Queen Elizabeth Walks A Tightrope[1]
Queen Elizabeth I ruled in a turbulent, violent time respecting matters of religion. She wanted peace, unity, and conformity for her Church of England. She was a Protestant by conviction: learned, personally pious and observant, she read the Bible daily.[2] Her Church of England was to be decidedly Protestant. The fact she had been declared illegitimate by Rome also required her to be Protestant in order to reign. Most of all she wanted to avoid the religious divisions and civil strife that lasted throughout Europe during her reign.
Following the religious upheaval due to Henry VIII’s break with Rome, the succession of Edward VI (vigorously reformed), and the reactionary Queenship of Mary Tudor (Roman Catholic), she sought a midpoint between Catholics and the more radical reformers. Elizabeth’s decisions about religion would determine whether her reign would endure and whether England would suffer the civil unrest and violence of Continental Europe. Elizabeth navigated these troubled waters shrewdly, true to her religious convictions while maintaining civil order and stability. The English church she established could have been, and could be a model for reunifying the Christian church.[3]
Elizabeth’s father Henry VIII grew up and remained Catholic in personal preference, maintaining all the essential Catholic doctrines under his headship of the English Church, including the Catholic tenets on justification and transubstantiation.[4] His separation from the Roman Catholic church had little if anything to do with theological persuasion, nor did it rise from any popular support for reform; it was, instead, born of the necessity to have a male heir to the throne. That is, he put English political order first, not the church.[5]
Parliament validated this in the Act of Supremacy in 1534, declaring the sovereign “supreme head” of the church in England.[6] These steps did not, however, automatically lead to a full embrace of Continental reformed theology.[7] His Archbishop of Canterbury, Cranmer, was a committed Protestant. He was to be the main author of the Book of Common Prayer that first appeared in 1549, rich in scripture and allusions to scripture, reformed in theology, and engaging the laity in all aspects of worship.[8] Henry, however, would best be described as a “non-Roman” Catholic, adhering in nearly all parts to the same Christianity as the Roman church right up to his own death January 28, 1547.
If Henry was comfortable with maintaining most of the old church practices and doctrines, his son, Edward VI (reigned 1547-1553), who assumed the throne at age nine, was not. Raised mainly by Catherine Parr,[9] and tutored by reformed scholars, Edward was a personally convinced Protestant even at a young age.[10] Though under “protection” due to his minority, the new Josiah led the way for Cranmer, now freed to express his Protestant views more freely, to produce two versions of the Prayer Book, 1549 and 1552. He also led the writing of forty-two Articles of Religion, a richly reformed confessional statement, “for the avoiding of controversy in opinions and the establishment of a Godly concord in certain matters of religion.”[11]
Edward’s death in 1553, however, caused another political crisis and, within it, another religious crisis. Lady Jane Grey (1537-1554),[12] Henry’s reformed Protestant niece, wise beyond her years, was made the uncrowned queen for a mere nine days before being executed. Mary Tudor (February 1516 - November 1558) then took the crown, as much because the people wanted a direct heir of Henry on the throne as for any popular religious imperative. Mary was a Catholic reactionary and quickly undid all Edward’s reforms.[13] She persecuted Protestants and executed over 300. Many fled to Geneva or Scotland.[14] Upon Queen Mary’s death, Elizabeth, who had been careful not to give any cause for her own execution during Mary’s reign, became queen. The words attributed to her upon being informed, “This is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes,”[15] reflect both her knowledge of scripture and her personal faith.
Elizabeth ruled from 17 November 1558 until her death on 24 March 1603. She wanted unity and conformity for the Church of England. Schooled alongside Edward, her half-brother, by Protestant tutors, under the shelter of Catherine Parr, she was herself Protestant by conviction.[16] Having lived through the terrible period of Catholic Mary Tudor’s reign, she ascended to the throne threatened by challenges from within and without. On the matter of religion, the situation in England was unstable.
What Elizabeth did was to act quickly to settle the matter by crafting supremacy legislation, a prayer book, and a confession of faith that embodied both her sense of biblically sound Protestantism and her desire to avoid matters that would divide.[17] She shepherded through Parliament legislation that restored the prayer book in a third revision melding the stronger Protestant language of the former book Mary had abolished with somewhat less reformed text and toning down some anti-Catholic rhetoric.[18]
Then she procured the development of a confession of faith, the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion. Based on the former 42 Articles, it struck a middle path (the so-called via media) between the Lutheran and other Reformed conceptions, grounded in the historic episcopate.[19] She maintained Cranmer’s distinction between the essentials and things indifferent, or adiaphora.[20] Her policy was to allow leeway locally for gradual acceptance of change, and she preferred to preserve some of the old forms and practices in worship.[21] She accepted somewhat vague formulations that were nonetheless consistent with reformed orthodoxy, rather than forcing a specific doctrine on her people. This does not mean her theology was weak or compromised, and she enjoyed considerable support from theologians and scholars.[22] She sought only to avoid the high temperature disputes over points of doctrine that were provoking such bitterness and violence all around her. This was true, for example, in her manner of dealing with the point of doctrine that most prevented reuniting the Christian church: the issue of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and the Christological questions it raised.[23]
We can see this in brief with examples from the Prayer Book and the 39 Articles. Under the words of administration of the Lord’s Supper from Edward’s first prayer book in 1549, you would hear,[24]
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee,
preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life.
The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for thee,
Preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life.
This language does not directly confront the question of the real presence or whether the sacrament operated ex opere operato. It could be read in an acceptable manner by a Catholic or a Lutheran. Three years later, however, when a second Edwardian prayer book came into use in 1552, it reflected criticisms by reformers such as Martin Bucer and read,
Take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee,
and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving.
Drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for thee,
and be thankful.
This is readily seen as more consistent with the view that the Lord’s Supper is, if not purely, mainly, a memorial, with no suggestion of a real presence, let alone transubstantiation.
