and their allies wished simply to ignore the Pope, but in October 1530 a meeting of clergy and lawyers advised that Parliament could not empower the [[Archbishop of Canterbury]] to act against the Pope's prohibition. Henry thus resolved to bully the [[priest]]s.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 105–106}}

Having first charged eight bishops and seven other clerics with [[praemunire]], the King decided in 1530 to proceed against the whole clergy for violating the 1392 [[Statute of Praemunire]], which forbade obedience to the Pope or any foreign ruler.{{Sfn|Morris | 1998 | p = 172}} Henry wanted the clergy of [[Province of Canterbury|Canterbury province]] to pay £100,000 for their pardon; this was a sum equal to the Crown's annual income.{{Sfn| Shagan | 2017 | p = 30}} This was agreed by the [[Convocations of Canterbury and York|Convocation of Canterbury]] on 24 January 1531. It wanted the payment spread over five years, but Henry refused. The convocation responded by withdrawing their payment altogether and demanded that Henry should fulfil certain guarantees before they would give him the money. Henry refused these conditions, agreeing only to the five-year period of payment.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 106}} On 7 February, Convocation was asked to agree to five articles that specified that:
# The clergy should recognise Henry as the "sole protector and supreme head of the English Church and clergy"
# The King was responsible for the souls of his subjects
# The privileges of the church were upheld only if they did not detract from the [[royal prerogative]] and the laws of the realm
# The King pardoned the clergy for violating the Statute of Praemunire
# The laity were also pardoned.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 107}}

In Parliament, Bishop Fisher championed Catherine and the clergy, inserting into the first article the phrase "as far as the word of God allows".{{Sfn|Brigden|2000|p=118}}{{Sfn|Tanner|2013}}{{page needed|date=September 2018}} On 11 February, [[William Warham]], Archbishop of Canterbury, presented the revised wording to Convocation. The clergy were to acknowledge the King to be "singular protector, supreme lord and even, so far as the law of Christ allows, supreme head of the English Church and clergy". When Warham requested a discussion, there was silence. Warham then said, "He who is silent seems to consent", to which a bishop responded, "Then we are all silent."{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 108}} The Convocation granted consent to the King's five articles and the payment on 8 March 1531.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}} Later, the [[Convocations of Canterbury and York|Convocation of York]] agreed to the same on behalf of the clergy of [[Province of York|York province]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 108}} That same year, Parliament passed the Pardon to Clergy Act 1531.{{citation needed|date=November 2021}}

By 1532, Cromwell was responsible for managing government business in the House of Commons. He authored and presented to the Commons the ''[[Supplication against the Ordinaries]]'', which was a list of grievances against the bishops, including abuses of power and Convocation's independent legislative authority. After passing the Commons, the ''Supplication'' was presented to the King as a petition for reform on 18 March.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 111–112}} On 26 March, the ''Act in Conditional Restraint of Annates'' mandated the clergy pay no more than five percent of their first year's revenue ([[annates]]) to Rome.{{Sfn|Moorman|1973|p=167}}

On 10 May, the King demanded of Convocation that the church renounce all authority to make laws.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 114}} On 15 May, Convocation renounced its authority to make canon law without royal assent—the so called [[Submission of the Clergy]]. (Parliament subsequently gave this statutory force with the [[Submission of the Clergy Act 1533|Submission of the Clergy Act]].) The next day, More resigned as lord chancellor.{{Sfn|Shagan|2017|p=31}} This left Cromwell as Henry's chief minister. (Cromwell never became chancellor. His power came—and was lost—through his informal relations with Henry.){{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

===Separation from Rome===
[[File:Hans Holbein, the Younger - Sir Thomas More - Google Art Project.jpg|thumb|right|[[Thomas More]], with [[John Fisher]] the leader of political resistance against the break with Rome. Both were executed in 1535.]]
Archbishop Warham died in August 1532. Henry wanted [[Thomas Cranmer]]—a Protestant who could be relied on to oppose the papacy—to replace him.{{Sfn|Shagan|2017|p=33}} The Pope reluctantly approved Cranmer's appointment, and he was consecrated on 30 March 1533. By this time, Henry was secretly married to Anne, who was pregnant. The impending birth of an heir gave new urgency to annulling his marriage to Catherine. Nevertheless, a decision continued to be delayed because Rome was the final authority in all ecclesiastical matters.{{Sfn|Moorman|1973|p=167}} To address this issue, Parliament passed the [[Statute in Restraint of Appeals|Act in Restraint of Appeals]], which outlawed appeals to Rome on ecclesiastical matters and declared that

{{blockquote|This realm of England is an Empire, and so hath been accepted in the world, governed by one Supreme Head and King having the dignity and royal estate of the Imperial Crown of the same, unto whom a body politic compact of all sorts and degrees of people divided in terms and by names of Spirituality and Temporality, be bounden and owe to bear next to God a natural and humble obedience.{{Sfn|Elton | 1982 | p = 353}}}}

This declared England an independent country in every respect. English historian [[Geoffrey Elton]] called this act an "essential ingredient" of the "Tudor revolution" in that it expounded a theory of [[national sovereignty]].{{Sfn| Elton | 1991 | p = 160}} Cranmer was now able to grant an annulment of the marriage to Catherine as Henry required, pronouncing on 23 May the judgment that Henry's marriage with Catherine was against the law of God.{{Sfn|Ridley|1962|pp=59–63}} The Pope responded by [[Excommunication#Catholic Church|excommunicating]] Henry on 11 July 1533. Anne gave birth to a daughter, [[Elizabeth I of England|Princess Elizabeth]], on 7 September 1533.{{Sfn|Moorman|1973|p=168}}

In 1534, Parliament took further action to limit papal authority in England. A new Heresy Act ensured that no one could be punished for speaking against the Pope and also made it more difficult to convict someone of heresy; however, [[sacramentarian]]s and [[Anabaptist]]s continued to be vigorously persecuted.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 208,221}} The [[Act in Absolute Restraint of Annates]] outlawed all annates to Rome and also ordered that if [[cathedral]]s refused the King's nomination for bishop, they would be liable to punishment by praemunire.{{Sfn|Elton|1982|pp=364–365}} The Act of First Fruits and Tenths transferred the taxes on ecclesiastical income from the Pope to the Crown. The [[Act Concerning Peter's Pence and Dispensations]] outlawed the annual payment by landowners of [[Peter's Pence]] to the Pope, and transferred the power to grant dispensations and licences from the Pope to the Archbishop of Canterbury. This Act also reiterated that England had "no superior under God, but only your Grace" and that Henry's "imperial crown" had been diminished by "the unreasonable and uncharitable usurpations and exactions" of the Pope.{{Sfn|Lehmberg | 1970}}{{Page needed|date=March 2019}}{{Sfn|Moorman|1973|p=168}}

The [[First Act of Supremacy]] made Henry [[Supreme Head of the Church of England]] and disregarded any "usage, custom, foreign laws, foreign authority [or] prescription".{{Sfn|Elton|1982|pp=364–365}} In case this should be resisted, Parliament passed the [[Treasons Act 1534]], which made it high treason punishable by death to deny royal supremacy. The following year, Thomas More and John Fisher were executed under this legislation.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 119–120}} Finally, in 1536, Parliament passed the [[Act against the Pope's Authority]], which removed the last part of papal authority still legal. This was Rome's power in England to decide disputes concerning [[Scripture]].{{citation needed|date=November 2020}}

=== Moderate religious reform ===

The break with Rome gave Henry the power to administer the English Church, tax it, appoint its officials, and control its laws. It also gave him control over the church's doctrine and ritual.{{Sfn|Elton|1991|p=162}} While Henry remained a traditional Catholic, his most important supporters in breaking with Rome were the Protestants. Yet, not all of his supporters were Protestants. Some were traditionalists, such as [[Stephen Gardiner]], opposed to the new theology but felt [[papal supremacy]] was not essential to the Church of England's identity.{{Sfn|Shagan|2017|pp=33–34}} The King relied on Protestants, such as Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer, to carry out his religious programme and embraced the language of the continental Reformation, while maintaining a middle way between religious extremes.{{Sfn|Bernard | 1990 | p = 185}} What followed was a period of doctrinal confusion as both conservatives and reformers attempted to shape the church's future direction.{{Sfn|Marshall|2017|p=238}}

The reformers were aided by Cromwell, who in January 1535 was made [[vicegerent]] in spirituals. Effectively the King's [[vicar general]], Cromwell's authority was greater than that of bishops, even the Archbishop of Canterbury.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 215}} Largely due to Anne Boleyn's influence, a number of Protestants were appointed bishops between 1534 and 1536. These included Latimer, [[Thomas Goodrich]], [[John Salcot]], [[Nicholas Shaxton]], [[William Barlow (bishop of Chichester)|William Barlow]], [[John Hilsey]], and [[Edward Foxe]].{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 216–217}} During the same period, the most influential conservative bishop, Stephen Gardiner, was sent to France on a diplomatic mission and thus removed from an active role in English politics for three years.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 140}}

Cromwell's programme, assisted by Anne Boleyn's influence over episcopal appointments, was not merely against the clergy and the power of Rome. He persuaded Henry that safety from political alliances that Rome might attempt to bring together lay in negotiations with the German Lutheran princes of the [[Schmalkaldic League]].{{NoteTag|According to {{Harvtxt| Brigden |2000 | p = 107}}, Henry was no innocent: he sought influence in European affairs and, in pursuance of it, his relationship with the French was ambivalent and essentially treacherous.}} There also seemed to be a possibility that Emperor Charles V might act to avenge his rejected aunt (Queen Catherine) and enforce the Pope's excommunication. The negotiations did not lead to an alliance but did bring Lutheran ideas to England.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 125}}

In 1536, Convocation adopted the first doctrinal statement for the Church of England, the [[Thirty-nine Articles#Ten Articles (1536)|Ten Articles]]. This was followed by the ''[[Thirty-nine Articles#Bishops' Book (1537)|Bishops' Book]]'' in 1537. These established a semi-Lutheran doctrine for the church. Justification by faith, qualified by an emphasis on good works following justification, was a core teaching. The traditional seven sacraments were reduced to three only—baptism, Eucharist and penance. Catholic teaching on praying to saints, purgatory and the use of [[Religious images in Christian theology|images]] in worship was undermined.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 254–256}}

[[File:StPaul'sCross.jpg|right|thumb|St Paul's Cross (in the lower left corner of the painting) was a prominent [[preaching cross]] on the grounds of [[Old St Paul's Cathedral]].]]

