From 597 AD to 1534 AD the country of England was a Roman Catholic country, and that meant that the church of England was under the rule of the Pope, but in 1534 the King of England left the Catholic church and fell in with it’s greatest rival, Protestantism.
King Henry VIII did not actually prefer Protestantism over Catholicism, but instead had a disagreement with the Pope, after the Pope said that he could not divorce his wife, Catherine of Aragon. See, after much trying the king and queen could not have a baby boy, an heir for Henry, she only managed to give him a daughter, Elizabeth. He wanted a divorce so that he could marry a different wife and have a son. Since it was sinful to get a divorce without the blessing of the Pope, Henry asked for permission. Unfortunately for Henry, the Pope was currently under the Holy Roman Emperors thumb, and the H.R.E Charles V was the nephew of Catherine, so Catherine asked her nephew to ask the Pope to tell Henry that having a male heir was really overrated. This made Henry mad, and much history shows you don’t want to make an English King mad, because they do radical things, such as passing the Act of Supremacy, that made it law that the English King was in total control of the church in England, not the Pope. Henry then went on to divorce and banish Catherine, marry, have a daughter with, divorce, and execute Anne Boleyn, then marry Jane Seymour, who didn’t get divorced because she gave birth to Edward VI. Despite the split from the Pope the church went on pretty much the way it had, and it still taught Catholicism.
Edward became king at nine years old in 1547. He died nine years later at age 18, and since he never reached adulthood he never really ruled England, since a council of advisors did the actual political stuff for any child Kings. However, the Act of Supremacy made it so that Edward had control of the church, and the advisors couldn’t decide anything for him. While he was raised in a mostly Catholic country, one of his teachers was Thomas Cranmer, a Protestant who went to England after it’s separation from the church, and so when Eddie realized he had power over the church, he decided to complete the separation and turn England into a Protestant country. When it became apparent he was dying in 1553, he didn’t want his half-sister Mary (Anne Boleyn’s daughter) to become queen, because she was a staunch Catholic, so he named her illegitimate, and incapable of becoming Queen. His other half-sister Elizabeth was protestant, but he had to name her illegitimate if he named Mary thus, so he elected his protestant cousin Jane Grey to be queen after him. Unfortunately, Mary won the favor of the council who used to rule, and had them depose and execute Jane. She was only queen for nine days, earning her the name “The Nine Day Queen”
As mentioned before Mary (in the picture) was a staunch Catholic, and was obviously violent, since she executed Jane instead of, say, banishing, imprisoning, or just deposing her. She then married the King of Spain, and must of learned something from their inquisitors, since she became extremely strict about religion, burning over 280 protestants at the stake. This doesn’t count the other religions, or the ones killed in less creative ways, and this is actually rather impressive, since her reign only lasted five years, giving her the name “Bloody Mary” which is strange, because people don’t bleed when they are burned atthe stake. Despite this fierce Catholicism her half sister Elizabeth took the monarchy from the King of Spain when Mary died and reversed all of Mary’s actions, and England has overall been Protestant ever since, though Catholics where allowed into England hierarchy starting in 1770.
School Essays 