I believe that the blame lies entirely with Henry, who with his ways traumatized his three children ( Mary above all, but also Elizabeth in minor size ), making them become what we all know
What PoD would be needed so that British parliament weren’t so prejudiced against James VII & II’s Catholicism?
- Thread starter Charles III Stuart
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I believe that the blame lies entirely with Henry, who with his ways traumatized his three children ( Mary above all, but also Elizabeth in minor size ), making them become what we all know
Most of the ones to which I presume you are referring- and I certainly may be wrong - predate today's majority religions, or were laid low by them.
They didn't exactly treat people of other religions as equals, though, did they? Also, toleration varied quite a bit over time.
How about: "the Pope rescinds the Church's claim to exclusive authority to define Christianity, abolishes the Inquisition, and ceases all efforts to impose its theology and jurisdiction by force"?
British Protestants objected to a Catholic ruler because they feared (quite reasonably) that Catholic political authority would be used to impose Catholic religious practice. The last Catholic to rule England had 287 people executed, many by burning alive, for professing Protestant belief.
It may come as a great surprise to you, but the people of the late 17th century actually believed their religious professions.
The King of England is the head of the Church of England. As of 1688, the C of E was anathematized by the Pope as heretical; James II and VI was a Catholic, and therefore bound by the Pope's decrees. It was hardly mere bigotry for Englishmen (and Scotsmen) to see this as a dangerous contradiction, which could not be allowed to continue. (The birth of James' Catholic son, which displaced his Protestant daughters from the succession, threatened to extend this danger indefinitely.)
British Protestants objected to a Catholic ruler because they feared (quite reasonably) that Catholic political authority would be used to impose Catholic religious practice. The last Catholic to rule England had 287 people executed, many by burning alive, for professing Protestant belief.
It may come as a great surprise to you, but the people of the late 17th century actually believed their religious professions.
The King of England is the head of the Church of England. As of 1688, the C of E was anathematized by the Pope as heretical; James II and VI was a Catholic, and therefore bound by the Pope's decrees. It was hardly mere bigotry for Englishmen (and Scotsmen) to see this as a dangerous contradiction, which could not be allowed to continue. (The birth of James' Catholic son, which displaced his Protestant daughters from the succession, threatened to extend this danger indefinitely.)
You could say the same about most liberal democracies. E.g., being an open Neo-Nazi will get you banned from certain jobs almost everywhere, and in some places (such as Germany, for obvious reasons) will get you thrown in prison.
The Church of England imposed its theology by force -- that was the whole point of the Act of Uniformity, after all -- and its efforts to do so could get pretty inquisitorial. And to put it bluntly, the Pope's claim to define Christianity has a lot more historical and theological backing than the English Parliament's.
Are you comparing suppression of Neo-Nazism to religious persecution? Am I reading this right?
I don't think he really compared religious persecution, with discrimination ( justified by logical common sense, given the historical precedents they created ) towards the neo-Nazi ideology, but he just tried to use an example of something that can happen in the present by comparing it with the various methods of era to persecute some ( religious ) ideas not appreciated by the local elite, although it is a somewhat shaky example, it manages to make itself understood, after all it is just trying to explain that a current of thought in one country can make you be considered an excluded / criminal in another it can make you have a career ( however bad it may be seem, unfortunately it wouldn't be so strange ) at least ( at least that's what I understand )
My point is simply that every country privileges some ideas and suppresses others (with varying degrees of severity). I know there are some free-speech absolutists who think we should be able to express whatever opinion we want without any consequences, but no actual country is run on such principles. If treating all belief systems with absolute equality is necessary to count as a free state, then there are no free states.
ETA: And, to shut down a potential line of argument, I consider the fact that we don't let Neo-Nazis hold certain jobs to be a good thing.
after all, Elisabeth also sent Catholics to their deaths, but aware of her sister's mistakes, she used the legal loophole that they were actually traitors ( so she wasn't really punishing them for their faith 😉, but only because they represented a threat to the state, very clever I must say ) this explains why we have " Bloody Mary " but not the equally " Bloody " Elisabeth or Edward and above all Henry the Tyrant, anyway yes, I think it is necessary to change English history a lot, to have the conditions in which a people and a parliament deeply radicalized in their beliefs can accept a situation similar to their contemporary Saxony, to be able to separate the figure of the king from political thought from that of the head of the church and from Protestantism in general it would be a very complicated process
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If we compare apples with apples, Elizabeth and Edward VI executed far more Catholics/non-conformists in their reign than Mary did. ISTR reading that, if the stats were boiled down, for all Elizabeth's supposed tolerance, she executed (directly or indirectly) 3-5x more Catholics in a single decade than Mary did Protestants in her entire reign. And when compared with Henry VIII (1536-1547), both women are left to look like rank amateurs (although Harry tended to execute anyone who disagreed with him, regardless of religion)
furthermore I would like to point out that the persecutions really began only after Wyatt's revolt and the formalization of his marriage with Philip ( who personally was against the murder of even ordinary people, was more inclined to eradicate the leadership of these movements ( therefore people like Cranmer ) and then work with the church to bring the poor deviated from them back into Catholic orthodoxy ) then in 1555 ( also her first aborted "pregnancy" escalated matters, because she was sincerely convinced it was divine punishment ( l I would add yet another ) so extraordinary bloodiest or too pro-Spanish she wasn't, she became that way due to the traumas and abuses she suffered in her youth due to her father
and I absolutely confirm what Kellan said about Elisabeth, she was no less bloodthirsty, but only more cunning, passing off a mere religious persecution as justice, using the excuse of the violation of the act of supremacy which made anyone a traitor ( case strange that they were mostly Catholics eh ! )
even if paradoxically extending their lives of Henry by a few years ( 1 ), can help the Catholic faction ( above all the imposition of the prayer book in Cornwall of Otl is avoided ) because it would weaken the Protestant part which under Edward made important and radical steps forward, drastically changing the Henrician church
1 ) Unfortunately, of course, the ones who will lose out will be Catherine Parr and another poor woman who perhaps will succeed him, I would say until 1551 ( the year in which there was yet another sweat epidemic ) so father and son were taken away and Mary ascended the throne two years earlier and from here things can get a little interesting ( which can affect the last Italian war, the Destiny of Calais, the Council of Trent, the League of Smalcanda, the Peace of Augsburg etc )
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If Katherine Parr lose her crown, the next bride of Henry would be most likely Katherine (Willoughby) Brandon
Seems a bit silly to complain about how democratic systems are less legitimate than autocratic ones and then being outraged by the illegitimate deposition of one autocrat by another. As one Irish Catholic said, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” The problem wasn’t that the British monarchy just oppressed the wrong people, but rather that it was oppressive at all.