In August 1536, the same month the Ten Articles were published, Cromwell issued a set of Royal Injunctions to the clergy. Minor [[Calendar of saints|feast days]] were changed into normal work days, including those celebrating a [[Dedications in the Church of England|church's patron saint]] and most feasts during harvest time (July through September). The rationale was partly economic as too many holidays led to a loss of productivity and were "the occasion of vice and idleness".{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 129}} In addition, Protestants considered feast days to be examples of superstition.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 241}} Clergy were to discourage [[pilgrimage]]s and instruct the people to give to the poor rather than make offerings to images. The clergy were also ordered to place Bibles in both English and Latin in every church for the people to read.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 130}} This last requirement was largely ignored by the bishops for a year or more due to the lack of any authorised English translation. The only complete vernacular version was the [[Coverdale Bible]] finished in 1535 and based on Tyndale's earlier work. It lacked royal approval, however.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 241–242}}

The historian [[Diarmaid MacCulloch]] in his study of ''The Later Reformation in England, 1547–1603'' argues that after 1537, "England's Reformation was characterized by its hatred of images, as [[Margaret Aston]]'s work on iconoclasm and [[iconophobia]] has repeatedly and eloquently demonstrated."{{Sfn|MacCulloch | 2001 | p = 57}} In February 1538, the famous [[Rood of Grace]] was condemned as a mechanical fraud and destroyed at [[St Paul's Cross]]. In July, the statues of [[Our Lady of Walsingham]], [[Our Lady of Ipswich]], and other Marian images were burned at Chelsea on Cromwell's orders. In September, Cromwell issued a second set of royal injunctions ordering the destruction of images to which pilgrimage offerings were made, the prohibition of lighting [[votive candle]]s before images of saints, and the preaching of sermons against the veneration of images and relics.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 134}} Afterwards, the shrine and bones of [[Thomas Becket]], considered by many to have been martyred in defence of the church's liberties, were destroyed at Canterbury Cathedral.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 227}}

===Dissolution of the monasteries===
{{Main|Dissolution of the Monasteries}}
[[File:Fichale.jpg|thumb|right|Remains of [[Finchale Priory]], a Benedictine monastery near Durham that was closed in 1535]]

For Cromwell and Cranmer, a step in the Protestant agenda was attacking [[monasticism]], which was associated with the doctrine of purgatory.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 131}} One of the primary functions of monasteries was to pray for the souls of their benefactors and for the souls of all Christians.{{Sfn|Ryrie|2017|p=19}} While the King was not opposed to [[religious house]]s on theological grounds, there was concern over the loyalty of the monastic orders, which were international in character and resistant to the Royal Supremacy.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 226}} The [[Order of Friars Minor|Franciscan Observant]] houses were closed in August 1534 after that order refused to repudiate papal authority. Between 1535 and 1537, 18 [[Carthusian]]s were killed for doing the same.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 141}}

The Crown was also experiencing financial difficulties, and the wealth of the church, in contrast to its political weakness, made confiscation of church property both tempting and feasible.{{Sfn|Smith|1979 | p = vii}} Seizure of monastic wealth was not unprecedented; it had happened before in 1295, 1337, and 1369.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 131}} The church owned between one-fifth and one-third of the land in all England; Cromwell realised that he could bind the [[Landed gentry|gentry]] and nobility to Royal Supremacy by selling to them the huge amount of church lands, and that any reversion to pre-Royal Supremacy would entail upsetting many of the powerful people in the realm.{{Sfn|Elton|1991|p=142}}

In 1534, Cromwell initiated a [[Dissolution of the Monasteries#Visitation of the monasteries|visitation of the monasteries]] ostensibly to examine their character, but in fact, to value their assets with a view to expropriation.{{Sfn| Smith|1979 | p = vii}} The visiting commissioners claimed to have uncovered sexual immorality and financial impropriety amongst the [[monk]]s and [[nun]]s, which became the ostensible justification for their suppression.{{Sfn|Elton|1991|p=142}} There were also reports of the possession and display of false relics, such as [[Hailes Abbey]]'s vial of the [[Blood of Christ|Holy Blood]], upon investigation announced to be "honey clarified and coloured with saffron".{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 269}} The ''[[Compendium Compertorum|Compendium Competorum]]'' compiled by the visitors documented ten pieces of the [[True Cross]], seven portions of the [[Mary, mother of Jesus|Virgin Mary]]'s milk and numerous saints' girdles.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 229}}

Leading reformers, led by Anne Boleyn, wanted to convert monasteries into "places of study and good letters, and to the continual relief of the poor", but this was not done.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 232}} In 1536, the [[Suppression of Religious Houses Act 1535|Dissolution of the Lesser Monasteries Act]] closed smaller houses valued at less than £200 a year.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 130}} Henry used the revenue to help build coastal defences (''see [[Device Forts]]'') against expected invasion, and all the land was given to the Crown or sold to the aristocracy.{{Additional citation needed|date= September 2018 |reason= Coastal defences are not mentioned in Haigh.}} Thirty-four houses were saved by paying for exemptions. Monks and nuns affected by closures were transferred to larger houses, and monks had the option of becoming [[secular clergy]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 144–145}}

[[File:The Chapel, Forde Abbey - geograph.org.uk - 1287934.jpg|thumb|The [[chapter house]] of [[Forde Abbey]], a Cistercian monastery closed in 1539 and converted into a country house]]

====Civil unrest====
The Royal Supremacy and the abolition of papal authority had not caused widespread unrest, but the attacks on monasteries and the abolition of saints' days and pilgrimages provoked violence. Mobs attacked those sent to break up monastic buildings. Suppression commissioners were attacked by local people in several places.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 143–144}} In Northern England, there were a series of uprisings against the dissolutions in late 1536 and early 1537. The [[Lincolnshire Rising]] occurred in October 1536 and culminated in a force of 40,000 rebels assembling at Lincoln. They demanded an end to taxation during peacetime, the repeal of the [[statute of uses]], an end to the suppression of monasteries, and that heresy be purged and heretics punished. Henry refused to negotiate, and the revolt collapsed as the nervous gentry convinced the common people to disperse.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 145–146}}

The [[Pilgrimage of Grace]] was a more serious matter. The pro-Catholic, anti-[[Statute_of_Uses|land-tax]] revolt began in October at Yorkshire and spread to the other northern counties. Around 50,000 strong, the rebels under [[Robert Aske (political leader)|Robert Aske]]'s leadership restored 16 of the 26 northern monasteries that had been dissolved. Due to the size of the rebellion, the King was persuaded to negotiate. In December, [[Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk]], offered the rebels a pardon and a parliament to consider their grievances. Aske then sent the rebels home. The promises made to them, however, were ignored by the King, and Norfolk was instructed to put the rebellion down. Forty-seven of the Lincolnshire rebels were executed, and 132 from the Pilgrimage of Grace. In Southern England, smaller disturbances took place in Cornwall and Walsingham in 1537.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 147–149}}

====Closure of all houses====
The failure of the Pilgrimage of Grace only sped up the process of dissolution and may have convinced Henry VIII that all religious houses needed to be closed. In 1540, the last monasteries were dissolved, wiping out an important element of traditional religion.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=201}} Former monks were given modest pensions from the [[Court of Augmentations]], and those that could sought work as parish priests. Former nuns received smaller pensions and, as they were still bound by vows of chastity, forbidden to marry.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 282}} Henry personally devised a plan to form at least thirteen new dioceses so that most counties had one based on a former monastery (or more than one), though this scheme was only partly carried out. New dioceses were established at Bristol, Gloucester, Oxford, Peterborough, [[Diocese of Westminster (Church of England)|Westminster]] and Chester, but not, for instance, at Shrewsbury, Leicester or [[Waltham Abbey (abbey)|Waltham]].{{Sfn|Mackie|1966 | pp = 399–400}}

According to the political historian Gregory Slysz, "The dissolution of the monasteries [...] brought social catastrophe to England" for the next 50 or so years, due to the closure of the numerous associated urban almshouses for poor relief and hospitals, worsened by spiraling inflation and a doubling of the population.<ref name="slysz">{{Cite journal |last=Slysz |first=Gregory |date=2018 |title=The impact of the dissolution of Westminster Abbey on the provision of social welfare, c. 1540-1600 |journal=American Benedictine Review}}</ref>

===Reforms reversed===
According to the historian [[Peter Marshall (historian)|Peter Marshall]], Henry's religious reforms were based on the principles of "unity, obedience and the refurbishment of ancient truth".{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 266}} Yet, the outcome was disunity and disobedience. Impatient Protestants took it upon themselves to further reform. Priests said Mass in English rather than Latin and were marrying in violation of [[clerical celibacy]]. Not only were there divisions between traditionalists and reformers, but Protestants themselves were divided between establishment reformers who held Lutheran beliefs and radicals who held Anabaptist and Sacramentarian views.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 269–270}} Reports of dissension from every part of England reached Cromwell daily—developments he tried to hide from the King.{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=132}}