When the Prayer Book was restored under Queen Elizabeth in 1559, it reflected her desire to be nonspecific (and non-divisive) when possible without fatal compromise to her Protestant convictions. The words you would then hear upon reception of the elements were,[25]
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee,
preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life: and take and
eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee,
and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving.
The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for thee,
Preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life: and
drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for thee,
and be thankful.
The words are identical to the phrases of the two previous books conflated by a colon to produce one text. Not wholly agreeable to any faction but complete in its own way, it reflects Elizabeth’s own convictions, so far as we can know them, with respect to the Eucharist.[26] She firmly rejected transubstantiation but was probably closer to the Lutheran view of a real presence than the Zwinglian memorial view. The statement she approved melded them both.[27] Her object was to settle the matter on one point of most severe contention in the early decades of the English Reformation, avoiding the struggles experienced at home and elsewhere.[28]
Elizabeth’s religious settlement is very like the “third force” or middle path of Christian humanism whose intellectual leader was Erasmus.[29] She wanted conformity and order above all.[30] She is described as an Erasmian reformer: “Queen Elizabeth of England was certainly an Erasmian princess, learned, moderate in her religious views, and protector of scholars like Dr. [John] Dee.”[31] “Elizabeth was a subtle and reflective woman who had learnt about politics the hard way. She showed no enthusiasm for high temperature religion, despite the private depth and quiet intensity of her own devotional life.”[32] Her upbringing and personal faith were Protestant, and she saw to it that the church under her headship was both Protestant and apostolic, without forcing on her people any doctrine or practice that was intolerable to large numbers.[33] The model she established, not strictly imposing one view on matters of indifference while resting on the apostolic foundations of the ages, successfully finds the navigable part of the channel between the conflicting theological shoals of her age.[34] At times it appeared Anglicanism could be more widely embraced as a solution to the Protestant divisions of the sixteenth century.[35] If adopted more widely today, it could perhaps serve as a safe harbor to unify the church, at least among those who hold orthodox Christian beliefs and seek to uphold the apostolic succession.[36] What are “orthodox Christian beliefs”? A good place to find them is the 39 Articles of Religion, the Prayer Book of 1559, and the ancient confessions embraced therein.
Bibliography
Bernard, G.W. The King’s Reformation: Henry VIII and the Remaking of the English Church. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2005.
Book of Common Prayer, And Adminiſtration of the Sacraments, and other rites and ceremonies of the Church According to the Uſe of The Church of England: together with the Psalter or Psalms of David Pointed as they are to be ſung or ſaid in Churches, The, 1662, https://www.eskimo.com/~lhowell/bcp1662/communion/index.html, accessed March 27, 2020.
Bullett, Maggie. “The Reception of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement in Three Yorkshire Parishes,” 1559–72, Northern History, 48:2 (2011), 225-252.
Busfield, Lucy. 2013. “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England.” Reformation & Renaissance Review 15 (3): 217–36.
Church of England. The Booke of Common Prayer, and Administracion of the Sacramentes, and Other Rites and Ceremonies in the Churche of England London, in officina Richardi Iugge & Iohannis Cawood, 1559.. http://ezproxy.liberty.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-, com.ezproxy.liberty.edu/docview/2240869376?accountid=12085, accessed April 1, 2020.
Clegg, Cyndia Susan. “The 1559 Books of Common Prayer and the Elizabethan Reformation.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 67 (1, 2016): 94–121.
Congress of Religion, The. Unity LXVIII, No. 8 (Chicago: Lincoln Press, 1916): 396-98.
Cook, Faith. Lady Jane Grey: Nine Day Queen of England. Darlington: Evangelical Press, 2004.
Davie, Martin. “Calvin’s Influence on the Theology of the English Reformation.” Ecclesiology 6 (3) (2010): 315–41.
Davis, Natalie Zemon. "The Rites of Violence: Religious Riot in Sixteenth-Century France." Past & Present, no. 59 (1973): 51-91.
Doran, Susan. “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 51, no. 4 (October 2000): 699–720.
Goring, Jeremy. “The Reformation of the Ministry in Elizabethan Sussex.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 34 (3) (1983): 345–66.
Green, Janet M. “‘I My Self’: Queen Elizabeth I's Oration at Tilbury Camp.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 28, no. 2 (1997): 421–45.
____________. “Queen Elizabeth I's Latin Reply to the Polish Ambassador.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 4 (2000): 987–1008.
Johnson, Paul. A History of Christianity. New York: Touchstone, 1976.
Lane, Tony. A Concise History of Christian Thought. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006.
Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christianity, Beginnings to 1500, vol. II. Peabody, MA: Prince Press, 1975.
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years. New York: Penguin, 2009.
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture." Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005): 75-95.
McGrath, Alister E. Historical Theology, 2d ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
_______________. Reformation Thought, An Introduction, 4th ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.
Noll, Mark A. Turning Points, Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity 3d ed. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012.
Reeves, Michael. “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans.” Lecture from Ligonier Ministries series on the English Reformation, 2019.
Scarisbrick, J. J. Henry VIII. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997.
Spickard, Paul R., and Kevin M. Cragg. A Global History of Christians. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1994.
Thompson, Mark. “Origin of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion.” Churchman, Vol. 12 (1) (2011): 37-XX.
Vitale, Kyle Sebastian. “An Overlooked Detail in Elizabeth I’s Coronation.” Notes and Queries 65 [263], no. 1 (March 2018): 25–27.
[1] By Rev Dcn Bryan M. Dench, St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Portland, Maine.
[2] She demonstrated her devotion to the Bible at her coronation by pausing in procession not merely to receive a Bible (in English) but to kiss it. Kyle Sebastian Vitale, “An Overlooked Detail in Elizabeth I’s Coronation,” Notes and Queries 65 [263], no. 1 (March 2018): 25–27. Her surviving letters show a deep personal faith, Protestant in theology. See Susan Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 51, no. 4 (October 2000), 699–720. She is believed to have read the Bible in Greek daily. Michael Reeves, “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans,” (lecture from Ligonier Ministries series on the English Reformation, 2019).
