As with most religious movements, though, there is more than meets the eye. The political reality of the 1530s and 1540s show that the formation of the Church of England probably had more to do with money and political power than true religious differences.
Pope Clement VII might have been right in his ruling that undoing Henry’s marriage would be a violation of Canon law, but it certainly weighed heavy on his mind that Catherine of Aragon’s nephew was Charles V, ruler of Spain and the Holy Roman Emperor. Charles held some animosity against Clement VII because the prelate had been allied against him with France in the League of Cognac.
While it is held that Charles had no intent to actually attack Rome for this offense, a large number of his soldiers, who had mutinied because they had gotten no pay, sacked Rome in 1527 – the same year Henry asked for his annulment. No doubt Clement feared the power of Charles and knew that having a hand in the fall from power of his aunt would surely bring the Emperor’s enmity upon him once again.
So after Clement’s refusal Henry went about the business of passing laws that slowly but steadily separated England from Rome. The Ecclesiastical Appeals Act of 1532 essentially outlawed Papal authority in England, making the King the ultimate arbiter of all laws, be they secular or religious. It was followed by the first Succession Act, which stripped Catherine of Aragon’s daughter, the unabashedly Catholic Princess Mary, of her right to the throne. This was capped off with The First Act of Supremacy, which stated that the king was the Fidei Defensor (Defender of the Faith) and “the only supreme head on earth of the Church in England.”
Every one of these acts not only weakened the pope, it also strengthened the king. These acts also allowed Henry to seize Roman Catholic holdings in his country (which had previously been invulnerable to taxation), greatly increasing his wealth.
So why was Henry so bold? The formation of the Church of England was happening against the backdrop of the Protestant Reformation. Men like Martin Luther and John Calvin had done what no rebellious heretic had done in the history of Christianity – namely survive the wrath of Catholicism. So while Henry worked actively to keep many of the Protestant revisions to Christianity out of his Anglican Church, he was more than willing to take advantage of the same political realities that allowed that movement to take root.
