From: Religious Context 16th Century
Bible Translation Return to Home
By Roland H. Worth, Jr. © 2016
Chapter Six:
Traditional Catholicism
Motivations For Rejecting
the New Regal Orthodoxy
It required an individual of
considerable moral fortitude to publicly stand up to the reformation in
England. The resentment of the Catholic
Church on both real and exaggerated grounds was so pervasive, that only a deep
conviction that it possessed the solemn truth would enable individuals to
persevere when faced with a public consensus in the opposition direction.
Yet caution must be exercised. The degree of consensus varied from regime to
regime and became undeniably present only well into Elizabeth’s reign. Hence the degree of psychological pressure
varied immensely and the amount of inner determination required to handle it.
Furthermore, there were many more
who would stand up for the church but not necessarily the papacy. Indeed, few English Catholics were all that
thrilled about papal supremacy.
If push came to shove many would have preferred the ultimate authority
to dwell in church councils.
What they were concerned with was the church as an institution
and the faith of the church. It was
loyalty to the institution rather than to the papacy that motivated the bulk of
those who retained their Catholicism through this trying and dangerous period.[1]
Idealistic reasons were one
underpinning of their continued allegiance.
In the abstract there was an aversion against overt church division on
the grounds that such schism was inherently sinful. The charge of religious divisiveness
obviously touched a tender point, since the reformers were clearly divided among
themselves.
Of course, the reform minded were
not without a counter-argument. If one
chose to, one could have pointed to the significant differences between pro-council and pro-papal Catholics as to the
source of ultimate religious authority in the church, not to mention
significant differences in emphases (contradictions?) on issues of religious
faith and practice. These divisions,
however, were not as obvious as the ones between the reformers and had not created
formal schisms within the Catholic Church, though some of them had the
potential for such.
Furthermore, one could, of course,
concede that such division was wrong.
But how would that necessarily prove that Catholicism was in the right
rather than one of the movements it so vigorously criticized? Contemporary pro-reform apologists pointed to
the fact that Rome was but one of several religious divisions then
existing. In addition, they noted that
earlier centuries had exhibited divisions both within Christianity and even
within Judaism.[2]
If the question of religious issues
and open schism stirred the Catholic in his or her heart, the potential impact
upon society worried their political awareness.
The possible societal consequences of a collapse of the traditional
faith encouraged many to remain as steadfast as personal survival
permitted. This was a specially pressing
consideration in the first decades of the Reformation when everything was
untried and uncertain and there was no established record of precedent by which
to predict the future.
In one sense, however, the argument
was of minimum relevance to the kingdom.
Only one local example of social destructiveness due to heresy could be
appealed to, but it had been so long before the days of those then living that
it was of questionable relevance. This
was a Lollard supported revolt in 1414 and its
approval by those earlier reformers.
They had encouraged the correlation of drastic doctrinal challenge and
political revolt at the same time. On
the other hand, it is unclear as to the degree of actual Lollard
involvement and the causes for their participation; all references to it are in
the records of those who prosecuted the survivors.[3] Furthermore, the revolt was so far in the
past it is unlikely that it came to the mind of many.
More convincing “proof” of the
heresy-unrest correlation came from abroad and this could be found in the
massive recent excesses during the Peasants Revolt in Germany. It vividly demonstrated the chaos that could
undermine the very existence of governmental authority if religious extremism
gained the upper hand. Henry the VIII
even explicitly blamed Luther for the bloodshed. Sir Thomas More saw the collapse of civilized
society if reform doctrine similarly gained the upper hand in England.[4]
Even in the German case, the
supposed responsible party (Luther) repudiated the rebellion and called as
loudly as anyone for the crushing of those involved. Hence the correlation was an appealing
one--but it was strongest with one was seeking grounds to blacken the
reputation of a movement one was already opposed to.
The social disaster scenario hinged
upon a revolt of the “lower” against the “higher” classes, all being carried
out in the nature of “reformed” religion.
The usefulness of the societal collapse scenario was grievously
compromised when the King himself embraced a form of religious dissidence.
In that context, the concern over potential societal
disintegration could lead to the embracing rather than rejection of “heretical”
control. After all, if Henry were
toppled, a period of uncertainty would follow, during which one or more
individuals would be vying for the throne--and then probably fighting each
other to assure the security of their new position. Factoring in regional preferences, profound
religious disagreements, and possible foreign military intervention, a virtual
Pandora’s box was a very realistic possibility.
If one’s convictions led one to grasp the sword to oust Henry, without
his unifying role as national leader, would there even be a “nation”
left to lead?[5]
At the time, the argument equating
religious disagreement with chaos could also be answered by conceding the
danger while denying the conclusion that the reform movement was the religious
element to blame. For example, Tyndale conceded that the land was undergoing serious
politico-social disruption, but traced it back to the disruptions that began
much earlier, in the age of Wycliff,[6]
Let England look about them and mark what
hath chanced since they slew their right King, whom God had anointed over them,
King Richard II? Their people, towns and
villages are minished by the third part. Of their noble blood, if I durst be bold, I
might safely swear there remaineth not the sixteenth
part. Their own sword hath eaten them up! And enough pastures be enlarged above
measure, yet rot of sheep, murrain of beasts, with parks and warrens, with
raising of fines and rent, making all things twice so dear as they were, to the
destruction of our realm.
In other words, it was not a new
problem but a long term one that antedated the rise of the more recent
religious reform movements. The triumph
of Catholicism over Wycliff had not solved it; now it
would be the turn of Protestants to try.
(Not successfully, we might add.)
Sir
Thomas More was politically astute enough to be aware that the church's
possessions represented a tidy value whose seizure appealed to the greed of
rulers. He implored them not to yield to
the temptation for if they destroyed the church the next step would be their
own destruction. As he wrote in the Responsio ad Lutherum
(1523),[7]
For just as very many of the princes look
not without pleasure on a degenerating clergy, undoubtedly because they pant
for the possessions of those who defect and hope to seize them on the grounds
of abandonment, and just as those princes rejoice that obedience is withdrawn
from the Roman pontiff with the hope that they will be able to dispose and
divide and squander it all for themselves at home, so too there is no reason
for them to doubt that the people look to the time when they may shake off in
turn the yoke of the princes and strip them of their possessions; once they
have accomplished this, drunk with the blood of princes and reveling in the
gore of the nobles, enduring not even common rule, with the laws trampled
underfoot according to Luther's doctrine, rurerless, without
restraint, wanton beyond reason, they will finally turn their hands against themselves
and like those earthborn brethren, will run each other through.
Yet most Englishmen found it
inconceivable that they could fall into such traps. True, they might war, plunder, and murder on
an embarrassing scale. But nothing in
their recent national experience prepared them for the far greater excesses
found on the continent. To conjure those
up, merely illustrated the depths of depravity upon the Continent rather than
any realistic dangers their own nation faced.[8]
Furthermore, the alleged danger of
such unrest could become the legal pretext for those opposed to church power to
legislatively require innovation.
This way government showed that it was in control. When Parliament enacted the initial
legislation restoring Henry’s Independent Catholicism (though not yet papal Catholicism),
it was justified on the ground that social unrest was pervasive and that it
posed an imminent danger to the political system as well,[9]
[The post-Henry innovations had produced]
diverse and strange opinions and diversities of sects, and thereby grown great unquietness and much discord, to the great disturbance of
the commonwealth of this realm, and in very short time like to grow to extreme
peril and utter confusion of the same, unless some remedy be in that behalf
provided, which thing all true, loving, and obedient subjects ought and are
bound to foresee and provide, to the uttermost of their power.
It is of interest that the dire
prophecy of More had proved itself erroneous.
On the other hand, it could have turned out that way.
Under Elizabeth’s reign, the fear of
national instability eventually came into play as a significant argument
against traditional Roman Catholicism itself.
Each generation tends to perceive its current situation as
the typical one against which to judge all others. It worked in favor of Catholicism when it was
dominant and delayed the establishment of a Protestant control.
