The Causes Of Discontent Between Catholics And Protestants In Ireland
...division in Ireland was sown by the Reformation movement and a king's desires. The reformation religious movement of the 1500's that led to Protestantism. It had a tremendous impact on social, political, and economic life, and its influences are still felt today. The movement began in 1517 when Martin Luther, a German monk, protested certain practices of the Roman Catholic Church.
Henry VIII (1491-1547), king of England (1509-1547), and founder of the Church of England. The son of King Henry VII, he profoundly influenced the character of the English monarchy. In 1527, Henry announced his desire to divorce his wife, on the grounds that the papal dispensation making the marriage possible was invalid. The chief reason for the divorce, however, was that Catherine had failed to produce a male heir. Her only surviving child was Mary, later Mary I of England.
Henry now proceeded to dissolve one by one the ties to the papacy. With the aid of parliamentary legislation, he first secured control of the clergy, compelling that group in 1532 to acknowledge him as head of the English church. In the following year, Henry secretly married Anne Boleyn, who was crowned queen after Henry's obedient archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, declared the marriage with Catherine void and that with Anne valid. An act of succession affirmed the declaration of the archbishop and established Anne's progeny as heirs to the throne. Anne's only surviving child, Elizabeth, later Elizabeth I, was born in 1533. Although Henry was immediately excommunicated, he repudiated papal jurisdiction in 1534 and made himself the supreme ecclesiastical authority in England.
In 1537, the Irish Parliament declared the Anglican religion to be the "established" (i.e., official) religion of the Church of Ireland. Anglicism also became a part of the "English culture" that Henry was forcibly...
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