In September 1538 Stephen Gardiner returned to England, and the official religious policy began to drift in a conservative direction.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 229}} This was due in part to the eagerness of establishment Protestants to disassociate themselves from religious radicals. In September, two Lutheran princes, the [[John Frederick I, Elector of Saxony|Elector of Saxony]] and [[Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse|Landgrave of Hesse]], sent warnings of Anabaptist activity in England. A commission was swiftly created to seek out Anabaptists.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 231}} Henry personally presided at the trial of [[John Lambert (Protestant martyr)|John Lambert]] in November 1538 for denying the [[real presence]] of Christ in the Eucharist. At the same time, he shared in the drafting of a proclamation ordering Anabaptists and Sacramentaries to get out of the country or face death. Discussion of the real presence (except by those educated in the universities) was forbidden, and priests who married were to be dismissed.{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=132}}{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 233}}

It was becoming clear that the King's views on religion differed from those of Cromwell and Cranmer. Henry made his traditional preferences known during the [[Easter Triduum]] of 1539, where he crept to the cross on [[Good Friday]].{{Sfn | MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 241}} Later that year, Parliament passed the [[Six Articles (1539)|Six Articles]] reaffirming the Catholic beliefs and practices such as [[transubstantiation]], clerical celibacy, [[Confession (religion)|confession]] to a priest, [[votive mass]]es, and withholding [[communion wine]] from the laity.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 153}}

On 28 June 1540 Cromwell, Henry's longtime advisor and loyal servant, was then executed. Different reasons were advanced: that Cromwell would not enforce the Act of Six Articles; that he had supported Robert Barnes, Hugh Latimer and other heretics; and that he was responsible for Henry's marriage to [[Anne of Cleves]], his fourth wife. Many other arrests under the Act followed.{{sfn|Brigden|2000|p=135}} On the 30 July, the reformers Barnes, [[William Jerome]] and [[Thomas Gerrard]] were burned at the stake. In a display of religious impartiality, [[Thomas Abel (martyr)|Thomas Abell]], [[Richard Featherstone]] and [[Edward Powell (martyr)|Edward Powell]]—all Catholics—were [[hanged and quartered]] while the Protestants burned.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 280–281}} European observers were very shocked and bewildered. French diplomat [[Charles de Marillac]] wrote that Henry's religious policy was a "climax of evils" and that:

{{blockquote|[I]t is difficult to have a people entirely opposed to new errors which does not hold with the ancient authority of the Church and of the Holy See, or, on the other hand, hating the Pope, which does not share some opinions with the Germans. Yet the government will not have either the one or the other, but insists on their keeping what is commanded, which is so often altered that it is difficult to understand what it is.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 281}}}}

[[File:Chantry Chapel, Wakefield Bridge (7568910296).jpg|thumb|right|The 14th-century [[Chantry Chapel of St Mary the Virgin, Wakefield|Chantry Chapel of St Mary the Virgin]] in Wakefield, West Yorkshire. Chantries were endowments that paid priests to say [[Requiem|masses for the dead]] to lessen their time in purgatory.]]

Despite some setbacks, Protestants managed to win some victories. In May 1541 the King ordered copies of the [[Great Bible]] to be placed in all churches; any failure to comply would result in a £2 fine. The Protestants could celebrate the growing access to vernacular scripture as most churches had Bibles by 1545.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 284}}{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 158}} The iconoclastic policies of 1538 were continued in the autumn when the Archbishops of Canterbury and York were ordered to destroy all the remaining shrines in England.{{Sfn | MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 284}} Furthermore, Cranmer survived formal charges of heresy in the [[Prebendaries' Plot]] of 1543.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 286–287}}

Traditionalists, nevertheless, seemed to have the upper hand. By the spring of 1543, Protestant innovations had been reversed, and only the break with Rome and the dissolution of the monasteries remained unchanged.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 161}} In May 1543, a new formulary was published to replace the ''Bishops' Book''. This ''[[Thirty-nine Articles#King's_Book_(1543)|King's Book]]'' rejected justification by faith alone and defended traditional ceremonies and the use of images.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 160}} This was followed days later by passage of the [[Act for the Advancement of True Religion]], which restricted the Bible reading to men and women of noble birth. Henry expressed his fears to Parliament in 1545 that "the Word of God, is disputed, rhymed, sung and jangled in every ale house and tavern, contrary to the true meaning and doctrine of the same."{{Sfn|Dickens | 1966 | p = 103}}

By the spring of 1544, the conservatives appeared to be losing influence once again. In March, Parliament made it more difficult to prosecute people for violating the Six Articles. Cranmer's ''[[Exhortation and Litany]]'', the first official [[vernacular]] service, was published in June 1544, and the ''King's Primer'' became the only authorised English [[prayer book]] in May 1545. Both texts had a reformed emphasis.{{NoteTag|{{harvtxt| Haigh | 1993 | p = 162}} argues that the Litany and ''Primer'' were largely traditional devotions and that the popularity of the ''Primer'' "suggest a continued vitality in conventional religion". {{harvtxt| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 291, 293}}, however, argues that both the Litany and ''Primer'' were reformed in outlook, especially in their reduced emphasis on the invocation of saints. They were successful, he writes, in "taking an old-fashioned form and subverting its traditional purposes". {{harvtxt| Duffy | 2005 | pp = 446–447}} agrees with Marshall.}} After the death of the conservative [[Edward Lee (bishop)|Edward Lee]] in September 1544, the Protestant [[Robert Holgate]] replaced him as Archbishop of York.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 292}} In December 1545, the King was empowered to seize the property of [[chantries]] (trust funds endowed to pay for priests to say [[Requiem|masses for the dead]]). While Henry's motives were largely financial (England was at war with France and desperately in need of funds), the passage of the Chantries Act was "an indication of how deeply the doctrine of purgatory had been eroded and discredited".{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 294}}

In 1546 the conservatives were once again in the ascendant. A series of controversial sermons preached by the Protestant [[Edward Crome]] set off a persecution of Protestants that the traditionalists used to effectively target their rivals. It was during this time that [[Anne Askew]] was tortured in the [[Tower of London]] and burnt at the stake. Even Henry's last wife, [[Katherine Parr]], was suspected of heresy, but saved herself by appealing to his mercy. With the Protestants on the defensive, traditionalists pressed their advantage by banning Protestant books.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 165–166}}

The conservative persecution of Queen Katherine, however, backfired.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 356}} By November 1546, there were already signs that religious policy was once again tilting towards Protestantism.{{NoteTag|According to {{harvtxt| MacCulloch | 1996 | pp = 356–357}}, Cranmer believed Henry would have pursued a radical iconoclastic policy and a transformation of the mass into a Protestant communion service if he had lived.}} The King's will provided for a [[regency]] council to rule after his death, which would have been dominated by traditionalists, such as [[Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk]], [[Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton|Thomas Wriothesly, 1st Earl of Southampton]] (the [[Lord Chancellor]]), Bishop Gardiner and Bishop [[Cuthbert Tunstall]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 166}} After a dispute with the King, Bishop Gardiner, the leading conservative churchman, was disgraced and removed as a councilor. Later, the Duke of Norfolk, the most powerful conservative nobleman, was arrested.{{Sfn| MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 359}} By the time Henry died in 1547, the Protestant [[Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset|Edward Seymour]], brother of [[Jane Seymour]], Henry's third wife (and therefore uncle to the future Edward VI), managed—by a number of alliances such as with [[John Dudley|Lord Lisle]]{{Clarify|reason=Who is this? The link goes to an individual not mentioned under this name.|date=May 2025}}—to gain control over the [[Privy Council of England|Privy Council]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 166–167}}

==Edwardian Reformation==
{{Main|Edwardian Reformation}}
[[File:Portrait of Edward VI of England.jpg|thumb|King [[Edward VI]], under whose reign the Church of England was reformed in a more Protestant direction]]

When Henry died in 1547, his nine-year-old son, [[Edward VI]], acceded to the throne. During the seven years of Edward's reign, a Protestant establishment would gradually implement religious changes that were "designed to destroy one Church and build another, in a religious revolution of ruthless thoroughness".{{Sfn|MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 366}}

The second year of Edward's reign was a turning point for the English Reformation; many people identified the year 1548, rather than the 1530s, as the beginning of the English Church's [[schism]] from the Catholic Church.{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 462}} On 8 March, a royal proclamation announced the first major reform of the Mass and of the Church of England's official [[eucharistic theology]].{{Sfn|MacCulloch | 1996 | p = 384}} The ''Order of the Communion'' was a series of English exhortations and prayers that reflected Protestant theology and were inserted into the Latin Mass.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 173}}{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 459}} A significant departure from tradition was that individual confession to a priest—long a requirement before receiving the Eucharist—was made optional and replaced with a [[Absolution#Anglican Communion|general confession]] said by the congregation as a whole.{{cn|date=March 2025}} 

A new prayer book and liturgy, the ''[[Book of Common Prayer (1549)|Book of Common Prayer]]'', was authorised by the [[Act of Uniformity 1549]]. It provided Protestants with a service free from what they considered superstition, while maintaining the traditional structure of the mass{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 174}} but provoked a rebellion—later known as the [[Prayer Book Rebellion]]—in the [[West Country]], the [[West Midlands (region)|West Midlands]] and [[Yorkshire]], with considerable loss of life.{{cn|date=March 2025}}

In March 1551 the Privy Council ordered the confiscation of remaining church plate and vestments "for as much as the King's Majestie had neede {{sic}} presently of a mass of money".{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 476}} 

King Edward became seriously ill in February and died in July 1553. Before his death, Edward was concerned that Mary, his devoutly Catholic sister, would overturn his religious reforms. A new plan of succession was created in which both of Edward's sisters Mary and Elizabeth were bypassed on account of [[illegitimacy]] in favour of the Protestant [[Jane Grey]], the granddaughter of Edward's aunt [[Mary Tudor, Queen of France|Mary Tudor]] and daughter-in-law of the Duke of Northumberland: her disputed reign lasted nine days. However, on 19 July, the Privy Council proclaimed Mary queen to the acclamation of the crowds in London.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 359}}

==Marian Restoration==
[[File:Mary I of England.jpg|right|thumb|Queen Mary I of England restored the English allegiance to Rome.]]
[[File:Reginald Pole cardinal.jpg|right|thumb|Cardinal [[Reginald Pole]] presided over the English Church's reconciliation with Rome]]

