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But the scarred sectarian history of Britain is enough to give pause to the most optimistic ecumenist. Though broad spiritual and nationalistic currents were at work, the actual split between Rome and Canterbury began with the ambitions of King Henry VIII. In 1527 he sought to have his marriage to Queen Catherine annulled so that he could wed Anne Boleyn. This was more a matter of state than of lust—though he had plenty of that too. Henry wanted a male heir to consolidate his realm, not just another sexual partner (mistresses were commonplace among Roman Catholic monarchs throughout Europe). But Henry VIII's desire ran counter to the authority of Pope Clement VII, who flatly refused an annulment for a number of reasons—including his political subservience to Catherine's nephew, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. Even today, judges of the Sacred Roman Rota, which rules on marriage cases, boast that the church gave away a kingdom rather than compromise its principles.
Henry finally took matters into his own hands by making the bishops recognize his legal authority over the church in England and securing the appointment of Thomas Cranmer as Archbishop of Canterbury. Henry married Anne, and Cranmer declared his marriage to Catherine null and void. In 1534 Parliament made the schism final by declaring the King to be temporal head of an independent Church of England. The Archbishop of Canterbury became his chief spiritual minister.
While Henry VIII sought to keep Catholic dogma intact, persecuting Lutherans as energetically as he did the handful of bishops and large number of priests who remained loyal to Rome, he did authorize an English translation of the Bible, the forerunner of the King James version. The Catholic hierarchy had permitted only the Latin Scriptures. The English Bible helped foster at the parish level the Protestant conviction that Christians should draw their beliefs directly from the Bible rather than from papal edicts.
After Henry's death, the church veered in a distinctly Protestant direction. Archbishop Cranmer felicitously supplanted Rome's Latin liturgy with the Book of Common Prayer in English. Then the Catholic Queen "Bloody Mary" sought to force England back under the Pope. Archbishop Cranmer was one of 300 Anglican "heretics" who were burned at the stake during her reign, which is the inspiration for much of today's lingering "No Popery!" hysteria. In 1559 the policies of Queen Elizabeth I gave shape to the Church of England as it is today. It remained largely Catholic in ritual and tradition, and Elizabeth's persecution of Catholics was, by 16th century standards, mild.
Then came the papacy of Pius V. Subsequently elevated to Roman Catholic sainthood, he made what seems in retrospect a monumental blunder. Pius not only excommunicated Elizabeth but ordered her subjects to deny her their allegiance. This was clearly a political bid by Rome to destroy the English Crown, and it had the effect of converting Catholics, whether they liked it or not, into a species of political subversives. At the time, England was under grave military threat from Roman Catholic Spain.