On the other hand, when Protestantism became engrained; it
became part of the root definition of social existence. Except for that minority of conscious
converts, the vast bulk of the population tended to continue the practices it
had grown up in. And fear that any major
changes in them could be the beginning of the nation falling apart.
The possibility of successful
Catholic opposition was weakened during Henry’s own reign by the lack of any
effective and prominent clerical traditionalist around whom the cause could
rally. (The one exception was Cardinal
Pole and he took refuge abroad, removing himself from any direct impact.) Even if there had been such, the chances of success
would have been marginal. Without such a
leader the cause hinged essentially upon the caprice of a changing king, a man
who would act without the restraining influence of a powerful traditionalist
voice.
Although there is much truth in this
line of reasoning, the pro-traditional policy reversals while Cranmer served as Archbishop were executed without
his support, over the opposition of many reform minded clerics, and without a
clear and obvious leader of the traditionalist mindframe. In spite of this, time and again
pro-tradition supporters convinced Henry to reject further reform, to reverse
himself in favor of traditionalism, and to use the power of the state to
suppress various specific elements and proponents of change.
But they still faltered short of their ultimate goal. Which brings us back to our initial
premise: If this much was possible with
an extremely disorganized opposition, if there had been a respected cleric to
coordinate the traditionalist faction or to put in a key word at the most
appropriate times, it is quite possible that the reform tide could have been
successfully vanquished.
A final element that undermined the
prospect of Catholic success in reclaiming England (especially during the years
of Henry's rule) was its own internal divisiveness. The Reformers were soon divided into
factions. The Anglican Catholics of
Henry, the Calvinists, the Lutherans, the followers of the even more radical
Ulrich Zwingli. Off the scale were the
even more revolutionary Anabaptists who repudiated the very infant baptism that
all had been brought up accepting. It is
easy to dismiss this as evidence of the self-destructiveness of the Reformers.
Yet there was considerable division
manifested among those who professed traditional Catholicism (see below). Erasmus was repeatedly denounced as a heretic
and it was a convenient label to brand anyone that one disagreed with. Indeed, individual claims of the
reformers would find acceptance even among the orthodox; the body of the
doctrine would be repugnant but specific assertions would find sympathy. Furthermore Catholic monarch was divided from
Catholic monarch in furthering the specific interests of his own nation, even
when it meant de facto alliance with the heretical reformers.
This was the situation under
Henry. The divisiveness continued under
Elizabeth. There were on-going tensions
between the Jesuit influenced Catholic community and the traditional Catholics
who were skeptical of their role. Not to
even mention differences between Jesuits as to the proper degree of
subservience/rebelliousness against the now entrenched Protestant regime.
It was an age in which neither
Protestant nor Catholic could be fully sure of the outcome nor even of his own
supposed compatriots. The ability to
successfully launch a religious counter-revolution in such an uncertain
atmosphere was an "iffy" one indeed.
Public opinion polling did not exist
in the sixteenth century. Even if it
had, it is doubtful if many (most?) would have given candid opinions as to
their religious convictions and the degree to which they held them. Hence it is impossible to know how many held
to the various religious options of the day and with what degree of passion they
did so--at any point in the century.
Human society has an inherent
inertia that always works in behalf of preserving the status quo--whatever
it might be. This would be one factor
assuring the preservation of sizable segments of traditional religion during
Henry’s, Edward’s, and Mary’s reigns, but its strength would vary in degree
from one region to another.[10] Furthermore, it is likely that there were at
least as many cultural Catholics (i.e., because they were raised as such) as
there were doctrinal ones, i.e., those who retained their religion as an
intentional act of will based upon intellectual commitment. (From Elizabeth on, however, the force of
inertia clearly shifted to the Protestant side of the ledger.)
This is individual psychology at
work. It is emotionally and
psychologically easier to persist in existing ways of thought and conduct than
to undergo the sometimes wrenching experience of rearranging one's framework of
social reality. Hence existing patterns
of Catholic opinion and comportment would tend to continue even beyond the
period when Catholicism was the established faith.[11]
The targeting of England, under
Elizabeth, for covert missionary work carried with it a minimum goal of
bringing back into the fold wavering and lapsed Catholics who had not been
carried off into Protestantism, but who had abandoned all religious
expression. At a maximum, it might be
possible to make inroads into the Protestant ranks as well. The latter was almost purely theoretical; the
religio-political climate of the time made any
serious efforts in that direction personally dangerous and carried little
assurance of success.
In a real sense, converting the “schismatics” was viewed as of only token importance. The conception was dominant that most of the
land could be considered “lapsed” rather than overt “heretics.” Hence, if only a sufficient number of those
could be reached, an effective and obvious religious majority would be
obtained--and with it the supporters able to implement changes in the political
field.
Then there were those that did not
clearly fall into either camp—the religiously unconcerned. At the time, the Jesuits themselves spoke
proudly of how there had been a major influx of new Catholics into the
fold due to their work. Since those
days, there has been a general consensus that in the last decades of the
sixteenth century there, indeed, emerged a “new” Catholicism, one strong and
vibrant enough to survive fully independent of official government support.[12]
On the other hand, the proportion
of new converts as contrasted with the survivalists from earlier decades, is
harder to determine. Did the Jesuits
really bring into the fold large numbers of new converts or did they merely
reinvigorate the weak or lapsed Catholics of the kingdom?
Either would have given the appearance of numerical growth. Natural zeal and the interests of their
clerical order understandably caused the Jesuits to stress the “true” growth
element. Protestant propagandists
likewise found it useful to concede the point because it allowed them to maximize
the “threat” posed by the reinvigorated movement.[13]
Whether we attribute the growth of
Catholicism to the Jesuits or (which is more likely) the creative interaction
between Jesuit input and the native English Catholic community, the religion
unquestionably enjoyed a rejuvenation.
The Jesuits certainly contributed a vigor, enthusiasm, dedication, and
education as they helped create a Catholicism more in the mold of the
Counter-Reformation than that which had existed in the days of King Henry.
They did so at a considerable
price. Approximately 20% of all Jesuits
sent to England were caught and executed.[14] The number of executions, however, directly
correlated with the danger of foreign war and the possibility of military
invasion that would reestablish Catholicism by force of arms. Hence the crisis years of 1586 to 1591
produced 48% of all Jesuits executed.[15] Furthermore, throughout the period, the
Jesuit emphasis on work in the London area exposed a disproportionate number of
priests to the greatest danger of arrest and punishment.[16]
Under Elizabeth, the nature of a
“faithful” Catholic was redefined at the same time. Previously some form of partial participation
in the Anglican Church was usually deemed acceptable, though undesirable on its
own merits. This was now no longer
perceived as adequate. Increasingly the
demand was for “recusancy,” a complete avoidance
under any and all circumstances. Even
when government repression was the result.
This approach had existed, to a lesser degree, throughout the past
decades. But the tendency had been to
think in term of minimal participation; now the dominant thinking was maximum
withdrawal.[17] (This and several other phenomena of the
period fall under more than one of the themes required to understand the
century and will be referred to several times as they affect these other
subjects.)
This shift in thinking became more
publicly obvious after 1570 due to the hardened official church position of the
past decade, and a more determined government effort to determine the degree of
continuing nonconformity with the State Church.[18] On the other hand, the proportion of
Catholics who chose recusancy probably rose as well,
since this was increasingly their self-definition of true faithfulness.
The introduction of the Jesuits
brought a needed infusion of “new blood” and the early stirrings of the
Counter-Reformation with its potential for offering a reform agenda within
the boundaries of orthodoxy. On the
other hand, it created tensions with the earlier generation of clerics and
laypeople as well.
