‘The Church was completely di erent in 1547 than it was in 1520’.
Assess the validity of this view,
In the years between 1520 and 1547 there were many clerical changes made by Henry VIII
and his chief ministers. Though on the surface it may seem that many of these changes were
insigni cant as they were reversed before the end of Henry VIII’s reign, in actuality, there
were a plethora of substan al changes within the Church. These changes had las ng e ects
on many facets of religious worship whilst impac ng di erent social groups. Therefore, in
order to determine the extent of change within the Church, it would be per nent to look at
the main changes made by Henry VIII such as; the dissolu on of monasteries, the changes to
the doctrine and the di erences in Church hierarchy.
Though Cromwell is o en recognised as the chief minister who dissolved monasteries within
England, the dissolu on of monasteries had already begun on a smaller scale under Wolsey -
demonstrated when Wolsey dissolved 29 lesser monasteries in 1524. The dissolu on was
further catalysed by the appointment of Cromwell, who used ‘Valor Ecclesias cus’ in 1535 to
assess the crown's wealth. In the following year, he began dissolving monasteries at a rapid
pace and by March 1940 all monasteries had been dissolved. The dissolu on of monasteries
completely changed the clerical structure and this therefore, impacted people from all
spheres of society. Firstly, the dissolu on of monasteries meant that many monks and nuns
were rendered unemployed. As a direct result of this, monks were made vagabonds as they
not only had lost their jobs, but their homes too. Further accentua ng the social problems
was the vacuum created by the destruc on of the main charitable organisa on within Tudor
society. Although some may argue that the dissolu on of monasteries only a ected the
lower classes, this view is invalid. The nobility (though lesser a ected), also felt the impact of
the dissolu on of monasteries. Many monasteries served the dual purpose of local
administra on as well as the place of worship. When they no longer existed, many nobles
lost their hub of administra ve power and this was seen in par cular in the pala nate of
Durham, where the main monas c property was a Cathedral. This ul mately led to a
massive change within the Church system, as well as social life for many members of society.
Thus, this illustrates how in this aspect the Church system was completely di erent.
Another key change which occurred under Henry VIII was the modi ca ons of Church
doctrines. In 1536 Cromwell passed the Ten Ar cles which was an ambiguous document
with both Conserva ve and Protestant in uences on the development of the doctrine. The
fact that only three sacraments were men oned was quite radical; however in the following
year the Bishop’s book restored the four missing sacraments omi ed from the Ten Ar cles.
The lack of clarity and the indecisiveness of clerical change in this aspect, led to regional
di erences in how religion was prac ced. Not only that, but many of the changes were then
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