Religious policy

• background of the Break with Rome

  most were loyal to Catholic church

  some anticlericalism with the advent of printing, more aware of taxes going to Pope

  Martin Luther's 95 these 1517 stressed importance of Bible

  these beliefs were reaching England through merchants and traders
• where did Lutheran supporters meet

  White Horse Pub in Cambridge

  led by Robert Barnes (later burned as a heretic in 1540 as he refused the King's supremacy)
• who started to publish parts of the Bible in English

  William Tyndale
• how many religious houses did Wolsey dissolve

  24
• how many unsuitable heads of monasteries did Wolsey remove

  8
• as Papal Legate, how did Wolsey try to reform the church

  instructed Bishops to carry out duties more scrupulously and inspect quality of monasteries
• how did Wolsey promote the religious learning of clergy

  partly with money from dissolution from 24 religious houses

  created Cardinal College Oxford
• when did Wolsey plan to close monasteries with fewer than 6 monks and combine with those with fewer than 12

  1528
• what was Wolsey opposed to and what did this lead him to do in 1521

  opposed to the spread of Protestant heresy

  burned Lutheran texts outside St Paul's
• weaknesses of the church

  - corruption

  - anti-clericalism

  - decline of monasticism

  - rise of Protestantism
• pluralism


  receiving multiple profits from more than 1 post
• simony


  purchase of church office
• non-residence


  receiving profits of a post without fulfilling its duties
• how many bishoprics did Wolsey have

  4

  + AB of York
• for how many yrs did Wolsey not visit York

  14
• why can Wolsey be accused of nepotism

  wanted his illegitimate child to be the see of Durham
• where was Wolsey the abbot of and why is this important

  St Alban's

  one of the wealthiest monasteries
• evidence for limited corruption in the church

  1514-21, in diocese of Lincoln, 1000 parishes were investigated and few corruption was uncovered

  King blocked Wolsey's attempt to make his son Bishop of Durham

  Archbishop Warham visits 260 Kentish priests 1511-12, only 4 guilty of corruption
• what was anti-clericalism


  opposition to political and social importance of clergy
• examples of anti-clericalism


  common lawyers objected to legal privileges of clergy

  Richard Hunne's murder in 1514 in the Bishop of London's prison

  1529 attack on clergy in Simon Fish's supplication of the Beggars
• Richard Hunne's murder


  arrested over dispute over mortuary fees

  accused his captors of praemunire

  his house was searched and Lollard writings were found

  denied transubstantiation

  was murdered in Bishop of London's prison
• what happened after Hunne's murder

  chancellor of Bishop of London was charged with his death

  Wolsey apologised to parliament for the event

  strength of criticism shows this was unique and unacceptable
• how did Simon Fish's 1529 Supplication of the Beggars portray the Catholic church

  as greedy and treacherous
• when did Augustinian monk Martin Luther nail his 95 theses to a church door

  1517
• when was Luther excommunicated

  1521
• what did Luther do with the Bible

  translated it into German
• the church as an institution had been weakened by what

  humanist criticisms of Colet and Erasmus and Simon Fish
• when did Colet preach a sermon criticising the ambitions of higher clergy, its absenteeism, pluralism and simony

  1511
• how had the church's claim to legal supremacy been challenged

  by Christopher St Germain's books which emphasised the role of state in controlling the church paved the way for the parliamentary attack on Church power (1528)
• who asserted that English Kings had always enjoyed both a secular and spiritual authority over the church

  Cranmer and Edward Foxe
• what was the Collectanea Satis Copiosa


  collection of historical documents by Edward Foxe and Thomas Cranmer
• was the church in crisis by 1529?


  - faults in its structure and who it was operated by

  - corruption, Wolsey could use his power to control how the church was run or use religious authority to spread messages that fulfilled personal aims

  = problems not seen at first glance, church is relatively secure, people weren't educated on teachings of Bible
• why was anti-clericalism not widespread in the general population

  principles and laws of church had been engrained for centuries

  commoners couldn't see issues in things like paying indulgences to bypass purgatory, not well educated and relied on teachings of priests
• when was the end of the benefit of the clergy

  1529
• end of benefit of clergy 1529

  only tried in normal courts

  principle of sanctuary ended

  limit pluralism to 4 roles

  = showed church to be corrupt
• when was the praemunire charge against 15 clergymen

  Jan 1531
• who offered to pay £100,000 to pardon the 15 clergymen

  Convocation at Canterbury Cathedral
• how did Henry deal with the praemunire charge

  agreed to the £100,000

  insisted they call him 'protector and only Supreme Head of the Church in England
• significance of praemunire charge

  £100,000 offered revealed the wealth of the church
• when was the first act of annates

  1532