In the 1520s and 30s, the stability
of Catholicism in its doctrinal and worship manifestations (as contrasted with
the ever changing face of Anglican Catholicism), provided an incentive to
remain with the traditional faith. By
the 1580s and 1590s, clear divisions within English Catholicism existed on religio-political matters and theoretical unity in worship
and theological belief could not paper these over.[19] At this point, the divisiveness within
Catholicism became an incentive for a limited number to seek refuge in
Anglicanism.[20]
Cultural Cleavage in
Moral Expectations
Catholicism benefited from a more
realistic “accommodation” with human nature than the reform movements found
possible. (Whether that evaluation should
have been the basis for one’s religious decisions is an entirely different
question.) Catholicism had traditionally
preached moral excellence as a goal for all but demanded it of
only a tiny minority. From the practical
standpoint, this could be interpreted as a pragmatic acceptance of the
limitations of human morality. Most
people "can't" live up to that standard; therefore one accepts a
lower norm that will pose a challenge--but only a modest one, one that is
reachable by many or most people.
With the Reformation, came the
growing expectation (especially among Puritan and more radical reformers) that all
believers in Christ should reach a similar high level of moral
achievement. Not only did the failure to
do so indicate a neglect of reaching one's potential, it also questioned one's
basic commitment to the Lord.
In contrast, barring the most
grievous offenses, the Catholic was safe in the bosom of the church; the sins
he confessed to usually bore just modest penances. If the penances were modest how could the
sins they were for be really all that evil?
Hence the very act of attempting to provide a human scale level of
forgiveness perversely and unintentionally encouraged the lowering of the
mental framework of how "bad" particular sins actually were.
In contrast, the militant reformer
expected the most serious manifestations of reform, not merely the carrying out
of prescribed rituals and ordinances.
One did not "do penance" for sin, one "repented" and
reformed or faced the prospect of shunning and official exclusion from the
believing community. Indeed, if a
particular congregation (or its prescribed leaders) refused to carry out such a
policy, that congregation itself was regarded as manifesting a dangerous moral
rot in its toleration.
Furthermore Puritan type ministers
tended to multiply the broadness of what they considered sin. Modest consumption of alcohol could easily
transform one into a drunkard. The unwillingness
to attend church services every time they were held became a manifestation of
spiritual unconcern. The pleasure in
even the most innocent Sunday recreation was proof of unregenerate
worldliness. And if one were guilty
of any of these, one was lumped in as virtually indistinguishable from those
whose conduct was far more excessive, harmful, and injurious. Hence they expected far more out of their
countrymen than most people were willing to attempt.
At this point society's modest
expectations and Catholicism's restrained expectations merged into one similar
mind frame. Both tolerated (though in
the latter case often disapproving of and requiring penances for) various acts
and behaviors that appalled Puritans.
From a cynical public’s standpoint, the fact that much less was expected
of a Catholic made Catholicism that much more appealing; from a more positive
standpoint, the fact that Catholicism was far more “understanding” and “tolerant”
of human imperfections also made Catholicism much more attractive. So out of both self-service and “realism,” a
lifestyle was permissible that was drastically foreign to the thinking of
Puritans.
The Puritans ultimately became
unable to distinguish between those who lived this way because they were
religiously or morally unconcerned and those who did so because of Catholicism's
greater "understanding" of their human weakness. Indeed, in one of their less profound
criticisms, the very existence of these faults was due to the popularity of
Catholicism.
This criticism extended to even
innocent forms of Sunday recreation.
Indeed when James issued his “Declaration of Sports for Lancashire,”
this was viewed as also implying a degree of toleration of “Romanism” previously unknown.[21] During James' reign, William Harrison wrote
in his The Difference of Hearers, "Who are greater maintainers of
this impiety [of Sunday recreation] than our recusants? By these means they keep the people from the
Church and so continue them in their Popery and ignorance."[22]
Indeed, even where large numbers
came to church services in the morning, often few were willing to come a second
time on the same day. (If it had been
merely a matter of Catholicism, would they have deemed it essential to
willingly come even the first time each Sunday? A thought the militants did not stop to
consider.) As Lancashire Puritan-minded
ministers wrote in 1590, "The youth will not by any means be brought to
attend the exercise of catechizing in the afternoon, neither the people to be
present at the evening service, so that it were hard for the preacher to find a
competent congregation in any church to preach unto."[23]
The phenomena of perceived religious
neglect was common even in London, where the reform elements were numerous and
which had been subjected to a steady barrage of such propaganda for
decades. As one London minister declared
in a sermon during Elizabeth’s reign, “Will not a filthy play with the blast of
a trumpet, sooner call thither a thousand, than an hour’s tolling of a bell
bring to the sermon a hundred?”[24]
If these patterns produced such an
intense reaction, more radical reformers were even more angered--even when one
is dealing with behavior that Catholics also (at least in the abstract) would
often denounce. Again Catholics received
the blame for the continuation of the problem.
As John White wrote in his The Way to the True Church (1624),[25]
For my own part, having spent much of my
time among them, this I have found, that in all excess of sin, papists have
been the ringleaders, in riotous companies, in drunken meetings, in seditious
assemblies and practices, and in profaning the Sabbath, in quarrels and brawls
in stage plays, greens, ales, and all heathenish customs. The common people of that sort [are]
generally buried in sin, swearing more than can be expressed, uncleanness,
drunkenness, perficiousness, vile and odious, their
families untaught and dissolute, their behaviour
fierce and full of contumely injury [and] inhumanity. . . .
This mind frame did not develop
overnight nor did the cleavage between societal/Catholic moral expectations and
that of the reformer movement occur in a short period of time. But as the decades went by, the difference
became more and more obvious and worked in the direction of encouraging either
religious unconcern or, if that were unacceptable to the individual, then
Catholicism. Only if one were personally
willing to make a dramatic break with what much--surely, most--of one's
fellow citizens found tolerable, did one accept the Puritan formula for moral
behavior.
Partly nullifying the implicit pro-Catholicism
appeal, was the existence of Anglicans who refused to go as far as the Puritans
demanded. However unsuccessful it was in
gaining control of the Episcopal Church, Puritanism was far more effective in
defining the mainstream concept of proper Christian-social morality. The Anglican rhetoric might not be as extreme
throughout even the end of the period in which we are interested, but there
would have been tremendous sympathy for the aspirations being manifested.
The “Class” Element in Maintaining
and Undermining Catholicism
Even when the position of bishop was
held by a determined reformer, if the leading nobleman (or noblemen) of the
area were determined traditionalists, most major religious change could be
tempered, avoided, or at least delayed.[26] New orthodoxies, however, wear out those who
are traditionalists out of custom rather than intellectual-emotional-spiritual
conviction.
Hence, under Elizabeth, more and more “Catholic” noblemen of only
modest religious commitment deemed it prudent or desirable to cast their lot
openly with the modified Catholicism of the new Anglican religious
establishment. A minority remained
Catholic out of conviction and their numbers were ultimately enlarged by the
much hated and much feared Jesuit missionaries.[27]
In the highly “classed” society of
that age, the nobles and leading men of each community provided the dominant
secular moral and financial leadership of any movement. By their allegiance, they added social
credibility to it and made it more popularly acceptable to those many
individuals acutely aware of the preferences of their “betters.” In the early 1590s, Jesuit missionary John
Gerard was the first to recognize this phenomena and advocate its utilization
as the basis of missionary activities in areas where there were few Catholics,[28]
In other places, where a large number of
the people are Catholics and nearly all have leanings to Catholicism, it is
easy to make converts and to have large congregations at sermons. . . . By contrast, in the districts I was living in
now Catholics were very few. They were
mostly from the better classes, none, or hardly any, from the ordinary people,
for they are unable to live in peace, surrounded as they are by most fierce
Protestants. The way, I think, to go
about making converts in these parts is to bring the gentry over first, and
then their servants, for the Catholic gentle folk must have Catholic
servants.
The problem with this “top down”
scenario was that the longer the Anglicanism of the day successfully survived
as the dominant religious institution, the more it itself became the permanent
embodiment of the status quo. And the
longer it represented the status quo--and the fewer who remembered a different
age--the more a conscious repudiation would be required to reverse the
situation.
