Why did Henry VII break with Rome?

Authors Avatar by yolandya123 (student)

Sunday 7th October 2012

Why did Henry VIII break from Rome?

 The main reason why Henry VIII broke from the Church of Rome was that he believed he needed a son to ensure the Tudor dynasty survived. However, there were also other reasons which included that Henry needed money to become more powerful in Europe that all added up with the break with Rome.

Despite Henry VIII reign being a devoted Catholic, he soon turned against the church, and then broke with Rome. Originally, Henry agreed with the pope being Head of the Catholic Church. Nevertheless, he wanted to divorce Catherine of Aragon (which the Church did not allow) after her failure at producing a male heir) to maintain the Tudor Dynasty. This angered Henry, getting annoyed at the Catholic Church, his dislike towards the Catholic Church started to grow. He began to come up with excuses regarding to his divorce, including the fact that Catherine and Henry’s marriage was not accepted by God, as Catherine was married before to his brother. In the Bible, Book of Leviticus, it was written ‘If a man shall take his brother’s wife it is an unclean thing. They shall be childless.’ Henry believed that God had cursed him to have no son. When the marriage occurred, the Pope had given permission for this marriage to take place. Henry now argued that the Pope had no right to disobey the law set by God. Desperately needing an heir, he needed to marry quickly before he cannot have children any more. With the Church’s disagreement towards his divorce, he thought that the Church had too much power. As Henry became more and more impatient, he began to listen to anti-clericals who said the church had too much power which convinced him even more. Henry wanted this power but the only way to do so was to break from Rome.

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Additionally, he assumed that the people thought the church was corrupt and if he broke with Rome, he would become more of a popular king, despite people being terrified from disagreeing with the Pope, from the rumoured image of hell. Martin Luther, a German Monk, was a protestant, thought that the Church was a corrupt Catholic church. Henry heard about this, and in the beginning, disagreed with his thoughts, though later, Martin Luther had said he would allow divorce. This gave Henry the idea to break away with the Catholic Church and become a Protestant. If he did so, he ...

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