[3] Note that England was unique as a place where the Reformation took its initiative from the sovereign, not from scholars or a popular movement of any kind. In fact, Henry VIII was never a committed Protestant but sought control of the church for political reasons. The sovereign rulers of other countries adopted Protestantism only after the reform movement was established by other means, whereupon, according to cujus regio, ejus religio, the people followed, like it or not. See, e.g., Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity, Beginnings to 1500, vol. II (Peabody, MA: Prince Press, 1975), 729. See also Diarmaid MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years (New York: Penguin, 2009), 635-37, discussing similar attempts at formulating a unifying doctrine through the Consensus Tigurinus (1549), the efforts of Calvin, and the Heidelberg Catechism of 1563. Calvin it seems was little aware of the reforming activities in England and little involved, except by way of being a target of attacks by critics of reform. See Martin Davie, “Calvin’s Influence on the Theology of the English Reformation,” Ecclesiology 6 (3) (2010), 315–41.
[4] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity (New York: Touchstone, 1976), 294-95 Henry was satisfied with the kind of Christianity developed by the Medieval church that was largely mechanical, what people “did,” rather than what they believed or thought, administered by the church. Ibid., 228, 267.
[5] Evidence of this can be seen, for example, in the Six Articles Henry shepherded through Parliament in 1539, which, among other things, reaffirmed transubstantiation and clerical celibacy, forcing Archbp. Cranmer to send his wife to the Continent for safety. Mark Thompson, “Origin of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion,” Churchman, Vol. 12 (1) (2011), 37-39. More so his retained commitment to Catholicism came through in the King’s Book of 1534. Alister E. McGrath, Reformation Thought, An Introduction, 4th ed. (Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 229-30. See also Latourette, History of Christianity, 802-805.
[6] This theory of royal supremacy was not entirely new, but emerged out of long history of legal, theological and academic debate back at least into the twelfth century, with biblical, patristic, papal, legal, political and historical roots. See, e.g., the discussions cited in note 4 supra. See also Tony Lane, A Concise History of Christian Thought (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 192-96; Mark A. Noll, Turning Points, Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity 3-D ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 168-70; Latourette, History of Christianity, 797-99.
[7] Latourette, History of Christianity, 799-805.
[8] E.g., Paul R. Spickard and Kevin M. Cragg, A Global History of Christians (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1994), 190-91. Cranmer fused Erasmian thought with continental reform. He distinguished between the essential and the indifferent.
[9] Parr was a devout and thoroughly reformed Protestant. Lucy Busfield, “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England,” Reformation & Renaissance Review 15 (3) (2010): 217–36.
[10] Latourette, History of Christianity, 805-807.
[11] Davie, “Calvin’s Influence,” 320. See also McGrath, Reformation Thought, 230-39; Cyndia Susan Clegg, “The 1559 Books of Common Prayer and the Elizabethan Reformation,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 67 (1, 2016), 94–121; MacCulloch, Christianity, 630-32.
[12] Busfield, “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England,” 219-220. See generally Faith Cook, Lady Jane Grey: Nine Day Queen of England (Darlington: Evangelical Press, 2004).
[13] Latourette, History of Christianity, 807-810.
[14] Latourette, History of Christianity, 809.
[15] Psalm 118:23.
[16] E.g., Diarmaid MacCulloch, "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture," Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005), 89; MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, 638-39; Reeves, “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans.”
[17] The Elizabethan Act of Supremacy was enacted by Parliament in April 1559.
[18] The Act of Uniformity 1558 (1 Eliz 1 c 2). Parliament acted in April 1559, but under the dating practice that dated all legislation as of the beginning year of a parliamentary session, the date commonly given is 1558.
[19] The 39 Articles were drawn up by the Church in convocation in 1563 working from the 42 Articles of 1553, and in 1571 Parliament ordered clergymen to subscribe to them. The 42 articles were the work of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury (1533-1556), who with other clergy developed several statements of faith during the reign of Henry VIII. Then during the reign of Edward VI, the ecclesiastical reformers presented a doctrinal statement consisting of forty-two points, just before the death of Edward, whereupon Mary reversed it all. There are two editions of the 39 Articles, the Latin version of 1563 and an English version approved in 1571.
[20] Spickard and Cragg, Global History, 190. “She had already argued in several of her communications to Protestant princes abroad, during the late 1570s and early 1580s, that the Scriptures provided no clear answer to the mysteries of predestinarianism and the Lord’s Supper, and that consequently they were ‘questiones contentiosas et inutiles’ (‘contentious and useless questions’) which could be dismissed as things indifferent or, in her own words, as ‘non magni momenti res’. In her view, these doctrinal issues needed to be settled by individual princes, presumably with the help of theologians, who should avoid too precise a definition of their meaning in order to prevent divisions and schisms from engulfing Protestantism.” Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 707.
[21] “The evidence tends to point towards a conclusion that the slow pace of reform in its early years was actually the Elizabethan Reformation’s greatest strength. Concessions in the 1559 Acts and Injunctions, such as the use of wafer bread, the wearing of copes and the altar-wise position for the communion table, helped to ease parishes into Protestantism.” Maggie Bullett, “The Reception of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement in Three Yorkshire Parishes,” 1559–72, Northern History, 48:2 (2011), 251-52.
[22] Latourette, History of Christianity, 812, citing the examples of John Jewell (1522-1571) (taught by Peter Martyr) and Richard Hooker (1554-1600).