===Reconciling with Rome===
Both Protestants and Catholics understood that the accession of [[Mary I of England|Mary I]] to the throne meant a restoration of traditional religion.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 360}} Before any official sanction, Latin Masses began reappearing throughout England, despite the [[Book of Common Prayer (1552)|1552 Book of Common Prayer]] remaining the only legal liturgy.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 363}} Mary began her reign cautiously by emphasising the need for tolerance in matters of religion and proclaiming that, for the time being, she would not compel religious conformity. This was in part Mary's attempt to avoid provoking Protestant opposition before she could consolidate her power.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 362–363}} While Protestants were not a majority of the population, their numbers had grown through Edward's reign. Historian Eamon Duffy writes that "Protestantism was a force to be reckoned with in London and in towns like Bristol, Rye, and Colchester, and it was becoming so in some northern towns such as Hessle, Hull, and Halifax."{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 479}}

Following Mary's accession, the Duke of Norfolk along with the conservative bishops Bonner, Gardiner, Tunstall, Day and Heath were released from prison and restored to their former dioceses. By September 1553, Hooper and Cranmer were imprisoned. Northumberland himself was executed but not before his conversion to Catholicism.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 360, 363}}

The break with Rome and the religious reforms of Henry VIII and Edward VI were achieved through parliamentary legislation and could only be reversed through Parliament. When Parliament met in October, Bishop Gardiner, now Lord Chancellor, initially proposed the repeal of all religious legislation since 1529. The House of Commons refused to pass this bill, and after heated debate,{{Sfn| Ward | 1981 | p = 229}} Parliament repealed all Edwardian religious laws, including clerical marriage and the prayer book, in the [[First Statute of Repeal]].{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 364}} By 20 December, the Mass was reinstated by law.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 208}} There were disappointments for Mary: Parliament refused to penalise non-attendance at Mass, would not restore confiscated church property, and left open the question of [[papal supremacy]].{{Sfn| Ward | 1981 | p = 230}}

If Mary was to secure England for Catholicism, she needed an heir and her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth had to be prevented from inheriting the Crown. On the advice of her cousin [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor]], she married his son, [[Philip II of Spain]], in 1554. There was opposition, and even a rebellion in Kent (led by [[Wyatt's Rebellion|Sir Thomas Wyatt]]); even though it was provided that Philip would never inherit the kingdom if there was no heir, received no estates and had no coronation.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=281}}

By the end of 1554, Henry VIII's religious settlement had been repealed, but England was still not reunited with Rome. Before reunion could occur, church property disputes had to be settled—which, in practice, meant letting the nobility and gentry who had bought confiscated church lands keep them. Cardinal [[Reginald Pole]], the Queen's cousin, arrived in November 1554 as [[papal legate]] to end England's schism with the Catholic Church.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=281}} On 28 November, Pole addressed Parliament to ask it to end the schism, declaring "I come not to destroy, but to build. I come to reconcile, not to condemn. I come not to compel, but to call again."{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 390}} In response, Parliament submitted a petition to the Queen the next day asking that "this realm and dominions might be again united to the Church of Rome by the means of the Lord Cardinal Pole".{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 390}}

On 30 November, Pole spoke to both houses of Parliament, [[Absolution#Catholic Church|absolving]] the members of Parliament "with the whole realm and dominions thereof, from all heresy and schism".{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 222}} Afterwards, bishops absolved diocesan clergy, and they in turn absolved parishioners.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 223}} On 26 December, the Privy Council introduced legislation repealing the religious legislation of Henry VIII's reign and implementing the reunion with Rome. This bill was passed as the [[Second Statute of Repeal]].{{Sfn| Ward | 1981 | p = 232}}

===Catholic recovery===
[[File:EdmundBonner.jpg|thumb|Conservative Bishop Edmund Bonner]]

The historian Eamon Duffy writes that the Marian religious "programme was not one of reaction but of creative reconstruction" absorbing whatever was considered positive in the reforms of Henry VIII and Edward VI.{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 526}} The result was "subtly but distinctively different from the Catholicism of the 1520s."{{Sfn| Duffy | 2005 | p = 526}} According to historian Christopher Haigh, the Catholicism taking shape in Mary's reign "reflected the mature [[Erasmian]] Catholicism" of its leading clerics, who were all educated in the 1520s and 1530s.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 217}} Marian church literature, church [[benefaction]]s and [[churchwarden]] accounts suggest less emphasis on saints, images, and prayer for the dead than had been prevalent in pre-Reformation English Catholicism. There was a greater focus on the need for inward contrition in addition to external acts of penance.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 215, 217}} Cardinal Pole himself was a member of the ''[[Spirituali]]'', a Catholic reform movement that shared with Protestants an emphasis on man's total dependence on God's grace by faith and [[Augustinianism|Augustinian]] views on salvation.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=214}}{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 368}}

Cardinal Pole would eventually replace Cranmer as Archbishop of Canterbury in 1556, jurisdictional issues between England and Rome having prevented Cranmer's removal. Mary could have had Cranmer tried and executed for treason—he had supported the claims of Lady Jane Grey—but she resolved to have him tried for heresy. His [[recantation]]s of his Protestantism would have been a major coup. Unhappily for her, he unexpectedly withdrew his recantations at the last minute as he was to be burned at the stake, thus ruining her government's [[propaganda]] victory.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=282}}

As the papal legate, Pole possessed authority over both his [[Province of Canterbury]] and the [[Province of York]], which allowed him to oversee the [[Counter-Reformation]] throughout all of England.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=283}} He re-installed images, vestment and plate in churches. Around 2,000 married clergy were separated from their wives, but the majority of these were allowed to continue their work as priests.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=282}}{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 227}} Pole was aided by some of the leading Catholic intellectuals, Spanish members of the [[Dominican Order]]: [[Pedro de Soto]], [[Juan de Villagarcía]] and [[Bartolomé Carranza]].{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=282}}

In 1556, Pole ordered clergy to read one chapter of Bishop Bonner's ''A Profitable and Necessary Doctrine'' to their parishioners every Sunday. Modelled on the ''[[Thirty-nine Articles#King's_Book_(1543)|King's Book]]'' of 1543, Bonner's work was a survey of basic Catholic teaching organised around the [[Apostles' Creed]], [[Ten Commandments]], [[seven deadly sins]], sacraments, the [[Lord's Prayer]], and the [[Hail Mary]].{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 398–399}} Bonner also produced a children's catechism and a collection of homilies.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 216}}

From December 1555 to February 1556, Cardinal Pole presided over a national legatine synod that produced a set of decrees entitled ''Reformatio Angliae'' or the Reformation of England.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 400}} The actions taken by the synod anticipated many of the reforms enacted throughout the Catholic Church after the [[Council of Trent]].{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=283}} Pole believed that ignorance and lack of discipline among the clergy had led to England's religious turmoil, and the synod's reforms were designed to remedy both problems. Clerical absenteeism (the practice of clergy failing to reside in their diocese or parish), [[Benefice#Pluralism|pluralism]], and [[simony]] were condemned.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 225}} Preaching was placed at the centre of the pastoral office,{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 401}} and all clergy were to provide sermons to the people (rectors and vicars who failed to were fined).{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 225}} The most important part of the plan was the order to establish a seminary in each diocese, which would replace the disorderly manner in which priests had been trained previously. The Council of Trent would later impose the seminary system upon the rest of the Catholic Church.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 401}} It was also the first to introduce the altar [[Church tabernacle|tabernacle]] used to reserve Eucharistic bread for devotion and adoration.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=283}}

[[File:Westminster-Abbey.JPG|thumb|Westminster Abbey was one of seven monasteries re-founded during the Marian Restoration]]

Mary did what she could to restore church finances and land taken in the reigns of her father and brother. In 1555, she returned to the church the [[First Fruits and Tenths]] revenue, but with these new funds came the responsibility of paying the pensions of ex-religious. She restored six religious houses with her own money, notably [[Westminster Abbey]] for the [[Benedictines]] and [[Syon Abbey]] for the [[Bridgettines]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 226}} However, there were limits to what could be restored. Only seven religious houses were re-founded between 1555 and 1558, though there were plans to re-establish more. Of the 1,500 ex-religious still living, only about a hundred resumed monastic life, and only a small number of chantries were re-founded. Re-establishments were hindered by the changing nature of charitable giving. A plan to re-establish [[Greyfriars, London|Greyfriars]] in London was prevented because its buildings were occupied by [[Christ's Hospital]], a school for orphaned children.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 402–403}}

There is debate among historians over how vibrant the restoration was on the local level. According to historian A. G. Dickens, it was a time of "religious and cultural sterility",{{Sfn|Dickens | 1989 | p = 311}} though historian Christopher Haigh observed enthusiasm, marred only by poor harvests that produced poverty and want.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 214}} Recruitment to the English clergy began to rise after almost a decade of declining ordinations.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 215}}  Repairs to long-neglected churches began. In the parishes, "restoration and repair continued, new bells were bought, and [[Parish ale|church ales]] produced their bucolic profits".{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 234}} Great church feasts were restored and celebrated with plays, pageants and processions. However, Bishop Bonner's attempt to establish weekly processions in 1556 was a failure. Haigh writes that in years during which processions were banned people had discovered "better uses for their time" as well as "better uses for their money than offering candles to images".{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 214–215}} The focus was on "the crucified Christ, in the mass, the rood, and Corpus Christi devotion".{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 215}}

===Obstacles===
{{Further|List of Protestant martyrs of the English Reformation}}
[[File:Acts and monuments-1641.jpg|right|thumb|Frontispiece of John Foxe's ''Book of Martyrs'']]

Protestants who refused to conform remained an obstacle to Catholic plans. Around 800 Protestants fled England to find safety in Protestant areas of Germany and Switzerland, establishing networks of independent congregations. Safe from persecution, these [[Marian exiles]] carried on a propaganda campaign against Catholicism and the Queen's Spanish marriage, sometimes calling for rebellion.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 228}}{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 386}} Those who remained in England were forced to practise their faith in secret and meet in underground congregations.{{Sfn|Hargrave|1982|p = 7}}

