Church of England

The Anglican Church in England was set up in 1534 by King Henry VIII after his break away from the Roman Catholic Church which did not annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon so that he could marry Anne Boleyn. This let to the passing of the Act that declared the King to be the head of the church and not the papacy. Eventually he was excommunicated by Pope Paul III. During his reign the Protestants could bring no reforms as he maintained the strong Catholic tradition of the church. However, after his death, his son Edward VI was influenced by the Protestant form of worship under the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Crammer. After him, Queen Mary restored the Papacy back to power and burnt alive the people who refused to give up their reformed faith. Those who gave up their life for the sake of their reformed faith were termed as Marian martyrs and she was nicknamed Bloody Mary for her cruel acts. This was the first attempt to curb the establishment of an independent Church of England. After Mary, her half sister Elizabeth I took up the matter of the church issue which is called the Elizabethan settlement. The Church of England would function as a moderately reformed church along side the Catholic and Apostolic traditions. It was during the reign of Charles II that the Church of England was restored again. In 1800, by the Fifth Article of the Union with Ireland, the Church of Ireland and the Church of England united to form one Protestant Episcopal Church which was named as the United Church of England and Ireland. As the Church of England follows the teachings in the Holy Scriptures, the church fathers and the principles of the Church Fathers , and has retained the leadership of the bishop ,it has a reformed Catholic characteristics rather than Protestantant characteristics on the whole.