The ‘Middle Way’

• Act of Supremacy 1559


  Re-established the break with Rome and an independent Church of England
• Elizabeth

  Became the Supreme Governor rather than the more controversial title of Head of the Church
• Catholics still saw the Pope as head of the Church
• Elizabeth appointed

  Moderate Protestant, Matthew Parker, as Archbishop of Canterbury to lead the English Church
• All members of the clergy had to swear an oath of loyalty to Elizabeth
• Act of Uniformity 1559


  A new Book of Common Prayer was issued which contained radical Protestant ideas
• The traditional Catholic Mass was abolished
• The Bible was written in English, services were held in English
• Priests were allowed to marry
• Crosses and candlesticks were allowed to be placed on the Communion table
• Priests had to wear traditional Catholic-style vestments rather than the plain black ones worn by Protestants
• Catholics were allowed to worship in their own way in private (Recusancy)
• Fines for Catholics who refused to attend Protestant services were very low
• Elizabeth passed the two acts

  To forge a middle path between Catholicism and Protestantism
• The acts were not a great compromise but certainly not spineless
• Elizabeth focused on style over substance, making changes to how churches were run and how they looked, but made no concessions to beliefs such as transubstantiation
• Many Catholics didn't buy into the Middle Way because there wasn't enough in it for them