NationStates Jolt Archive

For those who don't know when Elizabeth I of England came to the throne she did so after a year of religious genocide against Puritans in England by her older sister, Mary I. She had been raised as a Protestant but in a primaryly Catholic enviroment and she herself can be said to have been primarly puritan. Because she did not want to continue the bloodshead and various other reasons, she enforced a new church in England and broke away from Rome. For more infomation see here

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1429495

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabethan_Religious_Settlement

(on the second one, read the links)

Was it made the way it was because it was

A) A via-media (a compromise between Catholics and Protestants)

B) Her church (the church she wanted the way she wanted it)

And in terms of it's nature was it

C) A Primarly Catholic Church with Puritan influences

D) A Primarily Puritan Church with Catholic influences

(Poll soon)

Note: Choose 1 option from A & B and one option from C & D. Dont choose both A and B or C and D as that will screw things up.

Bump (I thought I would put this on here because I thought people were fed up of debating something beyond politics and history of the last 100 years. Obviously I was either wrong or over-anticipated interest levels in this particular subject)

Bleh the people who know anything about victorian history round these there parts will be thin and few, ive had a class on it once in year 5 so hell ill give it a god.

Ton mon opinion, i feel she most probally did it becuase the majority in england at the time where protestant, and haveing the majority behind you is allways good, even when your got god offical seal of aproval. But also becuase she really and truely starts the british empire off, and at this stage the prime enemies of that are the scot catholic, the french catholic and the spanish catholic, Considering shes going to be hitting them all from time to time, why bother with having to get shouted at by the pope for doing so evey time, just go protestant and do it your own way.

Best i could do

I guess not very many General forum users even saw the 1998 movie about Queen Elizabeth, starring Cate Blanchett.

Yes, it was fiction, but the historical background and the religious issues did figure pretty prominently in the movie. It certainly provided enough info to answer this poll, even if you hadn't read any books or taken any classes on the period.

Bump (I thought I would put this on here because I thought people were fed up of debating something beyond politics and history of the last 100 years. Obviously I was either wrong or over-anticipated interest levels in this particular subject)
No...it's a refreshing change...I just don't know if I'm in the mood right now...but I appreciate the effort!

Bleh the people who know anything about victorian history round these there parts will be thin and few, ive had a class on it once in year 5 so hell ill give it a god.

Is that a typo or a genuine misconception? :confused:

It is interesting to see the people who even bothered to look at this thread. A little too obscure for most people Neo-Cannen.

I feel that a lot of what ER did in the establishment of the Church was politically necessary. Despite being one of the most powerfiul nations at the time, England could not have withstood an all out religious war with the Catholic nations. Spain and France were powerful. The Italian states, in particular Venice and Genoa were wealthy and influential. The ideal for her would have been puritan, the way she wanted it to be. (She never was one to not get what she wanted.) Howecver her ideal had to be politically softened so as not to provoke her continental enemies too much.

Certainly is a refreshing change.

I have been through the British education system so I'm afraid my knowledge of British history is minimal. I can remember being taught that Elizabeth made a compromise between the Catholics and Puritans (Anglicanism) but extremists on both sides were never happy.

From the very little background knowledge I have (in A-Level History we studied the English Civil War, so to get the wider picture I delved back a little bit) I'd say that the Elizabethen Church leaned more to the Protestant than the Catholic.

I voted A, D.

I would caution against calling elizabeth a puritan. Under her the Anglican church came to prominence. It was not until Oliver cromwell that the puritans truly controlled things. YEs they had members in parlaiment but they did not persuade Elizabeth to be a puritan. She was a very smart woman so i would say she was what people wanted to see

Certainly is a refreshing change.

I have been through the British education system so I'm afraid my knowledge of British history is minimal. I can remember being taught that Elizabeth made a compromise between the Catholics and Puritans (Anglicanism) but extremists on both sides were never happy.



Again, Anglicanism is not Puritanism. Puritans were calvinists while anglicans were not much different than catholic. In fact they replaced the pope with the monarch and kept the order of worship pretty much the same. Puritans were much more spartan in their worship and represented the new middle class, not the old aristocracy.

The term Puritanism did come into use with Cromwell, but what was Cromwell's religious program? It was to return the Anglican church back to it's "pure" original form, away from the Catholic corruption that had occured. Hence the term Puritan. While it is anachronistic to refer to the Elizibethan church as puritan, it is not ideallistically incorrect.

One of the most intersting things about the settlement and Elizabeth herself is that she was brough up in Henry VIII's reign. So she was still surronded by all the Catholic imagery but was brought up doctrineally as a Protestant. So the question I suppose is which is more important. Doctrine or imagery?

Is that a typo or a genuine misconception? :confused:
hahah im stupid
Was 11ish when i posted i was tried ok!

Bleh the people who know anything about victorian history round these there parts will be thin and few, ive had a class on it once in year 5 so hell ill give it a god.

Ton mon opinion, i feel she most probally did it becuase the majority in england at the time where protestant, and haveing the majority behind you is allways good, even when your got god offical seal of aproval. But also becuase she really and truely starts the british empire off, and at this stage the prime enemies of that are the scot catholic, the french catholic and the spanish catholic, Considering shes going to be hitting them all from time to time, why bother with having to get shouted at by the pope for doing so evey time, just go protestant and do it your own way.

Best i could do

Oh my god, this post is like so wrong it is unbelievable!

Firstly, at the start of Elizabeth's reign, her country was still primarily Catholic. The Protestants were a small, but significant majority and puritanism as we know it didn't exist until the end of her reign.

