Notes to Teachers
Two catastrophic loses were suffered by the Papacy in the Sixteenth Century during the pontificate of Clement VII . The first was the Sacking of Rome and the second was the loss of England to the Protestant Reformation.
These two occurrences are rarely viewed as connected and related events. Normally they are considered independently of each other even though their impact was directly linked and the one affected the other. Roman Catholics have traditionally been quick to point out the ignoble motivation for the Protestant Reformation in England citing King Henry VIII’s desire for a divorce from his queen, Catherine of Aragon, and his adulterous relations with Anne Boleyn. Furthermore they have ascribed the moral high ground to Pope Clement VII for his defense of the royal marriage. Anglicans, tend to treat these original events like embarrassing skeletons which hang in the proverbial family closet.
The fact of the matter is, however, that Henry’s petition for annulment, while it may have been ignoble, was not an uncommon or unusual request. The marital arrangements of dynastic royalty in the Middle Ages for a variety of political and convenient purposes is well documented. The denial of Henry’s request had far more to do with the Pope’s precarious relationship with Emperor Charles V after his troops sacked the city of Rome then it did with his defense of the sacrament of marriage.
Charles V’s control of the papacy following the sacking of the papal city was the direct influence which caused the denial of Henry’s otherwise unremarkable request. This denial ultimately resulted in England’s break with Rome and the establishment of the Church of England.
Emperor Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, was trying to stop both the spread of Protestantism and the divorce of Henry and Catherine. The two however proved to be mutually exclusive in England’s case. By stopping the one the other would inevitably follow. Charles V was the favorite nephew of Catherine of Aragon, the wife of Henry VIII. His concern for his aunt and her daughter, Mary, resulted in his interference with the annulment request of the English King. As a consequence of this denial (and the impending birth of Henry’s daughter Elizabeth by Anne Boleyn) Henry forced the separation of the English church from Roman Catholic control and was granted his annulment by the English Primate rather then the Roman Pontiff.
Anglicans much prefer to cite the abuses and corruption of the Latin Church and the influences of the continental Reformation at the time of their schism but the fact remains inescapable that the English Reformation is inexorably intertwined with Henry’s propensity for divorce, adultery and re-marriage. On the Roman side of the equation the sacking of Rome, Imperial control of the Vatican and familial fidelity on the part of Charles to Catherine, precipitated this second of the two Clementine catastrophes. The first catastrophe, the Sacking of Rome, provided Charles’ political leverage over Clement VII and directly influenced the second catastrophe, the English Reformation.
In the 16th century the Italian peninsula was a collection of independent nations and states, not least of which were the Papal States. In 1527 Charles V had sent mercenary troops into Italy but he was unable to pay them for their labors. Many of the troops were recruited from Germany and the Lutheran influence was not inconsequential. Following repeated attempts at stalling the economic demands of the troops, who had not been paid in months, the mercenaries turned their sights on Rome and the riches of the Renaissance Papacy to appease what they perceived as their “rightful compensation”. Without the orders or permission of Charles V, and under the leadership of a renegade French Duke, Charles of Bourbon, these mercenary troops attacked Rome. Bourbon was killed in the battle and the troops were left uncontrolled to ransack and pillage the city.
The Sacking of Rome lasted eight days at which time untold sacrilege and villainy was conducted against the city and its inhabitants. Four Thousand citizens were killed, Roman Catholic clergy (and their consorts & children) were thrown from windows, sexual acts and rapes took place on the altars, the Sistine Chapel was used as a barn and all of the papal treasures were pillaged. Luther was named Pope in effigy and pro-Lutheran graffiti was painted on any works of art that could not be removed. (It should be noted that Lutherans in Germany including Melanchthon were appalled by these events and roundly condemned the Sacking of Rome).
Pope Clement VII escaped to a nearby papal castle under disguise. It was there that he negotiated with Emperor Charles V to regain as much of the papal treasures as could be restored and to regain control of the papacy itself. However, after centuries of French domination the pope and the papacy were now firmly under the control of Charles V and Spain. Many historians liken Clement’s agreement with Charles to a virtual imprisonment of the papacy.