Change is comparatively easy in a time of flux and uncertainty. But when a religion becomes the long-term
“establishment,” conscious “deviance” from it can only be produced by the
strongest of arguments. And--for better
or worse--Protestant reform found it far easier to create conscious dissent
through argumentation than did the Catholic alternative.
The down-side of a gentry-based
strategy was that the poor got squeezed out of the priorities of the
priests. Although one could potentially
build a politically important Catholicism with the support of the gentry, a
mammoth array of “foot soldiers”--the common men and women of the kingdom--was
also required and the strategy overlooked that necessity.
Furthermore, since there was a greater proportion of gentry in the
southeastern part of the kingdom, other areas suffered from a lack of clerical
effort. This encouraged many who might
have been salvaged for the movement to drift into Anglicanism or
unconcern. Hence the effort produced
significant gains among the “important” elements of society, but neglected to
systematically lay the mass roots required for the ultimate success it so
desired.[29]
A “top down” scenario also required
that class be the overwhelmingly controlling factor in shaping religious
opinions. Although all segments of
English society recognized and practiced class distinctions, the most committed
of the reform element knowingly, consciously, and intentionally based their
dissent on the basis of their reading of the scriptural evidence.
No amount of class respect would change that reading. Hence, at best, the approach might have
produced an upper class able to more or less suppress the religious
dissenters. Presuming, of course, that
it could even obtain sufficient support within that upper class to make the
attempt--and the toleration among their “inferiors” to implement it.
Factors that Minimized the
Suppression of Catholicism
In addition to manifesting political
loyalty (especially in time of crisis), religious suppression of the Catholic
element of the population was held down by two major factors. One might be called tokenism by
Catholics and the other their control over the local power structure.
Such elements also worked in the reverse direction for the protection
of dissenters when more “orthodox” policies were the official government stance
or when the reform convictions were far more “advanced” than a given regime
desired. We have alluded to these in our
earlier discussion, but they deserve greater stress as major elements in the
survival of English Catholicism in the sixteenth century as well.
By “tokenism” we refer to the
minimal participation by which an individual might feel he or she was keeping
the government happy without a sinful compromise with one’s private inner
convictions. Before the Papacy finally
denied the Catholic any right to attend Anglican services at all, even the
sincerest Catholic was usually able to accept at least some type of token
presence at the new-style churches royalty was encouraging in the land.
These individuals were, collectively, known as “Church papists.”[30] (Fellow Catholics who thought these were
guilty of ungodly compromise described them as “schismatics.”)[31] The form of presence varied from individual
conscience to individual conscience and (in reverse direction) similar forms of
reasoning were used by devout Protestants when Mary temporarily re-imposed the
old religion. As Carl S. Meyer has
summed up those options,[32]
Among the followers of Rome, as among the
Protestants during the reign of Mary, some drew the distinction between
participation in a church service or mass, whichever the case might be, and
merely being present. Others entered the
church service after it had begun and left before it had been completed. Some attended the English service without
apostasy, they believed, so long as they did not participate in Holy
Communion. Some participated in the
Sacrament, eating what they called “Calvin’s profaned bread,” because they
disallowed its sacramental character.
Clerics also practiced such
dualism. Certain closet traditionalists
would publicly go through the required ritual of the Prayer Book for worship
and Communion. Privately they would
consecrate the elements by the traditional rites and offer them to those on
whose discretion they could rely.[33]
Such contradictory practices were
both expedient (it kept quiet both the government and those citizens who
disagreed with one’s inner convictions) and was at least theoretically
consistent with one’s inner Catholicism (since no official position had been
laid down for the guidance of English Catholics).
This loophole was closed in 1562 when a group of English Catholics
asked the Spanish Ambassador to secure for them official guidance as to the
proper course to follow. In October, the
Council of Trent sent back emphatic word that even a passive presence in the
Protestant Church service was inherently sinful. This pushed many Catholics over the edge into
the open “recusancy” of absolutely refusing to make
even a token effort to conform to the legal church rites of the kingdom.
Some continued the past practice because this was the judgment of a
Council and not that of the Pope himself.
After a few years this rationalization was also eliminated by papal
decree.[34]
Thereafter, the practice of dual
participation left one in an untenable middle-ground: rejected by one’s own preferred faith while
unwilling to accept the Anglicanism of the day.
Although some could endure the psychological tensions this produced,
many others were forced to make a commitment one way or the other.
Parliament might enact the laws it
wished and the King or Queen might issue all the edicts they wished, but in the
final analysis law was enforced on the local basis. The enforcement was shaped by the twin
factors of the degree of local Catholicism and the enthusiasm (or lack of it)
by those who carried out the enforcement of the law.
A law on the books and a law
enforced are two different things--such is the case today and such was the case
in the sixteenth century. The
anti-Catholicism laws were often not enforced as often or as severely as the
text of legislation required because of a lack of support among the Justices of
the Peace and others who formed the enforcement level of justice in the England
of that century. Nor was this just
because of the proportion of Catholics among the Justices. One preoccupation of almost any
government official had to be the maintenance of peace and quiet. And the over-zealous application of the
religious suppression laws could easily upset that sometimes fragile situation.
Furthermore, the initiation of a
prosecution required the making of a formal complaint. In many cases, theological, class, or
personal friendship discouraged these from being lodged even when it was an
open secret that the letter and intent of the law was being violated in such
cases.[35]
One of the unknowables
of Tudor history is the number of committed Catholics at any given point
between the annulment of Henry and the Elizabethan Settlement. (In reverse, the same can be said of the
Protestant side of the equation.) It
would seem inherently probable that the highest proportion would have been at
the beginning of the break with Rome and with a declining percentage
thereafter.
Beyond such broadest of generalizations, all is uncertainty. At the time of Elizabeth the estimates run
from a low of 2-3 percent of the population to a high of around 25-30%.[36] No matter what estimate one accepts, there is
no question that in certain regions the percentage was far higher than any
theoretical national average.
The higher the percentage the less likely the desire to stir up the
local people. Unless, of course, the religio-power structure in that city or county was
extremely devoted to the cause of further reform--and even then prudence might
dictate considerable restraint.
Catholics as a Perceived
Security Threat
What caused the persecution of
Catholics in the kingdom? Pro-government
interpreters look upon the Catholics as a potential security threat to Henry
and his successors. Evidence can be
found in two areas. The first are the
repeated Catholic efforts to replace the Protestant rulers with a Catholic
regime. The second are the public
remarks of the Pope freeing English Catholics from all loyalty to their
monarch.
Pro-Catholic interpreters will often
prefer to emphasize persecution as an effort to suppress the practice of their
religion. In this interpretation, the
various Catholic supported insurrections (both those aborted and those actually
launched) were spurred by that repression.
Which came first (repression or insurrection) really depends upon the
individuals under discussion.
Doubtless some felt cornered and were moved to plotting the overthrow
of the government as a means of removing the pressure. Yet others were theological ideologues at
heart, moved by loyalty to the mother church to take the sword up against their
immediate ruler.
Indeed, if the Pope had his way, all
Catholics would have been violent revolutionaries. Persecution might have increased the personal
temptation, but the absolute obligation to revolt had come from no one
short of the head of the earthly church.
(Even in the period before it was committed to writing, the papal
preference for the overthrow of the regime was well recognized.) Hence if one took one’s own religious
obligations seriously and granted to the Catholic that he took his
obligations seriously as well, repression was essential.
In real life, however, the vast bulk
of a religion is composed neither of zealots nor theologs
(if we may suggest a verbal equivalent for political ideologues). Rather it is composed of a minority faction
of the deeply committed, probably never exceeding a third if anywhere near that
high a proportion. From there we go
through a thousand and one gradations of religious interest and commitment,
especially when one's secular position and economic welfare become significant
alternative motivating factors.
The long-range commitment to faith
of some of them and their families was fatally undermined by their short-term
commitment to financial self-aggrandizement.
