The Final Year of Anne Boleyn by Natalie Grueninger

Author:Natalie Grueninger
Format: epub

But forasmuch as the place where they be, the name thereof and kind of pains there, also be to us uncertain by Scripture; therefore this with all other things we remit to God Almighty, unto whose mercy it is meet and convenient for us to commend them, trusting that God accepteth our prayers for them, referring the rest wholly to God, to whom is known their estate and condition.⁵⁷

The article did, however, condemn the belief that ‘through the Bishop of Rome’s pardon, souls might… be delivered out of Purgatory, and all the pains of it’. This and other ‘abuses’ like the popular ‘Scala Coeli’ indulgence were denounced.

In regards to the veneration of images, as they were ‘representers [sic] of virtue and good example’ it was acceptable for them to be displayed in the churches, however, the bishops and preachers were to teach the people that idolatry was forbidden by God. As for the custom of censing the images and kneeling before them, this was permitted as long as the people were taught that regardless of whose image they knelt before, they were worshipping only God and not the image.

Henry hoped that his articles would help unite his people and quell the debates, but in fact they only served to further divide his subjects. As Peter Marshall reminds us, the fact that modern historians can’t agree on whether the Ten Articles was a victory for the conservatives or the reformers ‘mirrors the confusion of contemporaries’.⁵⁸

Up until this point, it’s been argued that all Henry had done was ‘in effect, create an English Catholic Church’.⁵⁹ Even after 1536, the king remained fairly conservative and his religious policies were ‘neither thoroughly Protestant nor thoroughly Catholic’.⁶⁰

By the time the articles and the injunctions that followed were issued in the summer of 1536, Anne was already in her shallow grave in the Tower of London. Nevertheless, they spotlight the issues that were being discussed and debated during her lifetime, discussions that Anne undoubtedly took part in. The religious tug of war was a great source of confusion, but other difficulties loomed.

Excessive rainfall led to failing crops and famine, which further intensified the unease and disgruntlement, and with the warmer weather came pestilence. Against this turbulent backdrop, Anne Boleyn navigated the sunlit peaks and desolate valleys of the final year of her life.

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