[23] It was this issue that led to impasse at the Regensburg colloquy and most thwarted Protestant efforts to produce joint agreed upon statements of belief. Johnson, Christian History, 285-286, 295; McGrath, Historical Theology, 132-133, 137-138, 141, 164-167; McGrath, Reformation Thought, 162-172, 174-179, 181-183, 185-187; MacCulloch, Christianity, 629-630, 635-637, 662-663.
[24] The Two Liturgies, A.D. 1549 and A.D. 1552 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1844), 92.
[25] Church of England, The Booke of Common Prayer, and Administracion of the Sacramentes, and Other Rites and Ceremonies in the Churche of England London, in officina Richardi Iugge & Iohannis Cawood, 1559, 129-130. http://ezproxy.liberty.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-, com.ezproxy.liberty.edu/docview/2240869376?accountid=12085, accessed April 1, 2020. “The First Prayer Book of Edward VI (1549), the liturgical book of the newly Reformed English church that contained evidence of Lutheran influence, was submitted for formal criticism to Bucer, who could not speak English. His assessment, the Censura, delivered to the Bishop Ely a month before Bucer died, pointed out the vague Lutheranisms of the prayer book. The Second Prayer Book of Edward VI (1552), utilizing Bucer’s criticism, offended the conservatives in the English church and did not satisfy the more radical reformers; it remained in force for about eight months. Bucer’s influence as a mediator, however, continued to have its effect in subsequent attempts at compromise in the English church in the 16th century.”
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[26] “There are other pieces of evidence which point to Elizabeth holding a personal faith in the real presence, although whether she understood the presence to be corporeal or spiritual in nature cannot be determined with any certainty.” Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 710-711.
[27] McGrath, Reformation Thought, 236-38.
[28] “The 1559 statement sets both [Lutheran and Zwinglian] positions alongside one another without attempting any form of theological resolution…. The Elizabethan ‘Settlement of Religion’ was essentially pragmatic rather than theological. Perhaps this could be seen as the most distinctive characteristic of the English Reformation under Elizabeth: a desire to reconcile all parties within the theologically and socially fragmented nation and recover a sense of national unity.” McGrath, Reformation Thought, 238.
[29] Ibid. See also Johnson, History of Christianity, 269-80,
[30] And despite her willingness to tolerate other views she was also willing to compel formal adherence to the worship practices of the English Church, as illustrated by The Act of Uniformity 1559 (1 Eliz., c. 2), which among other things required church attendance or payment of a fine.
[31] Dee was a scholar of mathematics and friend of humanists like Giordano Bruno, Sir Phillip Sidney, and Sidney’s sister, the Countess of Pembroke, and their intellectual circle, who advocated reunification of the church. Johnson, History of Christianity, 323. Elizabeth benefited from an uncommonly rich education for a female in her era at the hands of Roger Ascham and others, and she had mastery of Latin and Greek among other subjects. See Janet M. Green, “‘I My Self’: Queen Elizabeth I's Oration at Tilbury Camp,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 28, no. 2 (1997), 421–25; Janet M. Green, “Queen Elizabeth I's Latin Reply to the Polish Ambassador,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 4 (2000): 987–88.
[32] Diarmaid MacCulloch, "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture," Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005), 89.
[33] Ibid., 89-91 (offense taken by some to three-fold ministry, rites and observances, and maintenance of cathedrals). “Even in the north, the south-east Lancashire towns, and York, for instance, tended to favor the Anglican settlement, and by the end of Elizabeth’s reign the number of actual recusants even in Lancashire and Yorkshire, the most Catholic regions, was less than five percent of the population.” Johnson, Christian History, 296. This was the opposite of France, where the Protestant population was never able to pass ten percent, aiding for instance Henry IV’s conversion to Catholicism in 1593, which Elizabeth regarded as a monstrous betrayal. Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 716.
[34] It is worth noting also that the process of reform in England, as elsewhere, was often slowed by the lack of quality, trained clergy. In 1585 a survey of parishes throughout England compiled a “blacklist” of inadequately trained or incompetent clergy that was extensive and only gradually corrected, though interestingly Sussex was apparently one shire in which the opposite was true, said to be attributable to a local history of clerical reform. Jeremy Goring, “The Reformation of the Ministry in Elizabethan Sussex,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 34 (3) (1983), 345–66. See also Alister E. McGrath, Historical Theology, 2d ed. (Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), 130.
[35] In the Jacobean period the Anglicanism established by Elizabeth was the best hope for the third force. The English ambassador thought Venice might well embrace a form of it, and in 1616, Antonio de Dominis, Archbishop of Spoleto, converted to Anglicanism in 1616. He later published a history of the Council of Trent by Paolo Sarpi, which told the inside story of how the Pope manipulated the Council against the reformers, a book dedicated to James I! Johnson, History of Christianity, 324-25. However, James failed to come to the aid of Venice in the 1620s as Spain and Counter Reformation rolled across Europe, a betrayal of the embittered Venetians who supported the third force. Ibid., 326. The enthusiasm resurfaced in the 1640s under Charles I, but collapsed under civil war and sectarian strife, after which few thought re-unification a real possibility. Ibid., 326-27.
[36] Prospects for religious reunification were highest in the 1540’s and 1550’s, with reformers and Catholics such as Cardinal Gasparo Contarini, willing to work out agreement if possible on justification and the sacraments, for example. It was largely inability to agree on the theology of the Lord’s Supper, coupled with political divisions of European states and, and the intransigence of Rome regarding the power of the church, that prevented it. See, e.g., Diarmaid MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, (New York: Penguin, 2009), 629-37, 649-667; Johnson, Christian History, 284-86, 290-95, 319-20, 322-38. Elizabeth was widely seen as the leader for possible unification, and she was offered the “governorship” of the Netherlands when Protestant leader William the Silent was assassinated, ibid., 292, but in the larger setting “she was disqualified by her sex.” Ibid., 323.
