How far was the church in need of reform in 1529?

GCSE Religious Studies (Philosophy & Ethics)

In 1529 Henry the 8th started to reform the Catholic Church in England, however there are different reasons and opinions as to why he decided to reform the church. There was a big anti-clerical feeling in 16th century England, the corrupt church was unpopular with the masses. However the main view claims that the reformation was actually due to politics at the time. Henry needed a male heir to the throne and therefore needed a divorce to his wife.What te people of england wanted wasn’t taken into consideration.

There was generally an anti-clerical feeling amongst people. The clergy of that time and before were constantly viewed as corrupt and unholy. But were the clergy really that bad, and if they were would people not have done anything about it? Many laypeople did see the clergy, as greedy and excessive, people were growing discontented with hypocritical clergy such as Wolsey. Wolsey was alot richer than all the other priests, many people found this deceitful, after all when ordained he would have taken a pledge of poverty. He would also have taken a pledge of chastity, yet he had a mistress. Despite his great power within the church, he actually did very little for the religion. He became a symbol of everything that was wrong with the church and we know that many influential people didn't like him. However Wolsey was only one man within the church and many of the peasants wouldn't know have worried about much outside their own little parish.

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The Hunne case is an example of the church at its lowest and most dangerous. Richard Hunne, a merchant refused to pay money to the church for his child's funeral. After a series of court cases he is eventually arrested for the possession of heretical material and is taken to Lollards Tower where he was later found hanged. The case provoked a series of small-scale riots among the merchant classes in London. This case is an example at the discontent among many people at the high taxes; sometimes half of a person salary would go on different taxes. The church was widely discredited and anti-clericalism spread wider as rumours circulated that the church had planted the heretical materials on Hunne. However, the Hunne case is thought to be a one off, an isolated incident. The opposition that it stirred was very small scale and was in London within the merchant classes. Although nearly everyone would have grumbled about the taxes, people stilled pay them.

The Catholic Church remained popular as it had a great capacity to satisfy the needs of its entire people, both in the city and the country. For the peasants of the farming towns, church services were a way of bringing the entire community together; the church offered a lovely and social function and baptisms, confirmations and marriages were seen as social highlights. The church offered consolation and support to people with hard lives in times of need with blessings and prayers. Although the peasants wouldn't have understood the Latin services, rather than being frustrated they were fascinated, the services were a change from their usually boring lives.

However in the city, the church still manages to satisfy the needs of literate and educated townsmen. Rather than emphasising the importance of community, the church put more stress on the importance of the individuals and personal piety. People are encouraged to explore their own religious idea and personal worship. The church kept people content which is why the majority of people didn't complain a lot.

The criticisms of contemporaries show that the church was definitely in need of a reform. John Colet, Melton and More all criticised the church clergy, claiming that many priests were rude and ignorant and that the clergy were 'often unduly ambitious and guilty of moral laxity as they went in search of greater powers.' All three were calling for better standards among the church. Erasmus, a famous scholar called for an improvement in the standard of church education. However although all of these men were clearly criticising the church in one way 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 did have some faults, but generally people were happy 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 exaggerated these faults in order to reform the church for their own personal needs, rather than the needs of the ordinary people.

By Alex Ewing