UNIVERSIDAD AUTONOMA DE NUEVO LEON

FACULTAD DE INGENIERIA MECANICA Y ELECTRICA

Materia: Cultura de la lengua inglesa

Activity #3

Alumno: Gerardo Adrian Torres Díaz

Matricula: 1618032
Profesor: M.C. Edgar Fernando Arroyo Reyna

Grupo: 004 Día: Sábado Hora: M1 – M3

Semestre: Agosto – Diciembre 2022

Fecha de entrega: 3 de septiembre 2022

Introduction

• In the following work we are talking about Protestantism in England and the life
of Henry VIIIHow the separation of the church brought with it a Protestant
reformation.
• The English Reformation began with Henry VIII of England (reigned 1509-1547)
and continued in stages through the rest of the 16th century.
• The process witnessed the break with the Catholic Church led by the Pope in Rome.
The Protestant Church of England was thus established and the English monarch
became its supreme head. In addition, the monasteries were dissolved, the mass
was abolished, the English language began to be used in the services and in the
Bible, the altars were replaced by communion tables and the most decorative and
colorful elements of Catholicism were suppressed both in the services as in the
churches themselves. Most people accepted the change: the rich, because of the
wealth they derived from the dispossessed Church, and the commoners, because
they clung to the authorities and the imposition of fines for not toeing the line and
attending the new Anglican Church, as met. There were also objections from
Catholics, from the more radical Protestants, and from the various Puritan groups,
who would go their own way and establish their own churches, adhering more
closely to the thoughts espoused by reformers such as John Calvin (1509-1564).
• The origins of the English Reformation were political and date back to the reign
of Henry VII of England (reigned 1485-1509).The reform was started by the "big
deal," which was that the king was looking for an heir and was seeking to annul
his marriage to his first wife.
• The English Reformation advanced apace with Cromwell's Ten Articles of 1536,
which, inspired by the writings of Martin Luther (1483-1546), rejected the
seven sacraments of Catholicism and left only three (baptism, penance and the
Eucharist). There was also a statement of the new doctrine in the Bishop's
Book, published in July 1537.
• The Reformation came into full swing with the 1536 bill, which saw the closure
and abolition of Catholic monasteries, known as the dissolution of the
monasteries. The official excuse was that the monasteries were no longer
relevant, were full of corrupt and immoral monks and nuns, and did not help
the poor as much as their wealth indicated.
Henry VIII of England

• Second son of Henry VII of England, the future Henry VIII was nine years old
when he attended as an infant the wedding of his older brother Arthur, Prince
of Wales, with Catherine of Aragon, the youngest daughter of the Catholic
Monarchs. Arturo was the eldest son and consequently the heir to the throne of
Henry VII, who with this union intended to consolidate his alliance with Spain
and ensure a prolific offspring to his lineage.
• Henry VIII occupied the throne intended for his late brother. Henry VIII was then
seventeen years old and a handsome young man who lacked neither understanding nor
political skill. After wearing the crown in place of his brother, he considered that for
reasons of state it was necessary to replace him as husband as well. Getting rid of
Catherine of Aragon and returning her to her country meant losing the large dowry
provided by her parents and, what was even more important, cutting a tie of
inestimable value with the Spanish crown, more necessary than ever in the troubled
European political context of back then.
• The solution consisted in declaring null the link between Catalina and Arturo. Catherine
of Aragon herself recognized before an ecclesiastical court that the previous union had
not been consummated due to incapacity of the spouse and that, therefore, she
continued to be a maiden. The Holy See had no problem granting the dispensation and,
two months after taking the throne, Henry VIII married Catherine of Aragon, five years
his senior.
• Cultured and intelligent, Enrique VIII had shown from his youth his fervent Catholicism. He
had used his brilliance against the Protestant Reformation launched by Luther in 1520,
showing himself to be an energetic defender of the Catholic faith. "Defender of the Faith"
was exactly the title given to him by Pope Leo X for the Treatise on the Seven Sacraments,
which the monarch had written in 1521. But this situation would change as a result of the
conflict unleashed with the Church due to the pressing succession problem: the marriage
with Catherine of Aragon had not given him male heirs. In 1527, Henry VIII asked Pope
Clement VII to annul the marriage on the pretext of previous kinship between the spouses.
The pope, under pressure from Charles V (who was Catherine's nephew), denied the
annulment, and Henry VIII decided to break with Rome, advised by Thomas Cranmer and
Thomas Cromwell. To do this, Henry VIII armed himself with arguments by obtaining
favorable opinions from various European universities for his divorce (1529); and he took
advantage of the prevailing discontent among the English secular clergy over excessive
papal taxation and the accumulation of wealth in the hands of religious orders to have
himself recognized as head of the Church of England (1531).
The reign of Henry VIII

• It is necessary to point out that the episode of Catalina de Aragón and Ana Bolena
had a fundamental impact on her reign; As a result of the Act of Supremacy (1534),
the destinies of England took a very different course from those that could be
pointed out as probable. The Act of Supremacy created an Anglican Church detached
from the Catholic Church and subject to royal authority, although without
renouncing the dogmas and condemning the reformed doctrines (Act of the Six
Articles, 1539). But although this Church was at first only schismatic, not heterodox,
it would not take long to distance itself from the dogma and to approach
Lutheranism.The hegemony of the monarch over the Church would be the firm
foundation on which a new era was established. The monarchy grew rich with the
profits obtained from the sale of ecclesiastical assets (in 1539 the religious orders
were dissolved and all their assets were seized), which opened a period of economic
prosperity that favored a nascent industrialization and led to the creation of a
powerful maritime fleet, base of later military and commercial power.
• The reign of Henry VIII of England, in short, was characterized by a
strengthening of royal authority, by completely subjugating the Church and
eliminating the last feudal structures. This did not prevent the consolidation of
Parliament, both as an instrument of the king's policy and as a representative
body of the kingdom. Wales was assimilated into England (1536) and
jurisdiction over the Marches was centralised. Ireland was also annexed, of
which Henry VIII was proclaimed king in 1541.Another important chapter was
the victorious campaigns against Scotland in 1512-1513 and 1542-1545, which
were not enough to unify Great Britain under his rule. On the other hand,
England increased its leading role in Europe, thanks to the growth of its navy
and a foreign policy dominated by the search for balance between the
continental powers: first it fought against France by allying itself with Charles
V, but when, after the victory of Pavia (1525), it seemed to him that the
Spanish emperor was reaching excessive power, Henry VIII allied himself against
him alongside the French monarch Francis I.
Conclusion

• Once the investigation of the English reform has been carried out, it can be
understood how King Henry VIII did everything possible to control the church
and himself to obtain an heir to the throne.
Bibliography

• Fernández, Tomás y Tamaro, Elena. «Biografia de Enrique VIII de Inglaterra».

En Biografías y Vidas. La enciclopedia biográfica en línea [Internet]. Barcelona,
España, 2004. Disponible en https://
www.biografiasyvidas.com/biografia/e/enrique_viii.htm
• Cartwright, M. (2022, 1 septiembre). La Reforma inglesa. Enciclopedia de la
Historia del Mundo.
https://www.worldhistory.org/trans/es/1-18916/la-reforma-inglesa/