Queen Elizabeth I ruled in a turbulent, violent time respecting matters of religion. She wanted peace, unity, and conformity for her Church of England. She was a Protestant by conviction: learned, personally pious and observant, she read the Bible daily.[2] Her Church of England was to be decidedly Protestant. The fact she had been declared illegitimate by Rome also required her to be Protestant in order to reign. Most of all she wanted to avoid the religious divisions and civil strife that lasted throughout Europe during her reign.
Following the religious upheaval due to Henry VIII’s break with Rome, the succession of Edward VI (vigorously reformed), and the reactionary Queenship of Mary Tudor (Roman Catholic), she sought a midpoint between Catholics and the more radical reformers. Elizabeth’s decisions about religion would determine whether her reign would endure and whether England would suffer the civil unrest and violence of Continental Europe. Elizabeth navigated these troubled waters shrewdly, true to her religious convictions while maintaining civil order and stability. The English church she established could have been, and could be a model for reunifying the Christian church.[3]
Elizabeth’s father Henry VIII grew up and remained Catholic in personal preference, maintaining all the essential Catholic doctrines under his headship of the English Church, including the Catholic tenets on justification and transubstantiation.[4] His separation from the Roman Catholic church had little if anything to do with theological persuasion, nor did it rise from any popular support for reform; it was, instead, born of the necessity to have a male heir to the throne. That is, he put English political order first, not the church.[5]
Parliament validated this in the Act of Supremacy in 1534, declaring the sovereign “supreme head” of the church in England.[6] These steps did not, however, automatically lead to a full embrace of Continental reformed theology.[7] His Archbishop of Canterbury, Cranmer, was a committed Protestant. He was to be the main author of the Book of Common Prayer that first appeared in 1549, rich in scripture and allusions to scripture, reformed in theology, and engaging the laity in all aspects of worship.[8] Henry, however, would best be described as a “non-Roman” Catholic, adhering in nearly all parts to the same Christianity as the Roman church right up to his own death January 28, 1547.
If Henry was comfortable with maintaining most of the old church practices and doctrines, his son, Edward VI (reigned 1547-1553), who assumed the throne at age nine, was not. Raised mainly by Catherine Parr,[9] and tutored by reformed scholars, Edward was a personally convinced Protestant even at a young age.[10] Though under “protection” due to his minority, the new Josiah led the way for Cranmer, now freed to express his Protestant views more freely, to produce two versions of the Prayer Book, 1549 and 1552. He also led the writing of forty-two Articles of Religion, a richly reformed confessional statement, “for the avoiding of controversy in opinions and the establishment of a Godly concord in certain matters of religion.”[11]
Edward’s death in 1553, however, caused another political crisis and, within it, another religious crisis. Lady Jane Grey (1537-1554),[12] Henry’s reformed Protestant niece, wise beyond her years, was made the uncrowned queen for a mere nine days before being executed. Mary Tudor (February 1516 - November 1558) then took the crown, as much because the people wanted a direct heir of Henry on the throne as for any popular religious imperative. Mary was a Catholic reactionary and quickly undid all Edward’s reforms.[13] She persecuted Protestants and executed over 300. Many fled to Geneva or Scotland.[14] Upon Queen Mary’s death, Elizabeth, who had been careful not to give any cause for her own execution during Mary’s reign, became queen. The words attributed to her upon being informed, “This is the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes,”[15] reflect both her knowledge of scripture and her personal faith.
Elizabeth ruled from 17 November 1558 until her death on 24 March 1603. She wanted unity and conformity for the Church of England. Schooled alongside Edward, her half-brother, by Protestant tutors, under the shelter of Catherine Parr, she was herself Protestant by conviction.[16] Having lived through the terrible period of Catholic Mary Tudor’s reign, she ascended to the throne threatened by challenges from within and without. On the matter of religion, the situation in England was unstable.
What Elizabeth did was to act quickly to settle the matter by crafting supremacy legislation, a prayer book, and a confession of faith that embodied both her sense of biblically sound Protestantism and her desire to avoid matters that would divide.[17] She shepherded through Parliament legislation that restored the prayer book in a third revision melding the stronger Protestant language of the former book Mary had abolished with somewhat less reformed text and toning down some anti-Catholic rhetoric.[18]
Then she procured the development of a confession of faith, the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion. Based on the former 42 Articles, it struck a middle path (the so-called via media) between the Lutheran and other Reformed conceptions, grounded in the historic episcopate.[19] She maintained Cranmer’s distinction between the essentials and things indifferent, or adiaphora.[20] Her policy was to allow leeway locally for gradual acceptance of change, and she preferred to preserve some of the old forms and practices in worship.[21] She accepted somewhat vague formulations that were nonetheless consistent with reformed orthodoxy, rather than forcing a specific doctrine on her people. This does not mean her theology was weak or compromised, and she enjoyed considerable support from theologians and scholars.[22] She sought only to avoid the high temperature disputes over points of doctrine that were provoking such bitterness and violence all around her. This was true, for example, in her manner of dealing with the point of doctrine that most prevented reuniting the Christian church: the issue of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and the Christological questions it raised.[23]
We can see this in brief with examples from the Prayer Book and the 39 Articles. Under the words of administration of the Lord’s Supper from Edward’s first prayer book in 1549, you would hear,[24]
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee,
preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life.
The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for thee,
Preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life.
This language does not directly confront the question of the real presence or whether the sacrament operated ex opere operato. It could be read in an acceptable manner by a Catholic or a Lutheran. Three years later, however, when a second Edwardian prayer book came into use in 1552, it reflected criticisms by reformers such as Martin Bucer and read,
Take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee,
and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving.
Drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for thee,
and be thankful.
This is readily seen as more consistent with the view that the Lord’s Supper is, if not purely, mainly, a memorial, with no suggestion of a real presence, let alone transubstantiation.
