How The English Cinched The Reformation

A monarchal marital mess created the perfect storm of dissent

- Steve Weidenkopf

Why did the Reformation succeed?

Historians have debated that question for centuries. Many factors led to the permanence of the revolt begun in Germany, including the political structure of Germany, the growing German nationalist movement that fostered resentment against the papacy, the threat of the Ottoman Turks, and the avarice of the nobility for Church lands and wealth.

But one significant factor is frequently overlooked: the events in England. At first blush, it seems farfetched to link the permanent success of a European continental revolutionary movement to the events across the Channel, but without England the Protestant Reformation would not have succeeded.

The English author Hilaire Belloc examined the role of England in the success of the Protestant Revolt in three books: How the Reformation Happened (1928), The Characters of the Reformation (1936), and The Great Heresies (1938). Belloc identified two phases to the Protestant movement: internal and external. The movement began as an internal civil disturbance Belloc described as conflict not “between two religions but a conflict within one religion” (Great Heresies, 109).