Many Catholics freely purchased seized Church properties under both
Henry and Edward. When the powerful
forces of an energetic continental Catholicism was arrayed against England
under Elizabeth, this certainly undermined their enthusiasm for a return to the
old religious order.[37] They might continue to practice the old
system, but they dreaded the possibility that it would become so powerful they
had to cough up their confiscated properties.
Under
Henry to Elizabeth, Catholic traditionalists sought the "loop-holes"
in the law, by which they could provide outward conformity while maintaining,
in private, the traditional rites. For
example, consider the matter of obligatory church attendance. One method utilized by many Catholics to obey
the law requiring it, while not repudiating their own convictions, was by
attending the required Anglican services--but not participating of the
communion while doing so.
This way they protected themselves against charges of obstructionism
without denying their own convictions.
The formal excommunication of the Queen in 1570, with its explicit denial
of the right to obey these and all other Elizabethan laws, forced many Catholics into the position
they least desired: having to choose
between their sovereign and their Pope.[38]
In England it turned out that even
this was not enough to push them into insurrection. Most Catholics were politically loyal even if
they preferred the mass and arranged for as frequent participation as was
feasible. Only the passage of time clearly
revealed this, however. Furthermore it
was subject to immediate change if domestic circumstances so altered as to make
putting a Catholic monarch on the throne a genuinely realistic
possibility. In such cases personal
preferences might well lead to open rebellion that would never otherwise be
countenanced.
Hence so long as the Pope claimed
right to depose, the threat had to be taken seriously, especially since
several European regimes were quite willing to actively support the
effort. (Unless, of course, diplomatic
or economic concerns urged an immediate policy of greater prudence.) This is the political reality that had to be
faced.
Because of it, a policy of at least
moderate repression was inescapable.
Whether any degree of such suppression was ethically justified,
however, depends upon which side one believes had the greater degree of
religious and moral truth. The secular
consequences were the same whether the Catholics represented God's ideal for
England or whether they represented the most reprobate faction of the
populace.
The fears were confirmed (in the eyes
of the reformers and their allies) by the religious insurrections that did
erupt against the Protestantizing establishment,
especially in the early decades. When
the new prayer book was officially introduced to the churches in 1549, the
residents of one Devon village rebelled.
They forced the minister to offer the traditional rites and within a
month many of the citizens of both Devon and Cornwall were open participants in
the Western Rebellion.
Economic and social difficulties in the region also encouraged them in
this action, but in the religious realm they were essentially a conservative
rebellion: they simply wanted things
rolled back to the way they were under Henry VIII. Intensely Catholic they were, though, they
did not demand a return to recognizing the Pope as supreme authority.[39]
The Independent Catholicism of Henry
and his successors tended toward moderation in its suppression of traditional
Catholicism. Extreme action was most
likely to occur in reaction to domestic insurrection or times of high
international tension with the threat of potential invasion. Yet there was heavy pressure during Elizabeth
and James’ reign for far sterner steps whether these immediate provocations
were present or not.
Especially under Elizabeth, the crown resisted loud and boisterous
demands that a more vigorous policy be pursued.
As Sir William Cecil observed in 1563, "Such be the humours of the commons house [of Parliament] as they think
nothing sharp enough against the Papists."[40]
Of the various Catholic laymen and
priests who died during Henry’s reign, the most memorable was Sir Thomas
More. Although he supported the king's
religious independence policies as long as he could, More finally resigned his
position as chancellor (willingly, though under pressure) rather than repudiate
his root feelings of loyalty to the ancient church Henry was reworking.
Eventually neither his friends nor
his silence was enough to preserve his life.
More would not oppose the king as head of the church, but neither would
be explicitly affirm its legitimacy.
This was sufficient for the prosecutor.
As Christopher Hales rebuked him at his trial, "Though we should
have no word or deed to charge upon you, yet we have your silence, and that is
a sign of your evil intention and a sure proof of malice."[41] Of all Henry's executions this was the one
that sent the deepest shock waves throughout Europe.
Yet throughout the sixteenth
century, individuals suspected (sometimes rightly) of being covert Catholics
continued to occupy significant roles as supporters of the monarchy. During the reigns of Elizabeth and James,
Henry Howard, Duke of Northampton, was a conspicuous example.[42] When the Gunpowder Plot endangered James'
life in the following century, the Duke wrote a lengthy work defending the
right of kings to resist papal power. It
so impressed James that the monarch had it translated into Italian, French, and
Latin and circulated among rulers on the Continent.[43]
The belief in international Catholic
conspiracies was a “given” in the minds of influential English leaders
throughout the age from Henry to Elizabeth.[44] But astute analysts of the day recognized
that conspiracies did not all function in one direction: it was not a safe time for Catholic monarchs
either.
If France could be brought securely into the reformed camp, it was
recognized as a very real possibility that all major governments would retreat
from support for papal Catholicism within a decade.[45] Hence, from the English viewpoint, it became
a matter of not just surviving real plots, but also outlasting one’s rivals in
the hope that one day the tide would decisively turn and make such conspiracies
an utter impossibility. And, if the
right set of circumstances came one’s way, to encourage the destabilization of opposing
regimes as well.
Catholic Plots against Elizabeth
The actions of the Papacy did not
make it any easier for nationalistic English Catholics. Pius V's Regnans
in Excelsis defined Elizabeth's excommunication
in such terms that assassination (or, at the minimum, rebellion) was virtually
required. She was not merely "the
Pretended Queen of England" but, "Peers, subjects and people of the
said Kingdom and all others upon what terms so ever bound unto her are freed
from their oath and all manner of duty, fidelity and obedience. . . . They shall not dare to obey her or any of her
laws, directions or commands."[46]
The papal Secretary of State wrote
that there would be no taint of sin attached to the act of murdering the Queen,[47]
Since that guilty woman of England rules
over two such noble kingdoms of Christendom and is the cause of so much injury
to the Catholic faith and loss of so many million souls, there is no doubt that
whoseover sends her out of the world with the pious
intention of doing God service, not only does not sin but gains merit,
especially having regard to the sentence pronounced against her by Pius V of
holy memory. And so, if those English
gentlemen decide actually to undertake so glorious a work, your Lordship can
assure them that they do not commit any sin.
We trust in God also that they will escape danger.
The excommunication bull was issued
on February 25, 1570. The English
government did not learn of it until May 25, 1570. A Catholic nailed it to the garden gate of
the Bishop of London.[48] If a Catholic were bold enough to,
figuratively, wave it in the face of the government, might not a more dangerous
one actually attempt to act upon it?
Faced with active rebellion in
support of Mary Queen of Scots, Parliament adopted legislation in 1571 that
would not only require church attendance but also participation of the
communion, something anathema to Catholic traditionalists. Elizabeth exercised her right of veto. Discreet observance of Catholic rites would
be permitted while encouraging the public at large in the direction of
Anglicanism.
The coming of the Jesuits to
England, however, represented part of a deliberate strategy to return the
nation to papal submission. Their
“English College” at Douai was begun in 1568 under
the leadership of Cardinal Allen, with the explicit purpose of educating
Catholic laymen. The goal soon shifted
to that of training priests to work in their homeland.
A series of acts of Parliament resulted to discourage individuals from
attending the institution and to punish them if they returned to their homeland. In 1571, legislation required a license for
anyone to go abroad for more than a year.
Failure to obtain such permission was punishable by confiscation of
one’s land.[49]
In 1577 the first Jesuits were
condemned to death. Even so, by 1580,
more than a hundred of these men were secretly working in England.[50] In 1581, legislation made ordination
punishable by death for treason if they had attempted to convince the people to
refuse to obey Elizabeth as ruler and supreme governor of the church. Such laws required a degree of proof
difficult to obtain, however. Hence in
1587 the evidence requirement was reduced to proof that an individual was a
Jesuit (or a priest in seminary training).
In and of itself this was now sufficient evidence of treason.[51]
The Jesuits came in two
stripes: those overwhelmingly centered
upon the moral reform of Englishmen that Puritans also recognized as urgently
required and those to whom the political agenda was of equal or greater
importance. To them, restoring a
Catholic monarch and submitting England to the tokens of loyalty to Rome were
at least as pressing a need as moral rejuvenation.