Contemporary to these events England had been prospering and advancing in it’s own version of the Renaissance. Under the Tudor King, Henry VIII, England was advancing in a period of peace and prosperity. Henry was a true Renaissance man, philosopher, theologian, musician and statesman. Additionally (much to the surprise of high school students viewing his portraits) he was popular with the ladies.
Henry had ascended to the English throne following his elder brother’s untimely death. He took his brother’s wife, Catherine of Aragon, to be his queen probably to maintain England’s political relations with Spain. Catherine was a Spanish princes, one of the daughters of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain. In order to take his sister-in-law as his wife a papal indult was required. Henry obtained the needed permission from Pope Julius II who preceded Clement VII as pope. Regardless of the diplomatic advantages of the union the marriage was not a happy one.
Catherine produced one surviving child by Henry, a girl, Mary Tudor. In order to secure the future of the House of Tudor and to demonstrate the favor of God, a male heir was needed. Henry, growing weary of the unhappy marriage, claimed that it had been morally wrong for him marry his brother’s widow and asserted that God’s judgment upon the monarchy was apparent by the lack of a male heir. Henry did not even bother to attend Mary’s baptism.
The sincerity, or lack thereof, of Henry’s argument not withstanding, the fact remained that he had also fallen in love with a young courtier, Anne Boleyn. Under normal circumstances a reversal of Pope Julius II’s indult by the then current pope, Clement VII, would not have been too difficult to obtain (remember Catholic countries paid papal taxes). Clement VII could have reversed the previous indult and annulled the marriage which would have left Henry free to re-marry. With the help of Cardinal Wolsey, the ranking prelate of England, Henry gathered theological & ecclesiastical support for his claims and petitioned Clement VII in 1528 just a year after the Sacking of Rome. Clement stalled his response for four years. By 1531 matters were further complicated because Anne was pregnant with Henry’s child and therefore an expedient divorce from Catherine was urgent.
The complications, delaying this otherwise uncomplicated papal petition, involved the family connections of Queen Catherine and Emperor Charles V. Both were ardent Catholics and devoted Spaniards, a divorce was unthinkable. Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, Catherine was not only the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella but she was also Charles V’s favorite aunt. A divorce from Henry would have removed her as Queen, disgraced her and possibly placed her in mortal danger. Furthermore, a papal annulment would have declared that the sacrament of marriage never actually existed thereby making Mary Tudor a bastard child with no right to the English throne, title or royal benefits. Catherine appealed to her favorite nephew for help.
As a result of the Sacking of Rome in 1527, as noted above, the papacy was firmly under the direct control of Charles V. Pope Clement VII and Emperor Charles V both knew that a denial of Henry’s petition might result in the loss of England to Protestant control. Thus began the long and diplomatic stalling game. In the end, Henry, pressured by the impending birth of Elizabeth, forced the separation of the English Church from Papal control by pressing the Parliament into passing seven acts to sever England from Roman control. The first of these acts was called the Act of Supremacy which passed in 1531. These acts, building on the Investiture Crisis of prior days (remember St. Thomas Becket), declared the English Monarch as the Head of the Church in England rather then the Pope.
Henry appointed a new Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Canmer (the primate of England, replacing Wosley) who promptly annulled the marriage to Catherine, married Henry to Anne and crowned Anne Queen all before Elizabeth was born! England was lost to both Rome and the Holy Roman Empire and Catherine and Mary were not spared disgrace.
Interestingly, Henry VIII and Thomas Cranmer, unlike the Continental Reformers, did not establish a Protestant Church in England. Rather they maintained a Catholic Church in England which was simply and uniquely English rather than Roman thus leading to later claims of catholicity among Anglicans. Precedence for such a move was borrowed from the Celtic Christianity which existed independently of real Roman control prior to the Synod of Whitby in 663, the pervious royal claims from the Investiture Crisis and the historic Ecclesial Independence of the Oriental Churches. The result was a uniquely English innovation which eventually would settle into a middle way (Via Media) between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism.