When the Prayer Book was restored under Queen Elizabeth in 1559, it reflected her desire to be nonspecific (and non-divisive) when possible without fatal compromise to her Protestant convictions. The words you would then hear upon reception of the elements were,[25]
The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee,
preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life: and take and
eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee,
and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving.
The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for thee,
Preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life: and
drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for thee,
and be thankful.
The words are identical to the phrases of the two previous books conflated by a colon to produce one text. Not wholly agreeable to any faction but complete in its own way, it reflects Elizabeth’s own convictions, so far as we can know them, with respect to the Eucharist.[26] She firmly rejected transubstantiation but was probably closer to the Lutheran view of a real presence than the Zwinglian memorial view. The statement she approved melded them both.[27] Her object was to settle the matter on one point of most severe contention in the early decades of the English Reformation, avoiding the struggles experienced at home and elsewhere.[28]
Elizabeth’s religious settlement is very like the “third force” or middle path of Christian humanism whose intellectual leader was Erasmus.[29] She wanted conformity and order above all.[30] She is described as an Erasmian reformer: “Queen Elizabeth of England was certainly an Erasmian princess, learned, moderate in her religious views, and protector of scholars like Dr. [John] Dee.”[31] “Elizabeth was a subtle and reflective woman who had learnt about politics the hard way. She showed no enthusiasm for high temperature religion, despite the private depth and quiet intensity of her own devotional life.”[32] Her upbringing and personal faith were Protestant, and she saw to it that the church under her headship was both Protestant and apostolic, without forcing on her people any doctrine or practice that was intolerable to large numbers.[33] The model she established, not strictly imposing one view on matters of indifference while resting on the apostolic foundations of the ages, successfully finds the navigable part of the channel between the conflicting theological shoals of her age.[34] At times it appeared Anglicanism could be more widely embraced as a solution to the Protestant divisions of the sixteenth century.[35] If adopted more widely today, it could perhaps serve as a safe harbor to unify the church, at least among those who hold orthodox Christian beliefs and seek to uphold the apostolic succession.[36] What are “orthodox Christian beliefs”? A good place to find them is the 39 Articles of Religion, the Prayer Book of 1559, and the ancient confessions embraced therein.
Bibliography
Bernard, G.W. The King’s Reformation: Henry VIII and the Remaking of the English Church. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2005.
Book of Common Prayer, And Adminiſtration of the Sacraments, and other rites and ceremonies of the Church According to the Uſe of The Church of England: together with the Psalter or Psalms of David Pointed as they are to be ſung or ſaid in Churches, The, 1662, https://www.eskimo.com/~lhowell/bcp1662/communion/index.html, accessed March 27, 2020.
Bullett, Maggie. “The Reception of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement in Three Yorkshire Parishes,” 1559–72, Northern History, 48:2 (2011), 225-252.
Busfield, Lucy. 2013. “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England.” Reformation & Renaissance Review 15 (3): 217–36.
Church of England. The Booke of Common Prayer, and Administracion of the Sacramentes, and Other Rites and Ceremonies in the Churche of England London, in officina Richardi Iugge & Iohannis Cawood, 1559.. http://ezproxy.liberty.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-, com.ezproxy.liberty.edu/docview/2240869376?accountid=12085, accessed April 1, 2020.
Clegg, Cyndia Susan. “The 1559 Books of Common Prayer and the Elizabethan Reformation.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 67 (1, 2016): 94–121.
Congress of Religion, The. Unity LXVIII, No. 8 (Chicago: Lincoln Press, 1916): 396-98.
Cook, Faith. Lady Jane Grey: Nine Day Queen of England. Darlington: Evangelical Press, 2004.
Davie, Martin. “Calvin’s Influence on the Theology of the English Reformation.” Ecclesiology 6 (3) (2010): 315–41.
Davis, Natalie Zemon. "The Rites of Violence: Religious Riot in Sixteenth-Century France." Past & Present, no. 59 (1973): 51-91.
Doran, Susan. “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 51, no. 4 (October 2000): 699–720.
Goring, Jeremy. “The Reformation of the Ministry in Elizabethan Sussex.” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 34 (3) (1983): 345–66.
Green, Janet M. “‘I My Self’: Queen Elizabeth I's Oration at Tilbury Camp.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 28, no. 2 (1997): 421–45.
____________. “Queen Elizabeth I's Latin Reply to the Polish Ambassador.” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 4 (2000): 987–1008.
Johnson, Paul. A History of Christianity. New York: Touchstone, 1976.
Lane, Tony. A Concise History of Christian Thought. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006.
Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christianity, Beginnings to 1500, vol. II. Peabody, MA: Prince Press, 1975.
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years. New York: Penguin, 2009.
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture." Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005): 75-95.
McGrath, Alister E. Historical Theology, 2d ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.
_______________. Reformation Thought, An Introduction, 4th ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012.
Noll, Mark A. Turning Points, Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity 3d ed. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012.
Reeves, Michael. “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans.” Lecture from Ligonier Ministries series on the English Reformation, 2019.
Scarisbrick, J. J. Henry VIII. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997.
Spickard, Paul R., and Kevin M. Cragg. A Global History of Christians. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1994.
Thompson, Mark. “Origin of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion.” Churchman, Vol. 12 (1) (2011): 37-XX.
Vitale, Kyle Sebastian. “An Overlooked Detail in Elizabeth I’s Coronation.” Notes and Queries 65 [263], no. 1 (March 2018): 25–27.
[1] By Rev Dcn Bryan M. Dench, St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Portland, Maine.
[2] She demonstrated her devotion to the Bible at her coronation by pausing in procession not merely to receive a Bible (in English) but to kiss it. Kyle Sebastian Vitale, “An Overlooked Detail in Elizabeth I’s Coronation,” Notes and Queries 65 [263], no. 1 (March 2018): 25–27. Her surviving letters show a deep personal faith, Protestant in theology. See Susan Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 51, no. 4 (October 2000), 699–720. She is believed to have read the Bible in Greek daily. Michael Reeves, “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans,” (lecture from Ligonier Ministries series on the English Reformation, 2019).