Elizabeth most likely witnessed that in the reigns of her half brother Edward VI and Mary I, the country had gone two competing ways. Edward VI, wanted to push further the reforms of their great father Henry VIII, who despite breaking with Rome, closing down the monasteries and getting rid of a few icons he felt to be false, he wanted an essentially catholic church that he controlled. The reforms as mentioned were primarily the work of Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer who knew how to give Henry what he wnated while pushing through their own protestant reforms. It was Cromwell's failure to give Henry the divorce from Anne of Cleves (La Flanders Mare) or Henry's fourth wife, that cost Cromwell his job and head. Edward VI, promoted protestants like his maternal uncles Edward Seymour and Thomas Seymour (Edward Seymour executed his brother Thomas before being executed by the boy King himself). They pushed through the truly fundamental principles of the church, whitewashed churches, English as opposed to latin sermons and allowing priests to marry. This had resulted in the 'desecration' of catholic churches which angered most of Edward's subjects.

His death however reversed this extreme policy and caused Mary, a fervent Catholic to come to the throne. She reversed all the changes made by her half brother and father including making herselves the subject of Rome and through her England and burning Protestants. Although this second policy is best remembered and probably rightly so, it was not this terrible policy alone that earned her the wrath of her subjects. Although most of the nobility were proudly Catholic, few were relishing the policy as Mary made clear it was, of losing large areas of their estates as Mary gave the monasteries their land back. Alongside this, her marriage to Philip II of Spain (who as Mary was dying, proposed to the future Elizabeth I who was the next in line) was deeply unpopular especially as it caused the capture of Calais, the last of England's possessions from its old Angevin empire by the French. Mary died just before she would almost cetainly have been removed, as had already been attempted and for which Elizabeth, who was linked although possibly only via having knowledge rather than consent for it taking place, nearly lost her life.

It is most likely that Elizabeth, knowing how smart she undoubtedly was, wanted to reach a COMPROMISE, between the extreme policies of her brother and sister. There is no question that the Church was a protestant one in that, she styled herself, as her father had done and her brother had copied, as the 'Supreme Head on Earth of the Church in England in so far as the law of Christ allows', dismissing the authority of the Pope. All sermons were in English and churches were whitewashed again. However, unlike her brother she held out a carrot for the Catholics, by promising not to "open windows into mens souls" or to not try and force them to convert, merely ordering Catholicism to be a private faith. This was intended to make it die a slow and peaceful rather than a sudden and violent death which occurred as is shown by the fact that by the end of her reign only 1% of the country were openly Catholic. This only ceased when Spain, the superpower of the day, declared her and England an enemy. This was a mistake on Spain's part as many Catholics even though differing in faith actually enjoyed Elizabeth's peaceful reign and the belligerence of the Pope and Philip cost the Catholic faith not only some of its flock, for some turned protestant out of patriotism but also hurt English catholics themselves for Catholicism, like Communism in the USA after WWII became a dangerous ideal. This was centrally due to the fact that Catholics need a priest and priests served the Pope who ordered Elizabeth's subjects to assassinate her, hardly something the English could allow freely. Therefore Catholics were then fined for refusing to attend anglican services while captured priests were hung, drawn and quartered.

The answer is therefore, that Elizabeth's church was purely her own compromise, designed, as it did largely, to give England peace after 20 years of turmoil at the hands of religion.

Despite being one of the most powerfiul nations at the time, England

Also, England was pathetically weak and had been since the death of Henry VIII at ELizabeth's accession. It was her reign that saw it become more powerful than it had been even in Henry's reign in that England became THE MOST IMPORTANT PROTESTANT POWER in Europe. Without Elizabeth, we might well be asking, "what is a protestant" as she funded protestant resistance to Catholic Spain. England under Elizabeth and not again until Oliver Cromwell, like America was for Capitalism, was seen as synonymous with Protestantism in that they needed each other to survive.

Just a couple of points on what Syalwa said:
Edward VI didn't execute Edward Seymour, John Dudley (Duke of Northumberland) and his supporters did. Edward VI signed the warrant, but he was only 15 at the time, and was still heavily influenced by Dudley.
Mary's marriage to Philip II wasn't just unpopular because it caused the loss of Calais - it was unpopular because the guy was a dick. All he wanted was control of England to make sure it remained a Catholic country. He gave nothing to us, and Mary was so devoted to him that he could make her do anything, including joining in Spanish wars which would give us no benefit.
And England was the most important Protestant power in Europe during her reign...because it was virtually the only Protestant power.
In summary, here's the religious history of 16th century England:
1500-1527: Catholic
1527-1540: Catholic, but with Henry as head of the Church instead of the Pope, and some Protestant influences (vernacular bible etc.)
1540-1547: Catholic, with Henry as head of Church.
1547-1553: Big movement towards Protestantism, thanks to Edward Seymour and Edward VI.
1553-1558: Even bigger movement back towards Catholicism.
1558-1600: Move towards Protestantism; Catholicism gradually marginalised.

Mary's marriage to Philip II wasn't just unpopular because it caused the loss of Calais - it was unpopular because the guy was a dick.

Alongside this, her marriage to Philip II of Spain (who as Mary was dying, proposed to the future Elizabeth I who was the next in line) was deeply unpopular especially as it caused the capture of Calais, the last of England's possessions from its old Angevin empire by the French.

Where's the difference in what I said? Especially isn't the same as only.

Fairplay on the rest though.

I'm glad to see that people who complain about the continous religion and politcs themes in General are actually interested in some serious historical discussion [Insert sarcastic tone of voice at begining]

Where's the difference in what I said? Especially isn't the same as only.

Fairplay on the rest though.

The diffrence he was getting at was that when Philp II married Mary he effectively controled both her and England for Spain's own ends. Thats why he was unpopular in England, as was she for failing to stand up for herself and do anything about it.