Plus, James II sticking around isn't necessarily going to make things in Ireland better.
As I pointed out in another thread, by 1685 Irish land ownership had already plummeted to 22%, with the "Old English" who were Catholic owing most of the land. James' pro-Irish policies were not exactly great: for instance, the Irish Parliament still remained subordinate to the English one through the Poyning's Law, which James II refused to abolish, and he still demanded that the Anglican Church of Ireland remain the established church of Ireland, and he had no interest in Ireland having autonomy, as he favored a unitary state of England, Scotland, and Ireland.
His attempt to undo the Act of Settlement in 1662 only effected Cromwellian confiscations of land, not confiscations that had occurred prior: Irish landownership had already been eroded as early as Tyrone's rebellion. On top of that, James II's confiscations of Protestant land in Ireland (done to raise funds) led to a further erosion of Irish landownership, as it led to Williamite Settlement and confiscations in return. James II only agreed to laws effecting land ownership because the Irish Parliament (the Patriot Parliament of 1689) threatened to withhold funds from James if he didn't. James II's policies in Ireland during the Williamite War were all reluctant half measures, which pleased no one and eroded his Protestant support in England and Scotland.
If James II isn't overthrown, Ireland remains as oppressed as it was before: just by English Catholics (who owned the majority of land) instead of English Protestants. Being able to practice your faith means little when you're still dispossessed of land and the majority of arable lands remains in the hand of absentee landowners.
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What would have he preferred to do, as far as how he saw governing Ireland/Irish Catholics in particular?
Well, the Williamite War / campaign in Ireland wasn't his idea at all, but rather Louis XIV's. France sought to tie up English troops during the Nine Years War, and they saw a conflict in Ireland as the best (and cheapest way) to do so. It's worth remembering that despite Louis XIV giving refuge to James II following the Glorious Revolution, he really wasn't fond of the guy at all. France provided necessary supplies to James II's troops in Ireland, but only enough to keep the conflict going. A naval invasion from Ireland into the British Isles was also totally unrealistic, as the French navy had problems supplying the French troops in Ireland, there was little chance of them gaining control of the Irish sea long enough to land troops in the midst of a hostile population.
Louis XIV saw James II as a useful stooge to keep England occupied, and this tact was continued by his successors. There's a reason why most of the later Jacobite invasions were launched into Scotland rather than trying to invade England proper. It was a cheap way for France to cause trouble in Britain.
James II's main focus was on England: Ireland was always a periphery for him. If it had been up to James II, he would've preferred a cross channel invasion from France into England, which would have been much more feasible. A quick landing and a quick seizure of London, similar to William's invasion would've been a much better bet. James always saw England as the main goal. Had he never been overthrown, Ireland would've continued to have been governed as a dependency of England, with it's Parliament subordinate to the English one, with policy originating with the Irish governor and council, and certified by the English Parliament.
The Irish did become an important segment of the Jacobite cause and many Irish Jacobites would come to live at Saint-Germain, but in the earliest days of James II's attempts to reclaim his throne, the most important segment of his support didn't come from the Irish. While there were plenty of Catholics who supported James, there were also Tory adherents and even Protestants (typically High Church types who remained loyal to the legitimate line of successions) who formed the most important core of support, and whose support James II valued overall.
Interesting.
That does give me an impresison of James going on - in a timeline where he stays on the throne - more Irish enemies than supporters, by force of them seeing him as "the King of England" (as opposed to that any enemy of that can't be all bad) , however pro-Catholic.
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Derek Pullem
Donor
So a more absolutist England dominated by the Catholic Church is a good thing because those good Catholic aristocrats care about the poor peasants in Ireland? Just like their contemporaries in France and Spain?
French and Spanish peasants were better off than their Irish counterparts.
Also, realistically speaking, an England in which James II stayed in power would neither be "absolutist" nor "dominated by the Catholic Church". Parliament and Protestantism were both too well-entrenched for such an outcome.