In 1555, the initial reconciling tone of the regime began to harden with the [[Revival of the Heresy Acts|revival of the English late medieval civil heresy laws]], which authorised capital punishment as a penalty for heresy.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 390–391}} The persecution of heretics was uncoordinated—sometimes arrests were ordered by the Privy Council, others by bishops, and others by lay magistrates.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 396}} Protestants brought attention to themselves usually due to some act of dissent, such as denouncing the Mass or refusing to receive the sacrament.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 394, 396}} A particularly violent act of protest was [[William Flower (martyr)|William Flower]]'s stabbing of a priest during Mass on Easter Sunday, 14 April 1555.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 394}} Individuals accused of heresy were examined by a church official and, if heresy was found, given the choice between death and signing a [[recantation]].{{Sfn|Roddy|2016|p=64}} In some cases, Protestants were burnt at the stake after renouncing their recantation.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 408}}

Around 284 Protestants were burnt at the stake for heresy.{{Sfn|Cavill|2013|p=879}} Several leading reformers were executed, including Thomas Cranmer, Hugh Latimer, [[Nicholas Ridley (martyr)|Nicholas Ridley]], [[John Rogers (Bible editor and martyr)|John Rogers]], [[John Hooper (bishop)|John Hooper]], [[Robert Ferrar]], [[Rowland Taylor]], and [[John Bradford]].{{Sfn|Hargrave|1982|pp = 7–8}} Lesser known figures were also among the victims, including around 51 women such as [[Joan Waste]] and [[Agnes Prest]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 230}} Historian O. T. Hargrave writes that the Marian persecution was not "excessive" by "contemporary continental standards"; however, "it was unprecedented in the English experience".{{Sfn|Hargrave|1982|p = 8}} Historian Christopher Haigh writes that it "failed to intimidate all Protestants", whose bravery at the stake inspired others; however, it "was not a disaster: if it did not help the Catholic cause, it did not do much to harm it."{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 234}} After her death, the Queen became known as "Bloody Mary" due to the influence of [[John Foxe]], one of the Marian exiles.{{Sfn|Loades|1989|p=547}} Published in 1563, [[Foxe's Book of Martyrs|Foxe's ''Book of Martyrs'']] provided accounts of the executions, and in 1571 the Convocation of Canterbury ordered that Foxe's book should be placed in every cathedral in the land.{{Sfn|Hargrave|1982|pp = 9–10}}

Mary's efforts at restoring Catholicism were also frustrated by the church itself. [[Pope Paul IV]] declared war on Philip and recalled Pole to Rome to have him tried as a heretic. Mary refused to let him go. The support she might have expected from a grateful Pope was thus denied.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|pp=284–285}} From 1557, the Pope refused to confirm English bishops, leading to vacancies and hurting the Marian religious program.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 225}}

Despite these obstacles, the 5-year restoration was successful. There was support for traditional religion among the people, and Protestants remained a minority. Consequently, Protestants secretly ministering to underground congregations, such as [[Thomas Bentham]], were planning for a long haul, a ministry of survival. Mary's death in November 1558, childless and without having made provision for a Catholic to succeed her, meant that her Protestant sister Elizabeth would be the next queen.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 235–236}}

Although deeply concerned about her restoration of Catholicism, Mary ultimately recognized Elizabeth as her heir on 6 November 1558 on her deathbed. This decision was reportedly influenced by Elizabeth's vow of Catholic faith—including her belief in the [[Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist|Real Presence]]—which she affirmed under oath during Mary's final illness.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Clifford |first1=Henry |last2=Estcourt |first2=Edgar Edmund |last3=Stevenson |first3=Joseph |title=The life of Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria |date=1887 |publisher=London, Burns and Oates, limited |url=https://archive.org/details/lifejanedormerd00stevgoog}}</ref>{{rp|72,73,90}} Elizabeth became queen when [[Death and funeral of Mary I of England|Mary died]] on 17 November.<ref>{{Cite web |title=BBC - History - Elizabeth I: An Overview |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/tudors/elizabeth_i_01.shtml |access-date=9 June 2025 |work=BBC |language=en-GB}}</ref>

==Elizabethan Settlement==
{{Main|Elizabethan Religious Settlement}}
{{Further|List of Catholic martyrs of the English Reformation}}
[[File:Darnley stage 3.jpg|thumb|Queen Elizabeth I of England reached a moderate religious settlement.|alt=|293x293px]]
{{Puritans}}

[[Elizabeth I of England|Elizabeth I]] inherited a kingdom in which a majority of people, especially the political elite, were religiously conservative, and England's main ally was Catholic Spain.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2001|p=24}} For these reasons, the proclamation announcing her accession forbade any "breach, alteration, or change of any order or usage presently established within this our realm".{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 419–420}} This was only temporary. The new Queen was Protestant, though a conservative one.{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2005|p=89}} She also filled her new government with Protestants. The Queen's [[Secretary of State (England)|principal secretary]] was [[Sir William Cecil]], a moderate Protestant.{{Sfn|Moorman|1973|p=200}} Her Privy Council was filled with former Edwardian politicians, and only Protestants preached at [[Royal court|Court]].{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 238}}{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | p = 419}}

In 1558, Parliament passed the [[Act of Supremacy 1558|Act of Supremacy]], which re-established the Church of England's independence from Rome and conferred on Elizabeth the title of [[Supreme Governor of the Church of England]]. The [[Act of Uniformity 1559|Act of Uniformity of 1559]] authorised the [[Book of Common Prayer (1559)|1559 ''Book of Common Prayer'']], which was a revised version of the 1552 Prayer Book from Edward's reign. Some modifications were made to appeal to Catholics and Lutherans, including giving individuals greater latitude concerning belief in the real presence and [[Ornaments Rubric|authorising the use]] of traditional priestly vestments. In 1571, the [[Thirty-Nine Articles]] were adopted as a confessional statement for the church, and a [[Book of Homilies]] was issued outlining the church's reformed theology in greater detail.{{Citation needed|date=November 2023}}

The Elizabethan Settlement established a church that was Reformed in doctrine but that preserved certain characteristics of medieval Catholicism, such as [[cathedral]]s, [[church choir]]s, a formal liturgy contained in the Prayer Book, traditional vestments and episcopal polity.{{Sfn|Coffey|Lim|2008|pp=3–4}} According to historian Diarmaid MacCulloch, the conflicts over the Elizabethan Settlement stem from this "tension between Catholic structure and Protestant theology".{{Sfn|MacCulloch |2001 | p = 28}} 

"Church [[papist]]s" were Catholics who outwardly conformed to the established church while maintaining their Catholic faith in secret. Catholic authorities disapproved of such outward conformity. [[Recusants]] were Catholics who refused to attend Church of England services as required by law.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 256}} Recusancy was punishable by fines of £20 a month (fifty times an [[artisan]]'s wage).{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 263}} By 1574, Catholic recusants had organised an underground Catholic Church, distinct from the Church of England. However, it had two major weaknesses: membership loss as church papists conformed fully to the Church of England, at least outwardly, and a shortage of priests. Between 1574 and 1603, 600 Catholic priests were sent to England.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 261}} The influx of foreign trained Catholic priests, the unsuccessful [[Revolt of the Northern Earls]], the [[Regnans in Excelsis|excommunication of Elizabeth]], and the discovery of the [[Ridolfi plot]] all contributed to a perception that Catholicism was treasonous.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 487–495}} Executions of Catholic priests became more common—the first in 1577, four in 1581, eleven in 1582, two in 1583, six in 1584, fifty-three by 1590, and seventy more between 1601 and 1608.{{NoteTag|{{Harvnb| Haigh | 1993 | pp = 262f}}: "...England judicially murdered more Catholics than any other country in Europe."}}{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2003|p=392}} In 1585, it became treason for a Catholic priest to enter the country, as well as for anyone to aid or shelter him.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 263}} As the older generation of recusant priests died out, Catholicism collapsed among the lower classes in the north, west and in Wales. Without priests, these social classes drifted into the Church of England and Catholicism was forgotten. By Elizabeth's death in 1603, Catholicism had become "the faith of a small sect", largely confined to gentry households.{{Sfn| Haigh | 1993 | p = 266}}

Gradually, England was transformed into a Protestant country as the Prayer Book shaped Elizabethan religious life. By the 1580s, conformist Protestants (those who conformed their religious practice to the religious settlement) were becoming a majority.{{Sfn| Marshall | 2017 | pp = 542–543}} Calvinism appealed to many conformists, and [[Calvinism in the Church of England|Calvinist clergy]] held the best bishoprics and deaneries during Elizabeth's reign.{{Sfn|Coffey|Lim|2008|pp=3–5}} Other Calvinists were unsatisfied with elements of the Elizabethan Settlement and wanted further reforms to make the Church of England more like the [[Continental Reformed church]]es. These nonconformist Calvinists became known as [[Puritans]]. Some Puritans refused to [[Bowing|bow]] at the name of [[Jesus]], to make the [[sign of the cross]] in [[baptism]], use [[wedding ring]]s or [[Organ (music)|organ]] music in church. They especially resented the requirement that clergy wear the white [[surplice]] and [[Canterbury cap|clerical cap]].{{Sfn|Craig|2008|p=37}} Puritan clergymen preferred to wear [[Geneva gown|black academic attire]] (see [[Vestments controversy]]).{{Sfn|Craig|2008|pp=43–44}} Many Puritans believed the Church of England should follow the example of Reformed churches in other parts of Europe and adopt [[presbyterian polity]], under which government by bishops would be replaced with government by [[Presbyterian polity#Elder|elders]].{{Sfn|Craig|2008|pp=39–40}} However, all attempts to enact further reforms through Parliament were blocked by the Queen.{{Sfn|Craig|2008|p=42}}

== Consequences ==
[[File:Catalogue of Sects.GIF|thumb|Polemical [[popular print]] with a ''Catalogue of Sects'', 1647.]]