[3] Note that England was unique as a place where the Reformation took its initiative from the sovereign, not from scholars or a popular movement of any kind. In fact, Henry VIII was never a committed Protestant but sought control of the church for political reasons. The sovereign rulers of other countries adopted Protestantism only after the reform movement was established by other means, whereupon, according to cujus regio, ejus religio, the people followed, like it or not. See, e.g., Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity, Beginnings to 1500, vol. II (Peabody, MA: Prince Press, 1975), 729. See also Diarmaid MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years (New York: Penguin, 2009), 635-37, discussing similar attempts at formulating a unifying doctrine through the Consensus Tigurinus (1549), the efforts of Calvin, and the Heidelberg Catechism of 1563. Calvin it seems was little aware of the reforming activities in England and little involved, except by way of being a target of attacks by critics of reform. See Martin Davie, “Calvin’s Influence on the Theology of the English Reformation,” Ecclesiology 6 (3) (2010), 315–41.
[4] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity (New York: Touchstone, 1976), 294-95 Henry was satisfied with the kind of Christianity developed by the Medieval church that was largely mechanical, what people “did,” rather than what they believed or thought, administered by the church. Ibid., 228, 267.
[5] Evidence of this can be seen, for example, in the Six Articles Henry shepherded through Parliament in 1539, which, among other things, reaffirmed transubstantiation and clerical celibacy, forcing Archbp. Cranmer to send his wife to the Continent for safety. Mark Thompson, “Origin of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion,” Churchman, Vol. 12 (1) (2011), 37-39. More so his retained commitment to Catholicism came through in the King’s Book of 1534. Alister E. McGrath, Reformation Thought, An Introduction, 4th ed. (Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 229-30. See also Latourette, History of Christianity, 802-805.
[6] This theory of royal supremacy was not entirely new, but emerged out of long history of legal, theological and academic debate back at least into the twelfth century, with biblical, patristic, papal, legal, political and historical roots. See, e.g., the discussions cited in note 4 supra. See also Tony Lane, A Concise History of Christian Thought (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 192-96; Mark A. Noll, Turning Points, Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity 3-D ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 168-70; Latourette, History of Christianity, 797-99.
[7] Latourette, History of Christianity, 799-805.
[8] E.g., Paul R. Spickard and Kevin M. Cragg, A Global History of Christians (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1994), 190-91. Cranmer fused Erasmian thought with continental reform. He distinguished between the essential and the indifferent.
[9] Parr was a devout and thoroughly reformed Protestant. Lucy Busfield, “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England,” Reformation & Renaissance Review 15 (3) (2010): 217–36.
[10] Latourette, History of Christianity, 805-807.
[11] Davie, “Calvin’s Influence,” 320. See also McGrath, Reformation Thought, 230-39; Cyndia Susan Clegg, “The 1559 Books of Common Prayer and the Elizabethan Reformation,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 67 (1, 2016), 94–121; MacCulloch, Christianity, 630-32.
[12] Busfield, “Women, Men and Christ Crucified: Protestant Passion Piety in Sixteenth-Century England,” 219-220. See generally Faith Cook, Lady Jane Grey: Nine Day Queen of England (Darlington: Evangelical Press, 2004).
[13] Latourette, History of Christianity, 807-810.
[14] Latourette, History of Christianity, 809.
[15] Psalm 118:23.
[16] E.g., Diarmaid MacCulloch, "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture," Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005), 89; MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, 638-39; Reeves, “Elizabeth and the Rise of the Puritans.”
[17] The Elizabethan Act of Supremacy was enacted by Parliament in April 1559.
[18] The Act of Uniformity 1558 (1 Eliz 1 c 2). Parliament acted in April 1559, but under the dating practice that dated all legislation as of the beginning year of a parliamentary session, the date commonly given is 1558.
[19] The 39 Articles were drawn up by the Church in convocation in 1563 working from the 42 Articles of 1553, and in 1571 Parliament ordered clergymen to subscribe to them. The 42 articles were the work of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury (1533-1556), who with other clergy developed several statements of faith during the reign of Henry VIII. Then during the reign of Edward VI, the ecclesiastical reformers presented a doctrinal statement consisting of forty-two points, just before the death of Edward, whereupon Mary reversed it all. There are two editions of the 39 Articles, the Latin version of 1563 and an English version approved in 1571.
[20] Spickard and Cragg, Global History, 190. “She had already argued in several of her communications to Protestant princes abroad, during the late 1570s and early 1580s, that the Scriptures provided no clear answer to the mysteries of predestinarianism and the Lord’s Supper, and that consequently they were ‘questiones contentiosas et inutiles’ (‘contentious and useless questions’) which could be dismissed as things indifferent or, in her own words, as ‘non magni momenti res’. In her view, these doctrinal issues needed to be settled by individual princes, presumably with the help of theologians, who should avoid too precise a definition of their meaning in order to prevent divisions and schisms from engulfing Protestantism.” Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 707.
[21] “The evidence tends to point towards a conclusion that the slow pace of reform in its early years was actually the Elizabethan Reformation’s greatest strength. Concessions in the 1559 Acts and Injunctions, such as the use of wafer bread, the wearing of copes and the altar-wise position for the communion table, helped to ease parishes into Protestantism.” Maggie Bullett, “The Reception of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement in Three Yorkshire Parishes,” 1559–72, Northern History, 48:2 (2011), 251-52.
[22] Latourette, History of Christianity, 812, citing the examples of John Jewell (1522-1571) (taught by Peter Martyr) and Richard Hooker (1554-1600).