It did not take many in this
category to destroy both respect for the supposed moral reformation goal of the
Jesuits as well as tolerance for the discreet practicer
of Catholicism. Hence the draconian escalation of punishment
passed by Parliament in 1581. In the
legislation of 1559, the individual practicing Catholicism was fined twelve
pence; this was now escalated to 100 marks and a year imprisonment. To the degree it was enforced, impoverisation of every Catholic was inevitable.[52] The key was "to the degree." The tools were present for whatever policy
that was deemed appropriate.
Of course, there were also local
difficulties even when it was desired to stringently enforce laws suppressing
Catholicism. Especially in the more
Catholic sections of the country, there was a profound difference between fining
Catholics for rejection of the new Anglican system and actually collecting
the fine from them. Although a
significant number of individuals suffered financially from such impositions
(and even from outright confiscation of property), the local justices of the
peace often allowed such cases to slide by without enforcement.[53]
Foreign
powers supported the Jesuit effort not only out of religious loyalty to Rome
but also out of various specific complaints against England's national policies. In the most extreme form, the effort to recatholicize England by external force resulted in the
sailing of the Spanish Armada. A 130
vessels strong, it included a fighting core of about forty warships. The power of its might was designed to make
an invasion of England feasible, but a combination of British daring, Spanish
caution, and horrendous bad weather turned the threat into a disaster for the
would-be invaders.
Yet as long as foreign powers were
willing to send money to England to subsidize revolution, domestic Catholics
represented a potential security threat.
So long as European nations felt it might be possible to actually
conquer England, the Catholic minority represented a group of potential
collaborators that might flock to their ranks.
This is the unfortunate plight of any religious minority in a land where
the dominant religion is faced off in a religio-political
struggle with other nations that have the capacity to launch direct military
action (and/or finance domestic subversion) against it.
Because of the high stakes involved,
men and women did die under suspicion (or proof) of disloyalty: Under Elizabeth 183 Catholics in all. But the numbers were not as large as one
might expect nor was capital punishment the inevitable recourse. The bulk of executions (123) were of clergy;
57 were of laymen, and 3 of laywomen.[54] Most of the captured clerics were shown
mercy. Approximately three out of four
were banished from the kingdom or imprisoned in place of being executed.[55]
Catholics attempted to portray themselves
as continuing in loyalty to the Queen--and many were. But they were caught in a logical trap
between their nationalism and their loyalty to Rome and, human nature being as
diverse as it always is, specific individuals might take either of the two approaches. In his 1584 volume The True, Sincere and
Modest Defence of English Catholics, William
Allen did his best to convince his readers of the picture of Catholic loyalty
to the nation. He insisted that even
though the papal bull had been issued against Elizabeth in 1570,[56]
We never procured our queen's
excommunication; we have sought the mitigation thereof; we have done our
allegiance notwithstanding; we have answered, when we were forced into it, with
such humility and respect to her majesty and council, as you see; no man can
charge us of any attempt against the realm or the prince's person.
That might all be true, as far as it
went. But he undermined its power by
what he, as a faithful son of the church, was compelled to add: the right of the Pope to strip heretical
rulers of their post--and upheld it as valid.
The actual execution of such a policy, he assured his readers, was
hypothetical rather than one of pressing immediacy.
Even so, this would naturally set off alarm bells in the minds of even
the mildly cynical reader. If they had
been aware that the author was simultaneously attempting to work out an
arrangement with the Spanish to produce the overthrow of Elizabeth,[57] the
reaction would have been nothing short of volcanic.
If the government was uncertain how
deep went the loyalty of Catholic subjects, those wanting the violent overthrow
of Elizabeth were uncertain how pervasive was the willingness to act to obtain
that overthrow. John Bishop's Courteous
Conference with the English Catholics Roman (c. 1574) denied that the pope
had the temporal power to release anyone from their civil loyalty to their
king.
Catholic clerics arrested in the 1580s were likewise divided. Some denied the deposing power. Others were especially resentful of the
Spanish claim to have the right to exercise such an intervention. The middle of the road view of those opposed
to insurrection was that though the Pope had the deposing right, he had no
justification for utilizing it in the case of England as it existed in the
1570s.[58]
One fault line between opposers and supporters of the papal right of deposition
was between the Jesuits and the secular clergy that remained in the land. The Jesuits were usually the militants in
behalf of the papal right; a number of secular clergy were annoyed at their
insistence, not to mention their perceived arrogance and favoritism showed
toward them by higher clerics. In short
ideological and intramural grievances merged together to sharpen the conflict.[59]
(The general Jesuit opposition to
Elizabeth’s very right to rule also raises the question for later interpreters:
When they were sent to their death,
shall we consider them as having died for their religion or for their political
rejection of the Queen’s Queenship? On the one hand, their political opposition
grew out of their religious principles; on the other hand, the central concern
of the regime--and its professed reason for acting--was the security threat to
the government.)[60]
Underlying the perceived need for suppression
was the fear of how Catholics would act if they regained their dominance. (The massive bloodletting--by English
standards--that occurred under Mary was far from reassuring, as were the
repressive steps by contemporary European Catholic regimes.) This latent suspicion was well presented by
Elizabeth’s successor, James I, when he wrote, “I will never allow in my
conscience that the blood of any man shall be shed for diversity of opinions in
religion, but I should be sorry that Catholics should so multiply as they might
be able to practice their old principles upon us.”[61]
The government under Elizabeth
attempted to broaden the gap between the Jesuits and those Catholic clerics
more amenable to acceptance of the regime.
In 1601, it assisted a group of "Appellant" clergy who wished
to appeal to Rome against the pro-Jesuit (and anti-Elizabeth) policy of the
official top Roman cleric in the country.
In 1602, the government banished Jesuits but permitted other priests to
remain if they swore loyalty to Elizabeth and declined prosleytizing. Thirteen did so but it is unknown how many others
held similar sentiments but did not take the formal step.[62] In essence a substantial freedom of religious
practice was being offered in exchange for political loyalty.
Yet few openly expressed willingness
to take advantage of the offer. So the
problem still remained of how the regime was to tell the difference between
loyal Catholics and those willing to support foreign launched insurrections? One method of doing so was through a spy
network, that might give advance word when specific plots were under
consideration or about to be implemented.
Hence Elizabeth operated an
exhaustive and quite effective intelligence operation against her present and
potential foes both domestic and foreign.
Abroad, direct action to force out the truth was rarely feasible. On English soil, there was considerably more
freedom of action.
Those arrested in England were
subjected to persistent and intensive questioning to verify the truth of their
claims of being patriotic citizens. A
key question in determining whether to order the capital penalty, was the
answer to what Catholics came to describe as the "bloody
question:" if England were invaded
by a foreign army would they fight for the Queen or the invader?[63]
This was the nub of the issue from the standpoint of national security
and the ability of the accused to convince the court of his sincerity
determined his fate. Of course in times
of national alarm (the Armada year, for example) judicial cynicism was at its
highest and the difficulty of convincing the court at its greatest.
When all else failed and severe
suspicion still existed, there was always torture. A powerful case could be (and was) made for
the execution of captured priests as traitors, especially since Pius V's
excommunication in 1570 and the heavy influx of Jesuit missionaries
(subversives so far as Elizabeth was concerned) during the late 1570s and the
1580s. Their presence and zeal for
orthodoxy was taken as part of a cold war being waged to undermine the
regime.
Even so, there was considerable
skepticism about the torture utilized to obtain evidence. The legal generalization was that England was
distinct from other nations: torture was
abhorable. Sir
Thomas Smith had written in his De Republica Anglorum, "Torment . . . which is used by the
order of civil law and custom of other countries . . . is not used in
England. It is taken for servile."[64] This was true--as a generalization. (Not that imprisonment under the often vile
conditions of the day was not intimidating enough, even without the threat of further
coercion!)
