The Tudors for Dummies (AvaxHome Download) (20 page)

John Dudley, who'd taken over from Somerset (see Chapter 7), put John

Hooper forward as bishop of Gloucester. Hooper came out of nowhere. An

Oxford-educated Cistercian from Gloucester, he became a reformer after

reading Zwingli, got out of England in 1539, married and settled in Zurich.

(The Cistercians were an order of monks founded in 1098. Originally they

were strict, but perhaps their involvement in agriculture and wine-making

over the centuries made them more worldly!) He came back to England ten

years later and became a popular London preacher.

Things were black and white to Hooper: if the Scriptures said to do something,

you did it; if the Scriptures said nothing about an act, that act was forbidden.

Hooper refused to wear traditional papist robes for his consecration cer-

emony. In Chapter 1 we explain how clothes and status were important to

the Tudors, so Hooper's protest caused a storm in the Church. Nothing new

here, of course � the Catholic Church had nearly burst a blood vessel arguing,

centuries earlier, about how monks should have their hair cut! The whole inci-

dent was a storm in a stirrup cup (nobody in England knew what tea was at

this time!) with Dudley going head to head with the Council. Hooper ended up

in prison for being difficult and eventually went through the ceremony in the

clothes he hated. Who said the Tudors weren't petty?

After the robes incident, Hooper behaved himself � he worked hard, prayed,

heard religious cases and visited schools. He also carried out a visitation and

was horrified to find that many of his priests couldn't say the Lord's Prayer

or even find it in the Book of Common Prayer!

John Foxe paints a pen-portrait of Hooper in his Book of Martyrs (1563). The

bishop was extremely generous and charitable but so terrifyingly grim that

people turned away rather than talk to him.

Hooper was promoted to the see of Worcester in May 1552, but as things

turned out his days were numbered.

Getting Radical: Moving on with

the Second Prayer Book

As with all new ideas, the Book of Common Prayer went not far enough for

some, but too far for others. Protestant extremists felt the book was too

conservative and they didn't like the bit about the spiritual presence of

God during communion. They had some heavyweight backing� in England,

John Hooper, Peter Martyr (see the sidebar, `Countering the Counter-

Reformation'), Martin Bucer, Nicholas Ridley (bishop of London) and John

Cheke (Edward VI's tutor); and in Europe by 1551, John Calvin, whose follow-

ers out of Geneva were becoming just as numerous as the Lutherans. Chapter 8: Encouraging Protestantism 143 Conservative opposition was chopped in all directions. Gardiner and Bonner hadn't only lost their sees, they were in jail (see the earlier section `Moving on: Visitations and homilies'). Cuthbert Tunstall, bishop of Durham, was framed for treason and was also removed. Anybody not going to church or still carrying out the Catholic mass was to be hit with fines or imprisonment.

Cranmer got on with the revised version of his prayer book. This time he bypassed the bishops and took his book straight to Parliament. The Act for the Uniformity of Common Prayer passed both Houses at the end of March 1552. Dudley, now promoted to be duke of Northumberland, made sure the law went through unopposed.

A French version of the prayer book was produced for the Channel Islands and European exiles in London (how 21st-century politically correct is that!). And this happened at the same time that English people treated all foreigners with suspicion and, in the worst cases, spat at foreigners in the street.

Picking apart the revised prayer book: Noxious Knox The Book of Common Prayer talked about kneeling to take communion, but some reformers thought sitting (as in the Last Supper) would be better. The abrasive John Knox � a Scotsman who was one of the king's chaplains and who'd later be a fanatical opponent of Mary Queen of Scots and women in general � made a fuss about all this. Knox was backed by Hooper, a Lasco and even Dudley in the Council.

Publication of the book was held up until `certain faults therein be corrected'. Cranmer was furious. He'd already had his views on the sale of the chantries ignored and Parliament had turned down his ideas for changing Church law in 1552. This was the last straw.

