Henry VIIIs Reformation Essay -- Papers

Henry VIII's Reformation In 1529 Henry VIII started to reform the Catholic Church in England, however there are different opinions as to why he began these controversial changes. The orthodox view concurs that there was a vast anti-clerical feeling in 16th century England; the corrupt church was unpopular with the masses. However the revisionist view claims that the reformation was actually due to politics. Henry needed a male heir and therefore needed a divorce. The needs and wants of the masses were not taken into consideration. In this essay I am going to look at England pre-reformation and reach my own opinion of whether or not England was actually in need of a reformation in 1529. There were lots of anti-catholic movements going on at the time such as the Lutheran movement and also Lollardry. This suggests that people were growing tired with the Catholic Church and therefore looking towards other religions. The Lollards were an active group based in England. Lollardy appealed to the lower and middle classes and its idea's closely matched those of Luther. They denied the existence of purgatory, rejected the pope and spoke out against war. It wished to see a reduction in church wealth and the bible translated into English. They encouraged new ideas and criticism of the church. However it is difficult to interpret just how much Lollardry actually influenced the reformation. It undoubtedly helped to weaken the church and open peoples eyes to new ideas, yet it was also relatively small scale and wouldn't have affected many people. However there was generally an anti-clerical feeling amongst people. The clergy of that time a... ...ay or another, none of the were indicating that the church needed to go through a full scale reformation but rather that the church needed to reform itself, they were calling for a reformation from within the church, they wanted the clergy to improve themselves. The Catholic Church in England deniably did have some faults, but generally people were content and satisfied with it. It wasn't the institution in decline as it is often portrayed but actually just as popular as it had always been. People were happy with what they knew and therefore didn't like the idea of a new church and religion, which is why there were protests after the reformation. Henry VIII and his parliament undoubtedly exaggerated these faults in order to reform the church for their own political needs, rather than the needs of the ordinary people. Henry VIII's Reformation Essay -- Papers Henry VIII's Reformation In 1529 Henry VIII started to reform the Catholic Church in England, however there are different opinions as to why he began these controversial changes. The orthodox view concurs that there was a vast anti-clerical feeling in 16th century England; the corrupt church was unpopular with the masses. However the revisionist view claims that the reformation was actually due to politics. Henry needed a male heir and therefore needed a divorce. The needs and wants of the masses were not taken into consideration. In this essay I am going to look at England pre-reformation and reach my own opinion of whether or not England was actually in need of a reformation in 1529. There were lots of anti-catholic movements going on at the time such as the Lutheran movement and also Lollardry. This suggests that people were growing tired with the Catholic Church and therefore looking towards other religions. The Lollards were an active group based in England. Lollardy appealed to the lower and middle classes and its idea's closely matched those of Luther. They denied the existence of purgatory, rejected the pope and spoke out against war. It wished to see a reduction in church wealth and the bible translated into English. They encouraged new ideas and criticism of the church. However it is difficult to interpret just how much Lollardry actually influenced the reformation. It undoubtedly helped to weaken the church and open peoples eyes to new ideas, yet it was also relatively small scale and wouldn't have affected many people. However there was generally an anti-clerical feeling amongst people. The clergy of that time a... ...ay or another, none of the were indicating that the church needed to go through a full scale reformation but rather that the church needed to reform itself, they were calling for a reformation from within the church, they wanted the clergy to improve themselves. The Catholic Church in England deniably did have some faults, but generally people were content and satisfied with it. It wasn't the institution in decline as it is often portrayed but actually just as popular as it had always been. People were happy with what they knew and therefore didn't like the idea of a new church and religion, which is why there were protests after the reformation. Henry VIII and his parliament undoubtedly exaggerated these faults in order to reform the church for their own political needs, rather than the needs of the ordinary people.