Like any generalization, there were
exceptions. But they were rigid
ones. To authorize torture required the
prior written authority of either the Queen or her Privy Council. Indeed, during Elizabeth's entire, long reign
it was authorized in only ninety cases and twenty-four of these were for
clearly non-religious offenses.[65] Elizabeth made plain to her official
torturers that she considered them as doing valuable work in a dangerous
age. On the other hand, she limited the
number of cases where such extreme measures were permitted and sometimes had to
be convinced to permit them at all.[66]
Catholic Plots against James
The most infamous religious based
conspiracies against the monarchy occurred in the early years of the
seventeenth century. James had followed
an intentionally ambiguous policy prior to his coming to the throne and in the
initial succession to the position.
James’ moderate policies toward Catholics in Scotland encouraged those
of that religious tradition to expect a similar approach to be taken in England
when he became its monarch.[67] This expectation was enhanced since he had
also given promises to loosen or remove the anti-practicing Catholic
legislation then on the law books of England.[68]
Certainly Catholics thought
they had a commitment from him in such matters but rulers and politicians have
always had a reputation for seeming to promise more than they had actually
pledged. Hence wishful hopes may have
read into his indications of good will far more than the king was either
willing or able to deliver.
Earl Henry Northumberland played the
role of key intermediary for the Catholic minority, both before and after James
came to the English throne. Though not a
practicing Catholic himself, he was the conduit through which continuing
encouragement toward toleration could be funneled. Indeed in May 1603 (prior to the king’s
arrival in London) he was the vehicle by which a Catholic petition was
delivered to the king. His appointment
to the position of chief of the royal bodyguards (Captain of the Gentleman
Pensioners) gave him an important position in the government and regular access
to the monarch as well.[69]
By the time of James, even the
sentiments of the most militant Catholic clerics were divided concerning the
overthrow of the monarchy. In 1603, two
Catholic conspiracies, furthered by some clerics as well as laymen, were
simultaneously aborted by the government.
"The Bye Plot" (as it is known) called for the arrest of the
King and his advisers. The more hostile
advisers (especially Cecil) were to be forced out of office and the King held
prisoner until he signed the appropriate edicts granting full toleration to
Catholics. By revolutionary standards
this was, of course, a rather mild agenda.
The “Main Plot,” however, called for
the death of the king and his replacement with James’ first cousin, Lady Arbella Stuart.[70] It did not help that Arbella
herself was quite content with her status as the second most important woman in
the kingdom (behind the Queen) and had no interest in risking her neck for the
throne. Even if she had been otherwise
inclined, government investigators brought both simultaneous conspiracies to an
abrupt end by a series of arrests in July 1503.[71]
James ordered all priests out of the
country--it hadn't worked before and didn't work this time--but also abolished
the monthly fine levable on any Catholic who did not
attend Anglican services. Perhaps the
latter was James’ way of showing appreciation to the two priests (one of whom
was a Jesuit) who had heard of the Bye Plot and reported it to the Privy
Council. This was not mere patriotism on
the priests’ part--at least not fully.
Those backing the plots were members of a rival faction of priests and
intra-clerical relationships played a significant role above and beyond
abstract questions of propriety and appropriateness.[72]
Even so, there was no gainsaying the precedent it established--especially
at a time when there was a lingering suspicion that James or his wife might be
covert Catholics. Likewise the financial
relief of removing the fines was quite substantial in its own right. In 1602 the government had earned more than
7,000 pounds from such fines; in 1604 it dropped to 1,500.[73]
The change in policies concerning
fining practicing Catholics was certainly a significant step toward greater
tolerance. But this seemed ill repaid by
the Catholic conspiracy of 1605 to blow up Parliament.
Robert Catesby
led his fellow Catholics in this effort and one Guido (Guy) Fawkes
was to actually blow up the kegs of gunpowder secretly stored at Westminster
during a meeting of Parliament.
Parliament would be annihilated along with the king.[74] It seemed to some of the conspirators that it
was not the most appropriate thing to destroy Catholics who served in the Lords
along with their Protestant foes. Hence
efforts were made to alert them to what was about to happen. One who received an anonymous warning
promptly informed the government and the conspiracy was broken wide open.
Not surprisingly, the government
version of what happened has been questioned as to when officialdom knew of the
plot and to what extent it actively encouraged the conspirators on in order to
have an excuse to retaliate against those of similar sentiments. For example, some have argued that a
sufficient amount of gunpowder would have been impossible to obtain without tacit
government cooperation, a claim that is inaccurate.[75]
More
questionable is the government claim that the Jesuits played the pivotal role
in encouraging the conspiracy.[76] Whether justified or not, they were well
known enemies of the Protestant regime and their being targeted for accusation
was quite natural. Certainly, they would
have shed no tears if the plot had been successful and this, in itself, was
sufficient to virtually guarantee the execution of Father Henry Garnet, S.J.,
the one cleric arrested as part of the anticipated mass bloodshed. In retaliation for the conspiracy against
King and Parliament, penalties were increased against Catholics who did not
conform to Anglicanism and an annual day of celebrating the exposure of the
plot was begun.
There were two aspects to the
Gunpowder Plot. First there were the
active conspirators who were conspiring to blow up Parliament. So determined were they to carry out their
spectacular act of violence, that even warnings that the government knew what
was afoot was inadequate to convince them to drop the attempt.
Destroying the heart of the
Protestant political leadership was only the first step. Having done that, it would be necessary to
rally the Catholic gentry to support of a new monarch. To provide a launching pad for the second
stage, the plotters had arranged for a major hunt to be held simultaneously in
Warwickshire where such traditionalists were numerous. Word was to be sprung upon them when the deed
was accomplished and their support sought to fill the power vacuum.[77]
James’ spouse, Queen Anne, had been
careful to encourage the views of herself as a Catholic sympathizer if not,
perhaps, a covert adherent even after she came to the throne.[78] This interpretation was quite correct: in private, she was a practicing Catholic. She continued to exercise her religion away
from the public eye, while going through the necessary public rituals per the
official Anglican approach.
After the Gunpowder Plot, however, she had no further interest in
encouraging either domestic or Continental Catholics to believe that through
her influence the King would either embrace the faith or alter his religious
policies.[79] The Gunpowder Plot was simply too much. As for the king himself, whatever olive
branches he had waved to attract Catholic acquiescence to his reign were of
insignificance after the attempt to destroy him and the entire top political
leadership of the land.
The Gunpowder Plot of Fawkes sent anti-Catholic shock waves of indignation and
rage throughout the kingdom. One
indication of James’ intentional policy of moderation was exhibited in his
failure to exploit the plot to fuel the understandable paranoia that gripped
the country. Even at the height of
societal indignation, King James publicly stressed to Parliament that only a
few were involved in such monstrosities while most Catholics remained loyal to
the crown.[80]
The plots against Elizabeth and
James were part of a broader papally supported policy
implemented on the continent. William of
Orange evaded assassination upon several occasions until his good fortunate
failed him and he was struck down in 1584.
James escaped the Gunpowder Plot in 1605 but in 1610 King Henry IV of
France was murdered as he prepared to go to war in an alliance aimed at Spain.[81]
To many of the twentieth century, such
religiously inspired acts seem irrational and impossible. Yet we seem to have no trouble grasping the
rationale for the government inspired assassinations engaged in by the Communist
bloc at the height of the cold war. We
may rightly abhor such but we can understand why they occurred.
Just as there were men and women completely devoted to their secular
ideological convictions in the twentieth century, many men and women were
equally passionate in their religious convictions in the sixteenth. If we understand how otherwise honorable and
self-controlled individuals could be swept along by the means-justifies-the-end
mentality, by their desperation to achieve a victory that seemed otherwise
impossible, or by the emotional horror--the utter unthinkability--that
the despised foe might win, if we can understand such things in a secular
context, then we are touching the psychological well-springs from which similar
brazen acts were implemented during the Reformation.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Richard Marius, Thomas More (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984) presents him as an example of one faithful to the church rather than to the Pope in his study of the man’s life (517), but the principle would have been shared by many who die not pay the price of martyrdom that was inflicted upon that Lord Chancellor. On More's support for councillar authority over papal, see 457-458.