Cranmer realised, a bit late perhaps, that the secular authorities (the Council and Parliament) were sidelining the bishops at every turn. In a way, it was his own fault because he'd missed too many crucial Council meetings (like the one over communion kneeling). Also, he'd been too keen to turn the bishops into better priests, which made them worse politicians, likely to be outma- noeuvred by everybody else.

Defining faith The Augsburg Confession was a book that explained clearly the beliefs, prin- ciples and practices of Lutheranism. Cranmer realised by the autumn of 1549 that the Church of England needed something similar so that everybody would sing from the same hymn sheet. He started working on this at once. 144 Part III: Remembering the Forgotten Tudors: Edward VI and Mary

Bishop Hooper had the same idea, but decided to go it alone, coming up with

19 Articles in Gloucester in 1552. This kind of private enterprise would cause

chaos because every bishop in England would be dreaming up any number of

quite possibly conflicting Articles, so the Council gave Cranmer the go-ahead

to come up with a solution. In May 1552 he produced his 42 Articles of the

Faith, which became 45 by September.

The Council annoyed Cranmer again by giving the Articles to the royal chap-

lains � including Knox � to pick over, and the chaplains reduced the number to

42 once more. A bureaucratic delay followed, and Cranmer had to be patient

because he knew he couldn't publish the Articles without the Council's say-

so. On 9 June 1553 the Articles finally saw the light of day. They were a clear

statement that England was now a fully Protestant country, and they included

warnings about the extremism of the Anabaptists (see `Taking in the refu-

gees'), who were fast becoming the bogey-men lurking in the shadows.

Reforming zeal and dodgy dealings

The real driving force behind the religious changes under Edward came not

from Cranmer but from Dudley.

It was pretty obvious that by October 1549, by which time he was 12, the pre-

cocious boy king was firmly Protestant and quite keen on the Swiss school of

reformers. If Dudley wanted to stay in power by becoming chief minister when

Edward came of age in 1555, he needed to show some reforming zeal.

Dudley was also busy lining his pockets. He carried out shady deals sell-

ing off chantry lands to his friends and backers, and he `unlorded' several

bishops, which took away their lands and palaces and made money for the

crown. Could there be a more devoted servant of his king?

The Catholic response to the prayer book

The second prayer book didn't actually make The impression we get about the Reformation

much difference to the Catholics. After all, the is that as soon as the Book of Common Prayer

things they cared about � the mass, prayers for came in, Catholics in England went under-

the dead � had already gone with the first ver- ground, hid priests in special hidey-holes in

sion in 1549. If Cranmer's Church was bickering their houses and were all secretly hoping for an

among themselves, that was fine, because their invasion from Spain. Some of this was certainly

actions were all heresy anyway. true, but not until years later under Elizabeth, as

you see in Chapters 12 to 18.

Clashing with Hibernia Ecclesia: The Irish Church

The Royal Supremacy (see Chapter 6) had gone When bishops died, it was almost impos-

down surprisingly well in Ireland because the sible to replace them.

clergy, who sat as a third house in the Dublin

Jesuit missionary priests began to arrive in

Parliament, saw it was a way to sort out their

Ireland from 1541.

wayward flocks. But after that, it was downhill

all the way: The Pope continued to appoint Irish arch-

bishops, like Robert Wauchop in Armagh, in

The Irish Parliament didn't meet at all

defiance of Henry VIII who'd already given

between 1543 and 1557, so the Edwardian

the job to George Dowdall in 1543.

Reformation, including the new prayer

books, was foisted on Ireland with no dis- Most Irish men and women stayed loyal to

cussion whatsoever. the Pope, carrying out demonstrations from

time to time against the Protestant faith, as

Because the prayer books and services

when Bishop John Bale was forced out of

were now in English, they had no effect on

the country in August 1553.

the majority of Gaelic-speaking Irishmen.