Traditionally, historians have dated the end of the English Reformation to Elizabeth's religious settlement. There are scholars who advocate for a "Long Reformation" that continued into the 17th and 18th centuries.{{Sfn|Heal|2003|p=12}}

During the early [[Stuart period]], the Church of England's dominant theology was still [[Calvinism in the Church of England|Calvinism]], but a group of theologians associated with Bishop [[Lancelot Andrewes]] disagreed with many aspects of the Reformed tradition, especially its teaching on [[Predestination in Calvinism|predestination]]. They looked to the [[Church Fathers]] rather than the Reformers and preferred using the more traditional 1549 Prayer Book.{{Sfn|Spinks|2006|p=50}} Due to their belief in [[Free will in theology|free will]], this new faction is known as the [[Arminianism in the Church of England|Arminian party]], but their [[high church]] orientation was more controversial. James I tried to balance the Puritan forces within his church with followers of Andrewes, promoting many of them at the end of his reign.{{Sfn|Maltby|2006|p=88}}

During the reign of [[Charles I of England|Charles I]], the Arminians were ascendant and closely associated with [[William Laud]], Archbishop of Canterbury (1633–1645). Laud and his followers believed the Reformation had gone too far and launched a {{"'}}Beauty of Holiness' counter-revolution, wishing to restore what they saw as lost majesty in worship and lost dignity for the sacerdotal priesthood".{{Sfn|Maltby|2006|p=88}} [[Laudianism]], however, was unpopular with both Puritans and Prayer Book conformists, who viewed the high church innovations as undermining forms of worship they had grown attached to.{{Sfn|Maltby|2006|p=89}} The [[English Civil War]] resulted in the overthrow of Charles I, and a Puritan-dominated Parliament began to dismantle the Elizabethan Settlement.{{Sfn|Spinks|2006|p=50}} The Puritans, however, were divided among themselves and failed to agree on an alternative religious settlement. A variety of new religious movements appeared, including [[Quakers]], [[Ranters]], [[Seekers]], [[Diggers]], [[Muggletonians]], and [[Fifth Monarchists]].{{Sfn | Marshall | 2017 | p = 576}}

The [[Restoration (England)|Restoration]] of the monarchy in 1660 allowed for the restoration of the Elizabethan Settlement as well, but the Church of England was fundamentally changed. The "[[Jacobean era|Jacobean]] consensus" was shattered.{{Sfn|Maltby|1998|p=235}} Many Puritans were unwilling to conform and became [[English Dissenters|dissenters]]. Now outside the established church, the different strands of the Puritan movement evolved into separate denominations: [[Congregational church|Congregationalists]], [[English Presbyterianism|Presbyterians]], and [[Baptists]].{{Sfn|Bremer|2009|p=27}}

After the Restoration, [[Anglicanism]] took shape as a recognisable tradition.{{Sfn|Maltby|1998|p=236}} From [[Richard Hooker]], Anglicanism inherited a belief in the "positive spiritual value in ceremonies and rituals, and for an unbroken line of succession from the medieval Church to the latter day Church of England".{{Sfn | Marshall | 2017 | p = 575}} From the Arminians, it gained a theology of episcopacy and an appreciation for liturgy. From the Puritans and Calvinists, it "inherited a contradictory impulse to assert the supremacy of scripture and preaching".{{Sfn|MacCulloch|2001|p=85}}

The new religion was not enthusiastically adopted in all locations for several centuries: Cornish philologist [[Henry Jenner]] noted that "the Cornish as a body...(remained)...more or less of the old religion, until the perhaps unavoidable neglect of its authorities caused it to drift into the outward irreligion from which [[John Wesley]] rescued them. ...the bulk of the population in Cornwall, as elsewhere, had no desire for the Reformed Service-book in any language."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Jenner |first=Henry |url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:A_handbook_of_the_Cornish_language;_Chiefly_in_its_latest_stages_with_some_account_of_its_history_and_literature.djvu/31 |title=A handbook of the Cornish language; Chiefly in its latest stages with some account of its history and literature |date=1904 |publisher=Nutt |location=London |language=en |access-date=3 May 2025}}</ref>{{rp|12}}

The religious forces unleashed by the Reformation ultimately destroyed the possibility of religious uniformity. Protestant dissenters were allowed freedom of worship with the [[Toleration Act 1688]]. It took Catholics longer to achieve toleration. [[Penal law (British)|Penal laws]] that excluded Catholics from everyday life began to be repealed in the 1770s. Catholics were allowed to vote and sit as members of Parliament in 1829 (see [[Catholic emancipation]]).{{Sfn | Marshall | 2017 | pp = 576–577}}

==Historiography==
{{Further|Historiography of the United Kingdom}}
The historiography of the English Reformation has seen vigorous clashes among dedicated protagonists and scholars for five centuries. The main factual details at the national level have been clear since 1900, as laid out for example by [[James Anthony Froude]]<ref>Froude, ''History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Defeat of the Spanish Armada,'' (12 volumes, 1893) [https://archive.org/search.php?query=Froude%2C%20"Wolsey" online free]</ref> and [[Albert Pollard]].<ref>R. A. F. Pollard, ''Henry VIII'' (1905) [https://archive.org/details/henryviii00pollgoog online free]; Pollard, ''The History of England from the Accession of Edward VI to the Death of Elizabeth, 1547–1603'' (1910) [https://archive.org/details/historyofenglandfr00polluoft online free].</ref>

Reformation historiography has seen many schools of interpretation with [[Catholic Church|Catholic]], [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] and [[Nonconformist (Protestantism)|Nonconformist]] historians using their own religious perspectives.{{Sfn| Vidmar | 2005}}{{Page needed|date=March 2019}} In addition there has been a highly influential [[Whig history|Whig]] interpretation, based on liberal secularised Protestantism, that depicted the Reformation in England, in the words of Ian Hazlett, as "the midwife delivering England from the Dark Ages to the threshold of modernity, and so a turning point of progress".  Finally among the older schools was a [[Neo-Marxism|neo-Marxist]] interpretation that stressed the economic decline of the old elites in the rise of the landed gentry and middle classes. All these approaches still have representatives, but the main thrust of scholarly historiography since the 1970s falls into four groupings or schools, according to Hazlett.{{Sfn|Hazlett | 1995}}{{Page needed|date=March 2019}}

[[Geoffrey Elton]] leads the first faction with an agenda rooted in political historiography. It concentrates on the top of the early modern church-state looking at it at the mechanics of policymaking and the organs of its implementation and enforcement. The key player for Elton was not Henry VIII, but rather his principal Secretary of State Thomas Cromwell. Elton downplays the prophetic spirit of the religious reformers in the theology of keen conviction, dismissing them as the meddlesome intrusions from fanatics and bigots.{{Sfn|Slavin | 1990 | pp = 405–431}}<ref>{{harvtxt|Haigh | 1997 | pp = 281–299}} deals with Elton.</ref>

Secondly, A. G. Dickens and others were motivated by a primarily religious perspective. They prioritise the religious and subjective side of the movement.  While recognising the Reformation was imposed from the top, just as it was everywhere else in Europe, it also responded to aspirations from below. Dickens has been criticised for underestimating the strength of residual and revived Catholicism, but has been praised for his demonstration of the close ties to European influences. In the Dickens school, [[David Loades]] has stressed the theological importance of the Reformation for Anglo-British development.<ref>A. G. Dickens, John Tonkin, and Kenneth Powell, eds., ''The Reformation in historical thought'' (1985).</ref>

Revisionists comprise a third school, led by [[Christopher Haigh]], [[Jack Scarisbrick]], [[Eamon Duffy]] and numerous other scholars.  Their main achievement was the discovery of an entirely new corpus of primary sources at the local level, leading them to the emphasis on Reformation as it played out on a daily and local basis, with much less emphasis on the control from the top. They emphasise turning away from elite sources, and instead rely on local parish records, diocesan files, guild records, data from boroughs, the courts, and especially telltale individual wills.{{Sfn| Duffy | 2006}} The revisions picture pre-Reformation parish Catholicism as a "vibrant church that provided spiritual succour to the English people."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=McGinnis |first=Scott |date=October 2011 |title=Review: Duffy, Eamon. Fires of Faith: Catholic England under Mary Tudor . New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009. xiv+249 pp. $28.50 (cloth); $18.00 (paper). |journal=The Journal of Religion |volume=91 |issue=4 |pages=554–555 |doi=10.1086/662392}}</ref>

Finally, [[Patrick Collinson]] and others have brought much more precision to the theological landscape, with Calvinist Puritans who were impatient with the Anglican caution sent compromises. Indeed, the Puritans were a distinct subgroup who did not comprise all of Calvinism. The Church of England thus emerged as a coalition of factions, all of them Protestant inspiration.<ref>Richard Cust and Ann Hughes, eds., ''Conflict in early Stuart England: studies in religion and politics 1603–1642'' (Routledge, 2014).</ref>

==See also==
{{Portal|Christianity|Reformed Christianity|England}}
* [[Anti-Catholicism]]
* [[Christianity in Wales]]
* [[Gunpowder Plot]]
* [[History of the Church of England]]
* [[History of England]]
* [[Putting away of Books and Images Act 1549]]
* [[Popery]]
* [[Reformation in Ireland]]
* [[Religion in England]]
* [[Scottish Reformation]]