[2] For an analysis of one 1537 English tract attempting to neutralize the Catholic church division argument see McConica, 173-175.
[3] On the need to consider the one-sided nature of the surviving sources on the rebellion, see Annabel Patterson, “Sir John Oldcastle as Symbol of Reformation Historiography,” in Religion, Literature, and Politics in Post-Reformation England, 1540-1688, edited by Donna B. Hamilton and Richard Strier (Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 9-10, and n. 29, page 26.
[5] Jasper Ridley, Thomas Cranmer (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), 12, argues that concerns of chaos may have motivated Cranmer’s insistence upon following the royal policy line even when it differed from his own understanding of the scriptures. He had lived in Germany for six months and had a German spouse so he knew full well what could occur if things got out of hand.
[9] For the entire text of the legislation see George B. Adams and H. Morse Stephens, Select Documents of English Constitutional History (New York: Macmillan Company, 1901), 281-283.
[10] On the matter of inertia and regional variations, see Christopher Haigh, “The Recent Historiography of the English Reformation,” in The Eglish Reformation Revised, edited by Christopher Haigh (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 31-32
[12] Christopher Haigh, “The Continuity of Catholicism in the English Reformation,” in The English Reformation Revised, edited by Christopher Haigh (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 177-178.
[13] For the case that it was a reinvigorated Catholicism rather than a new one based upon a new body of members, see Ibid., 178-192 in particular. For evidence from Jesuit sources that their primary, almost exclusive thrust, was among lapsed Catholics see 196-197.
[14] For a discussion of why the figure is sometimes given as 25% and why the lower one is more accurate, see Christopher Haigh, “Revisionism, the Reformation and the History of English Catholicism,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 36 (July 1985): 401-402.
[16] For a refutation of the theory that by working in the London area, a large number of Jesuits consciously courted death see Patrick McGrath, “Elizabethan Catholicism: A Reconsideration,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 35 (July 1984): 427.
[17] For the contrasting attitudes see Christopher Haigh, “The Continuity of Catholicism in the English Reformation,” 182, 185.
[19] For a discussion of these see Michael C. Questier, Conversion, Politics and Religion in England, 1580-1625 (Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 51-53.
[21] R. C. Richardson, Puritanism in North-west England: A Regional Study of the Diocese of Chester to 1642 (Manchester [Great Britain]: Manchester University Press/Rowman & Littlefield, Publishers, 1972), 157.
[24] As quoted by Christopher Haigh, “Puritan Evangelism in the Reign of Elizabeth I,” English Historical Review 92 (January 1977): 46.
[26] For the example of Suffolk, see Diarmaid MacCulloch, “Catholic and Puritan in Elizabethan Suffolk: A County Community Polarises,” Archiv fur Reformationsgeschichte/Archive for Reformation History 72 (1981): 232-236.
[27] On the gradual decatholicization of many and their displacement by a smaller but more devoted group, see Ibid., 248.
[29] On the repercussions of a gentry-centered strategy see Haigh, “The Continuity of Catholicism in the English Reformation,” 201-202, 205-206.
[31] On the nomenclature of partial dissent, see Alison Plowden, Danger to Elizabeth: The Catholics under Elizabeth I (New York: Stein and Day, 1973), 48.
[32] Carl S. Meyer, Elizabeth I and the Religious Settlement of 1559 (Saint Louis [Missouri]: Concordia Publishing House, 1960), 129.
[35] For a discussion of how such factors operated when the Catholics were on the receiving end, see D. M. Palliser, “Popular Reactions to the Reformation during the Years of Uncertainty,” in Church and Society in England: Henry VIII to James I, edited by Felicity Heal and Rosemary O’Day (Hamden, Connecticut: Archon Books, 1977), 51-53. For how it could work in favor of more militant reformers, see 44. Cf. David W. Hall, “Foundation of Elizabethean Ecclesiology, 1560-1590: A Key to Its Later Revival,” Premise (Volume II, Number 3; March 27, 1995), (http://www.public. usit.net/capo/ premise/95/march/eliz.html), AOL Netfind, August 22, 1997.
[42] On his Catholicism, see Linda L. Peck, "The Mentality of a Jacobean Grandee," in The Mental World of the Jacobean Court, edited by Linda L. Peck (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 148, 158, 316 (n. 60).
[44] For examples concerning the Elizabethan era, see Malcolm R. Thorp, “Catholic Conspiracy in Early Elizabethan Foreign Policy,” Sixteenth Century Journal: A Journal for Renaissance and Reformation Students and Scholars 15 (Winter 1984): 431-438.
[46] As quoted by Hibbert, 77. For the full text in both Latin and English see Elton, Tudor Constitution, 414-418.
[47] As quoted by Hibbert, 77. For the text in a different translation see Powel M. Dawley, John Whitgift and the Reformation (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1954; First British Edition, London: Adam and Charles Black, 1955), 128.
[56] As quoted by Claire Cross, The Royal Supremacy in the Elizabethan Church (New York: Barnes and Noble, Inc., 1969), 43.
[60] For the view that they should be counted as religious rather than political martyrs, see Thomas M. McCoog, “ ‘The Flower of Oxford:’ The Role of Edmund Campion in Early Recusant Polemics,” Sixteenth Century Journal: The Journal of Early Modern Studies 24 (Winter 1993): 907.
[61] As quoted by Antonia Fraser, Faith and Treason: The Story of the Gunpowder Plot (New York: Doubleday, 1996), 38.
[66] On the Queen’s ambivalent attitude, see Ibid., 394-395. On popular and Puritan resentment of the practice, see 395.
[67] Anonymous, “The Lot of the Recusants,” (http://www.indtts.co.uk/-asperges/fawkes/
fawkes2.html), Magellan, September 2, 1997.
[68] David Cody and George P. Landow, “James I,” (http://www.stg.brown.edu/projects/ hypertext/landow/victorian/history/james1.html), AOL Netfind, August 31, 1997.
[70] For a discussion of the limited primary source documentation for the two overthrow efforts, see Mark Nicolls, “Sir Walter Raleigh’s Treason: A Prosecution Document,” English Historical Review 110 (September 1995): 902-924.
[74] Those who look upon Guy Fawkes in a positive light, see him as creating a precedent for revolution against rulers who have abused the rights of the people. See Anonymous, “How The Powder Plot Changed the World,” (http://www.bcpl.lib.md.us/-cbladey/guy/ html/change.html), Excite, September 2, 1997, which quotes Thomas Jefferson at length in an attempt to prove that the Fawkes conspiracy inspired Jefferson’s revolutionary thinking.
[75] See the discussion in C. Northcote Parkinson, Gunpowder, Treason and Plot (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1976), 53-54..
[77] For the two aspects to the Plot see Joel Hurstfield, “Gunpowder Plot and the Politics of Dissent,” in Early Stuart Studies: Essays in Honor of David Harris Willson, edited by Howard S. Reinmuth, Jr. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1970), 97-98.
[79] Ibid., 277. To say that Anne’s Catholicism “irritated rather than influenced” James, as asserts James D. Douglas, “The King behind the [King James] Version,” Christianity Today 19 (March 28, 1975): 7, is not credible when one concedes on the same page that James “had a wild dream of joining forces” with traditional Catholics “to form one great united church of God” (7). The difference seems to be that Anne practiced Catholicism (though discretely) while James was intellectually tempted by it both on idealistic grounds and as a means of preserving the unity of his kingdom.
[80] Mark H. Curtis, “Trials of a Puritan in Jacobin Lancashire,” in The Dissenting Tradition: Essays for Leland H. Carlson, edited by C. Robert Cole and Michael E. Moody (Athens, [Ohio]: Ohio University Press, 1975), 88.