Reversions were happening all over the place, which meant that some court-

iers made property killings and others got fat annuities. For example:

The sees of Exeter, Coventry and Lichfield were reduced in size and the

lands sold off.

The new diocese of Westminster was merged with London.

Parliament broke up the see of Durham in 1552.

The biggest killing came with the richest see of all � Winchester. Bishop

Gardiner had clashed with the Council so often they'd fired him and the

reformer John Ponet got the job instead. Ponet wasn't interested in money,

so Dudley bought the see off him for an annuity of �1333. The lands were

actually worth over �3,500 a year, so tens of thousands came into the

Council's hands, mostly those of William Paulet, the lord treasurer.

One man who might have stopped all this racketeering was Thomas Cranmer,

especially because from 1550 he and the Council were drifting seriously apart.

But he'd spent a great deal of time � and his own money � in making Edward's

Reformation work and he wasn't going to rock too many boats.

Managing Mary

Henry VIII's eldest daughter had been horrified by religious events since her

father's death. She'd refused to get involved in the regency, even when that 146 Part III: Remembering the Forgotten Tudors: Edward VI and Mary

meant plotting against Somerset, and she'd taken a personal dislike to Dudley,

calling him `the most unstable [religiously unreliable] man in England'.

Mary was concerned for her own privileges and even safety, but she had an

ally: her cousin, Charles V, who, as holy Roman emperor, was the most pow-

erful man in Europe.

Plotting her escape

Van der Delft, Charles V's ambassador in London, was about to be recalled

because of ill health, and he and Mary hatched a plot for her to go with him

to the safety of the emperor. Mary would be giving up her right to the throne

by doing this � leaving the country voluntarily could be taken as a sign that

Mary had given up her position as Henry VIII's heir � but Edward wasn't

13 yet and that door seemed to be closed. No one expected that Edward

wouldn't grow up to be king and have children of his own, so Mary was

unlikely to inherit anyway.

Mary's plan was to be rowed out from Maldon in Essex to van der Delft's

waiting ship. Unfortunately, food shortages and high prices had led to local

rioting in Essex and government troops were watching the coast, as well as

Mary's house at Woodham Walter.

Mary's Plan B (the Tudors were, after all, a pretty cunning lot!) was to steal

a ship with van der Delft's secretary, Jehan Dubois. Mary had doubts � she

packed and unpacked several times and dithered and delayed until Dubois

had to go for fear of being caught in the plot himself (after all, a Dutchman

whisking an heir to the English throne abroad raised all kinds of problems,

even if it was Mary's idea).

While Mary felt abandoned and was wailing `What is to become of me?',

cousin Charles breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn't worth antagonising England

over a woman who couldn't make up her mind.

Coming to Court

Mary attended Court at Christmas 1550 to find herself under attack from the king

himself. She'd always pretended that all this religious nonsense was the work of

the evil advisers on the Council. Now she saw that Edward was as heretical as

any of them and he seemed to know all about her plans. It must have been humil-

iating for the 34-year-old princess to be told off by a 13-year-old, king or no king.

Charles continued to support Mary, but Edward wouldn't back down and the

emperor knew that Dudley was moving towards a French alliance. Charles

couldn't afford to go to war for Mary's sake, so he told his cousin to shut up Chapter 8: Encouraging Protestantism 147 and give in gracefully � drop the public Catholic worship idea and count her- self lucky. Without Charles's support, Mary had no choice.

Edward gave in slightly and the Council backed off. Mary continued with the Latin mass in private, but the public services in her chapel (which she never went to) used the Book of Common Prayer.

Many saw Mary as the symbolic head of the old guard. What wasn't clear was whether she was an out-and-out Catholic, like her mother, Catherine of Aragon (see Chapter 5), or whether she believed in the Six Articles as laid down by her father for his Church. Edward's death in July 1553 would throw a spotlight on Mary and perhaps stop the English Reformation in its tracks (see Chapter 9). 148 Part III: Remembering the Forgotten Tudors: Edward VI and Mary