== Notes ==
{{NoteFoot}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

===Bibliography===
{{refbegin|35em|indent=yes}}
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* {{Citation |last=Craig |first=John |title=The Cambridge Companion to Puritanism |pages=34–47 |date=2008 |editor-last=Coffey |editor-first=John |editor-last2=Lim |editor-first2=Paul C. H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jGcgAwAAQBAJ |series=Cambridge Companions to Religion |chapter=The Growth of English Puritanism |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-67800-1}}
* {{Cite book |last=Dickens |first=A. G. |title=Reformation and Society in 16th-Century Europe |publisher=Thames and Hudson |date=1966}}
* {{Cite book |last=Dickens |first=A. G. |url=https://archive.org/details/englishreformati0000agdi_j3v5 |title=The English Reformation |publisher=BT Batsford |date=1989 |isbn=978-0-7134-6924-0 |edition=2nd |location=London |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Duffy |first=Eamon |author-link=Eamon Duffy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E45TQd678hYC |title=The Voices of Morebath: Reformation and Rebellion in an English Village |publisher=Yale University Press |date=2001 |isbn=978-0300098259 |ref=none}}
* {{Cite book |last=Duffy |first=Eamon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K48k6JIcPrUC |title=The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, {{circa|1400|lk=no}} – {{circa|1580|lk=no}} |publisher=Yale University Press |date=2005 |isbn=978-0-300-10828-6 |edition=2nd |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Duffy |first=Eamon |author-mask=2 |date=2006 |title=The English Reformation After Revisionism |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/234301 |url-status=live |journal=Renaissance Quarterly |volume=59 |issue=3 |pages=720–731 |doi=10.1353/ren.2008.0366 |jstor=10.1353/ren.2008.0366 |s2cid=154375741 |url-access=subscription |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190328065501/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/234301 |archive-date=28 March 2019 |access-date=25 July 2017}}
* {{Cite book |last=Elton |first=G. R. |author-link=Geoffrey Elton |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CJZZzoBJOfwC |title=The Tudor Constitution: Documents and Commentary |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1982 |isbn=978-0521287579 |edition=2nd}}
* {{Cite book |last=Elton |first=G. R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=I1_p3zn2LI0C |title=England Under the Tudors |publisher=Routledge |date=1991 |isbn=978-0415065337 |edition=3rd |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Haigh |first=Christopher |author-link=Christopher Haigh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zFmS2ng9z7wC |title=English Reformations: Religion, Politics, and Society Under the Tudors |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=1993 |isbn=978-0-19-822162-3}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Haigh |first=Christopher |author-mask=2 |date=1997 |title=Religion |journal=Transactions of the Royal Historical Society |volume=7 |pages=281–299 |doi=10.2307/3679281 |jstor=3679281}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Hargrave |first=O. T. |date=March 1982 |title=Bloody Mary's Victims: The Iconography of John Foxe's Book of Martyrs |journal=Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church |publisher=Historical Society of the Episcopal Church |volume=51 |issue=1 |pages=7–21 |jstor=42973872}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hazlett |first=W. Ian P. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0HqoVsg6gycC |title=Handbook of European History 1400–1600: Late Middle Ages, Renaissance, and Reformation |publisher=Brill |date=1995 |isbn=9789004097629 |editor-last=Brady |editor-first=Thomas A. Jr. |volume=2: Visions, Programs and Outcomes |pages=455–490 |chapter=Settlements: The British Isles |editor-last2=Oberman |editor-first2=Heiko A. |editor-last3=Tracy |editor-first3=James D.}}
* {{Cite book |last=Heal |first=Felicity |author-link=Felicity Heal |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FnjnCwAAQBAJ |title=Reformation in Britain and Ireland |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2003 |isbn=0198269242 |series=The Oxford History of the Christian Church}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hefling |first=Charles |title=The Book of Common Prayer: A Guide |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2021 |isbn=9780190689681 |series=Guides to Sacred Texts |doi=10.1093/oso/9780190689681.001.0001}}
* {{Cite book |last=Lacey |first=Robert |author-link=Robert Lacey |title=The Life and Times of Henry VIII |publisher=Book Club Associates |date=1972}}
* {{Cite book |last=Lehmberg |first=Stanford |author-link=Stanford Lehmberg |url=https://archive.org/details/reformationparli0000lehm |title=The Reformation Parliament, 1529–1536 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1970 |isbn=9780521076555 |url-access=registration}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Loades |first=David |date=Winter 1989 |title=The Reign of Mary Tudor: Historiography and Research |journal=Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies |publisher=The North American Conference on British Studies |volume=21 |issue=4 |pages=547–558 |doi=10.2307/4049536 |jstor=4049536}}
* {{Cite book |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |author-link=Diarmaid MacCulloch |url=https://archive.org/details/thomascranmerlif0000macc |title=Thomas Cranmer: A Life |publisher=Yale University Press |date=1996 |isbn=9780300226577 |edition=revised |location=London |url-access=registration}}
* {{Cite book |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |url=https://archive.org/details/laterreformation00macc |title=The Later Reformation in England, 1547–1603 |publisher=Palgrave |date=2001 |isbn=9780333921395 |edition=2nd |series=British History in Perspective |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |title=The Reformation: A History |title-link=The Reformation: A History |publisher=Penguin Books |date=2003 |isbn=978-0-14-303538-1 |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite journal |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |author-mask=2 |date=December 2005 |title=Putting the English Reformation on the Map |journal=Transactions of the Royal Historical Society |publisher=Cambridge University Press |volume=15 |pages=75–95 |doi=10.1017/S0080440105000319 |jstor=3679363 |s2cid=162188544}}
* {{Cite book |last=Maltby |first=Judith |author-link=Judith Maltby |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q6sELiM_s7QC |title=Prayer Book and People in Elizabethan and Early Stuart England |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1998 |isbn=9780521793872}}
* {{Cite book |last=Maltby |first=Judith |author-link=Judith Maltby |title=[[The Oxford Guide to the Book of Common Prayer: A Worldwide Survey]] |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2006 |isbn=978-0-19-529756-0 |editor-last=Hefling |editor-first=Charles |pages=79–92 |chapter=The Prayer Book and the Parish Church: From the Elizabethan Settlement to the Restoration |author-mask=2 |editor-last2=Shattuck |editor-first2=Cynthia |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ezVH2h6PKUcC}}
* {{Cite book |last=Marshall |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M7S_DgAAQBAJ |title=Heretics and Believers: A History of the English Reformation |publisher=Yale University Press |date=2017 |isbn=978-0300170627}}
* {{Cite book |last=Mackie |first=J. D. |author-link=John Duncan Mackie |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IPPjvveNsTQC |title=The Earlier Tudors, 1485–1558 |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=1966 |isbn=978-0198217060 |series=Oxford History of England |orig-date=1952}}
* {{Cite book |last=Moorman |first=John R. H. |author-link=John Moorman |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TdnFzfzpOxsC |title=A History of the Church in England |publisher=Morehouse Publishing |date=1973 |isbn=978-0819214065 |edition=3rd}}
* {{Cite book |last=Morris |first=T. A. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tOSEAgAAQBAJ |title=Europe and England in the Sixteenth Century |publisher=Routledge |date=1998 |isbn=978-1134748204}}
* {{Cite book |last=Phillips |first=Roderick |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bibVS8_PDXMC |title=Untying the Knot: A Short History of Divorce |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1991 |isbn=978-0521423700}}
* {{Cite book |last=Ridley |first=Jasper |author-link=Jasper Ridley (historian) |url=https://archive.org/details/thomascranmer0000ridl |title=Thomas Cranmer |publisher=Clarendon Press |date=1962 |location=Oxford |oclc=398369 |url-access=registration}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Roddy |first=Kate |date=Winter 2016 |title=Recasting Recantation in 1540s England: Thomas Becon, Robert Wisdom, and Robert Crowley |journal=Renaissance and Reformation |volume=39 |issue=1 |pages=63–90 |doi=10.33137/rr.v39i1.26543 |jstor=43918982 |doi-access=free}}
* {{Cite book |last=Ryrie |first=Alec |author-link=Alec Ryrie |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ivniDQAAQBAJ |title=The Age of Reformation: The Tudor and Stewart Realms, 1485–1603 |publisher=Routledge |date=2017 |isbn=978-1-315-27214-6 |edition=2nd |series=Religion, Politics and Society in Britain}}
* {{Cite book |last=Scruton |first=Roger |author-link=Roger Scruton |title=A Dictionary of Political Thought |publisher=Macmillan |date=1996 |isbn=9780333647868}}
* {{Cite book |last=Shagan |first=Ethan H. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1WfODQAAQBAJ |title=The Oxford History of Anglicanism |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2017 |isbn=9780199639731 |editor-last=Milton |editor-first=Anthony |volume=1: Reformation and Identity, c. 1520–1662 |pages=28–44 |chapter=The Emergence of the Church of England, c. 1520–1553}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Slavin |first=Arthur J. |date=1990 |title=G. R. Elton: On Reformation and Revolution |journal=The History Teacher |volume=23 |issue=4 |pages=405–431 |doi=10.2307/494396 |jstor=494396}}
* {{Cite book |last=Smith |first=Herbert Maynard |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zo6wCwAAQBAJ |title=Pre-Reformation England |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |date=1979 |isbn=9780849549342 |location=London |orig-date=1938}}
* {{Cite book |last=Spinks |first=Bryan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ezVH2h6PKUcC |title=The Oxford Guide to The Book of Common Prayer: A Worldwide Survey |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2006 |isbn=978-0-19-529756-0 |editor-last=Hefling |editor-first=Charles |pages=44–54 |chapter=From Elizabeth I to Charles II |editor-last2=Shattuck |editor-first2=Cynthia}}
* {{Cite book |last=Tanner |first=J. R. |author-link=Joseph Robson Tanner |title=Tudor Constitutional Documents A.D. 1485–1603: With an Historical Commentary |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=2013 |isbn=978-1107679405 |edition=1930, 2nd |orig-date=1922}}
* {{Cite book |last=Vidmar |first=John |title=English Catholic Historians and the English Reformation: 1585–1954 |publisher=Sussex Academic Press |date=2005 |location=Brighton |oclc=54966133}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Ward |first=Cedric |date=Autumn 1981 |title=The House of Commons and the Marian Reaction 1553–1558 |url=https://www.andrews.edu/library/car/cardigital/Periodicals/AUSS/1981-3/1981-3-04.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Andrews University Seminary Studies |publisher=Andrews University Press |volume=19 |issue=3 |pages=227–241 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150928164442/https://www.andrews.edu/library/car/cardigital/Periodicals/AUSS/1981-3/1981-3-04.pdf |archive-date=28 September 2015}}
* {{Cite book |last=Warnicke |first=Retha |title=Women of the English Renaissance and Reformation |publisher=Praeger |date=1983 |isbn=978-0-313-23611-2}}
{{refend}}