[23] It was this issue that led to impasse at the Regensburg colloquy and most thwarted Protestant efforts to produce joint agreed upon statements of belief. Johnson, Christian History, 285-286, 295; McGrath, Historical Theology, 132-133, 137-138, 141, 164-167; McGrath, Reformation Thought, 162-172, 174-179, 181-183, 185-187; MacCulloch, Christianity, 629-630, 635-637, 662-663.
[24] The Two Liturgies, A.D. 1549 and A.D. 1552 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1844), 92.
[25] Church of England, The Booke of Common Prayer, and Administracion of the Sacramentes, and Other Rites and Ceremonies in the Churche of England London, in officina Richardi Iugge & Iohannis Cawood, 1559, 129-130. http://ezproxy.liberty.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-, com.ezproxy.liberty.edu/docview/2240869376?accountid=12085, accessed April 1, 2020. “The First Prayer Book of Edward VI (1549), the liturgical book of the newly Reformed English church that contained evidence of Lutheran influence, was submitted for formal criticism to Bucer, who could not speak English. His assessment, the Censura, delivered to the Bishop Ely a month before Bucer died, pointed out the vague Lutheranisms of the prayer book. The Second Prayer Book of Edward VI (1552), utilizing Bucer’s criticism, offended the conservatives in the English church and did not satisfy the more radical reformers; it remained in force for about eight months. Bucer’s influence as a mediator, however, continued to have its effect in subsequent attempts at compromise in the English church in the 16th century.”
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[26] “There are other pieces of evidence which point to Elizabeth holding a personal faith in the real presence, although whether she understood the presence to be corporeal or spiritual in nature cannot be determined with any certainty.” Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 710-711.
[27] McGrath, Reformation Thought, 236-38.
[28] “The 1559 statement sets both [Lutheran and Zwinglian] positions alongside one another without attempting any form of theological resolution…. The Elizabethan ‘Settlement of Religion’ was essentially pragmatic rather than theological. Perhaps this could be seen as the most distinctive characteristic of the English Reformation under Elizabeth: a desire to reconcile all parties within the theologically and socially fragmented nation and recover a sense of national unity.” McGrath, Reformation Thought, 238.
[29] Ibid. See also Johnson, History of Christianity, 269-80,
[30] And despite her willingness to tolerate other views she was also willing to compel formal adherence to the worship practices of the English Church, as illustrated by The Act of Uniformity 1559 (1 Eliz., c. 2), which among other things required church attendance or payment of a fine.
[31] Dee was a scholar of mathematics and friend of humanists like Giordano Bruno, Sir Phillip Sidney, and Sidney’s sister, the Countess of Pembroke, and their intellectual circle, who advocated reunification of the church. Johnson, History of Christianity, 323. Elizabeth benefited from an uncommonly rich education for a female in her era at the hands of Roger Ascham and others, and she had mastery of Latin and Greek among other subjects. See Janet M. Green, “‘I My Self’: Queen Elizabeth I's Oration at Tilbury Camp,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 28, no. 2 (1997), 421–25; Janet M. Green, “Queen Elizabeth I's Latin Reply to the Polish Ambassador,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 4 (2000): 987–88.
[32] Diarmaid MacCulloch, "Putting the English Reformation on the Map: The Prothero Lecture," Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 15 (2005), 89.
[33] Ibid., 89-91 (offense taken by some to three-fold ministry, rites and observances, and maintenance of cathedrals). “Even in the north, the south-east Lancashire towns, and York, for instance, tended to favor the Anglican settlement, and by the end of Elizabeth’s reign the number of actual recusants even in Lancashire and Yorkshire, the most Catholic regions, was less than five percent of the population.” Johnson, Christian History, 296. This was the opposite of France, where the Protestant population was never able to pass ten percent, aiding for instance Henry IV’s conversion to Catholicism in 1593, which Elizabeth regarded as a monstrous betrayal. Doran, “Elizabeth I’s Religion: The Evidence of Her Letters,” 716.
[34] It is worth noting also that the process of reform in England, as elsewhere, was often slowed by the lack of quality, trained clergy. In 1585 a survey of parishes throughout England compiled a “blacklist” of inadequately trained or incompetent clergy that was extensive and only gradually corrected, though interestingly Sussex was apparently one shire in which the opposite was true, said to be attributable to a local history of clerical reform. Jeremy Goring, “The Reformation of the Ministry in Elizabethan Sussex,” The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 34 (3) (1983), 345–66. See also Alister E. McGrath, Historical Theology, 2d ed. (Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013), 130.
[35] In the Jacobean period the Anglicanism established by Elizabeth was the best hope for the third force. The English ambassador thought Venice might well embrace a form of it, and in 1616, Antonio de Dominis, Archbishop of Spoleto, converted to Anglicanism in 1616. He later published a history of the Council of Trent by Paolo Sarpi, which told the inside story of how the Pope manipulated the Council against the reformers, a book dedicated to James I! Johnson, History of Christianity, 324-25. However, James failed to come to the aid of Venice in the 1620s as Spain and Counter Reformation rolled across Europe, a betrayal of the embittered Venetians who supported the third force. Ibid., 326. The enthusiasm resurfaced in the 1640s under Charles I, but collapsed under civil war and sectarian strife, after which few thought re-unification a real possibility. Ibid., 326-27.
[36] Prospects for religious reunification were highest in the 1540’s and 1550’s, with reformers and Catholics such as Cardinal Gasparo Contarini, willing to work out agreement if possible on justification and the sacraments, for example. It was largely inability to agree on the theology of the Lord’s Supper, coupled with political divisions of European states and, and the intransigence of Rome regarding the power of the church, that prevented it. See, e.g., Diarmaid MacCulloch, Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, (New York: Penguin, 2009), 629-37, 649-667; Johnson, Christian History, 284-86, 290-95, 319-20, 322-38. Elizabeth was widely seen as the leader for possible unification, and she was offered the “governorship” of the Netherlands when Protestant leader William the Silent was assassinated, ibid., 292, but in the larger setting “she was disqualified by her sex.” Ibid., 323.
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