==Further reading==
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite book |last=Aston |first=Margaret |author-link=Margaret Aston |title=England's Iconoclasts: Volume I: Laws Against Images |date=1988}}
* {{Cite book |last=Aston |first=Margaret |author-link=Margaret Aston |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OV40AAAAIAAJ |title=The King's Bedpost: Reformation and Iconography in a Tudor Group Portrait |date=1993 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=9780521484572 |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Aston |first=Margaret |author-link=Margaret Aston |title=Broken Idols of the English Reformation |date=2016 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Collinson |first=Patrick |url=https://archive.org/details/birthpangsofprot00coll |title=The Birthpangs of Protestant England: Religious and Cultural Change in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries |date=1988 |publisher=St. Martin's Press |isbn=978-0-312-02366-9}}
* {{Cite book |last=Dickens |first=A. G. |author-link=A. G. Dickens |title=Lollards and Protestants in the Diocese of York 1509–1558 |date=1982 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0197134085 |location=London |orig-date=1959}}
* {{Cite book |last=Duffy |first=Eamon |author-link=Eamon Duffy |title=Reformation Divided: Catholics, Protestants and the Conversion of England |date=2017}}
* {{Cite book |last=Graham-Dixon |first=Andrew |author-link=Andrew Graham-Dixon |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GBE2HPCN_1IC&pg=PA38 |title=A History of British Art |date=1996 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-22376-9}}
* {{Cite book |last=Guy |first=John |author-link=John Guy (historian) |url=https://archive.org/details/tudorengland00john |title=Tudor England |date=1988 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780192852137 |url-access=registration}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hazlett |first=Ian |title=The Reformation in Britain and Ireland: An Introduction |date=2003 |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing}}
* {{Cite book |last=Hearn |first=Karen |title=Dynasties: Painting in Tudor and Jacobean England, 1530–1630 |date=1995 |publisher=Tate Publishing |isbn=9781854371577}}
* {{Cite book |title=The Study of Liturgy |date=1992 |publisher=[[SPCK]] |isbn=978-0-19-520922-8 |editor-last=Jones |editor-first=Cheslyn |edition=revised |editor-last2=Wainwright |editor-first2=Geoffrey |editor-last3=Yarnold |editor-first3=Edward |editor-last4=Bradshaw |editor-first4=Paul}}
* Kümin, Beat A. ''The shaping of a community: The rise and reformation of the English Parish c. 1400–1560'' (Routledge, 2016).
* {{Cite book |last=Loach |first=Jennifer |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uhnAtumAHakC |title=Edward VI |date=1999 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=9780300094091 |series=Yale English Monarchs}}
* {{Cite book |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Fo8_2s84AkoC |title=The Boy King: Edward VI and the Protestant Reformation |date=1999 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0520234024}}
* {{Cite book |last=MacCulloch |first=Diarmaid |author-link=Diarmaid MacCulloch |title=Thomas Cromwell: A Revolutionary Life |date=2018 |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Marshall |first=Peter |title=Religious identities in Henry VIII's England |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge}}
* {{Cite book |last=Marshall |first=Peter |title=Reformation England 1480–1642 |date=2012 |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite book |last=Moorman |first=John R. H. |author-link=John Moorman |title=The Anglican Spiritual Tradition |date=1983 |publisher=Darton, Longman and Todd |isbn=978-0-87243-125-6}}
* {{Cite book |last=Randell |first=Keith |title=Henry VIII and the Reformation in England |date=2001}} short textbook
* Ryrie, Alec. ''Worship and the parish church in early modern Britain'' (Routledge, 2016).
* {{Cite book |last=Sheils |first=William J. |title=The English Reformation 1530–1570 |date=2013 |publisher=Routledge}}
* {{Cite book |last=Thompson |first=Bard |url=https://archive.org/details/liturgiesofweste0000thom |title=Liturgies of the Western Church |date=1974 |publisher=Meridian Books |isbn=0-529-02077-7 |orig-date=1961}}
* {{Cite book |last1=Turvey |first1=Roger |title=Access to History: Henry VIII to Mary I: Government and Religion, 1509–1558 |last2=Randell |first2=Keith |date=2008 |publisher=Hodder}}
* {{Cite book |title=England's Long Reformation: 1500–1800 |date=1997 |editor-last=Tyacke |editor-first=Nicholas}} 12 essays by scholars; [https://www.amazon.com/Englands-Long-Reformation-1500-1800-Colloquium/dp/1857287568/ excerpt] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190327210022/https://www.amazon.com/Englands-Long-Reformation-1500-1800-Colloquium/dp/1857287568 |date=27 March 2019}}
* {{Cite book |last=Whiting |first=Robert |url=https://archive.org/details/localresponsesto00robe |title=Local responses to the English Reformation |date=1998}}
* {{Cite book |last=Whiting |first=Robert |url=https://archive.org/details/TheReformationOfTheEnglishParishChurch |title=The Reformation of the English Parish Church |date=2010 |author-mask=2}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Wilkinson |first=Richard |date=December 2010 |title=Thomas Cranmer: The Yes-Man Who Said No: Richard Wilkinson Elucidates the Paradoxical Career of One of the Key Figures of English Protestantism |url=https://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=5048524774 |url-status=dead |journal=History Review |issue=68 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200605100905/https://www.questia.com/read/1G1-244158792/thomas-cranmer-the-yes-man-who-said-no-richard-wilkinson |archive-date=5 June 2020 |access-date=27 August 2017}}
* {{Cite book |last=Wilson |first=Derek |title=A Brief History of the English Reformation: Religion, Politics and Fear: How England was Transformed by the Tudors |date=2012 |publisher=Robinson |isbn=978-1-84529-646-9}}
{{refend}}

===Historiograpical===
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Haigh |first=Christopher |date=December 1982 |title=The Recent Historiography of the English Reformation |journal=Historical Journal |volume=25 |issue=4 |pages=995–1007 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X00021385 |jstor=2638647 |s2cid=154848886}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Marshall |first=Peter |date=July 2009 |title=(Re)defining the English Reformation |url=http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/97/1/WRAP_Marshall_redefining.pdf |url-status=live |journal=Journal of British Studies |volume=48 |issue=3 |pages=564–86 |doi=10.1086/600128 |jstor=27752571 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/97/1/WRAP_Marshall_redefining.pdf |archive-date=9 October 2022 |access-date=27 September 2019}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Walsham |first=Alexandra |date=December 2012 |title=History, Memory, and the English Reformation |journal=Historical Journal |volume=55 |issue=4 |pages=899–938 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X12000362 |doi-access=free}}
{{refend}}

===Primary sources===
{{refbegin}}
* {{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UGi6WWtzkJYC |title=Documents of the English Reformation, 1526–1701 |date=1994 |publisher=James Clarke and Company |isbn=978-0227172391 |editor-last=Bray |editor-first=Gerald |series=Library of Ecclesiastical History}}
* {{Cite book |title=Voices of the English Reformation: A Sourcebook |date=2004 |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |editor-last=King |editor-first=John N. |location=Philadelphia, PA |oclc=265599728}}
{{refend}}

==External links==
{{Commons category}}
* ''The History of the Reformation of the Church of England'' by [[Gilbert Burnet]] (Oxford University Press, 1829): [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat02burngoog Volume I], [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat07burngoog Volume I, Part II], [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat06burngoog Volume II], [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat00burngoog Volume II, Part II], [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat04burngoog Volume III] [https://archive.org/details/historyreformat05burngoog Volume III, Part II]
* ''Ecclesiastical Memorials, Relating Chiefly to Religion, and the Reformation of It, and the Emergencies of the Church of England, Under King Henry VIII, King Edward VI, and Queen Mary I'' by [[John Strype]] (Clarendon Press, 1822): [https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalm05strygoog, Vol. I, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalm02strygoog Vol. I, Pt. II], [https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalm03strygoog Vol. II, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalm01strygoog Vol. II, Pt. II], [https://archive.org/stream/ecclesiasticalm04strygoog Vol. III, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/ecclesiasticalm00strygoog Vol. III, Pt. II]
* ''Annals of the Reformation and Establishment of Religion, and Other Various Occurrences in the Church of England, During Queen Elizabeth's Happy Reign'' by [[John Strype]] (1824 ed.): [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat11stry Vol. I, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat0102stry Vol. I, Pt. II], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat0201stry Vol. II, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat0202stry Vol. II., Pt. II], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat0301stry Vol. III, Pt. I], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat0302stry Vol. III, Pt. II], [https://archive.org/details/annalsofreformat04stry Vol. IV]
* [http://history.hanover.edu/texts/ENGref/links.html ''Hanover College Historical Texts Collection'':  The English Reformation]—links to primary sources.
* [http://history.hanover.edu/link-lists/prot.html ''Hanover College Historical Texts Collection'':  The Protestant Reformation]—links to primary sources.

{{Kingdom of England}}
{{Christian History|collapsed}}
{{Anglican Liturgy|state=collapsed}}

<!--Categories-->
[[Category:English Reformation| ]]<!--Keep with [space] to index at start of list (eponymous category—see [[WP:EPONYMOUS]])-->
[[Category:Anglicanism]]
[[Category:Protestantism in England]]
[[Category:Anti-Catholicism in England]]
[[Category:Anti-Catholicism in Wales]]
[[Category:Religion and politics]]
[[Category:History of Catholicism in England]]
[[Category:History of the Church of England]]