It's a common misconception of non-Anglican Protestants (particularly in America, I'm afraid) to not be aware of the MANY differences between firmly Protestant traditional Anglican/Episcopalean beliefs and Roman Catholic beliefs. It stems from, I think, the fact that Anglican worship is very "high church" or Catholic APPEARING, yet as we all know, appearances can be decieving.
Besides not acknowledging the Pope, traditional Anglicans (not the liberals...they believe all kinds of strange stuff) accept the the "solas" of Protestantism, that is "sola fide, sola gracia, solo scriptura, solus Christus, sola Deo gloria" (only through faith, only by grace, scripture alone, Christ alone, all for God's glory alone). Henry the VIII may have liked Roman doctrine, (except on divorce...) but those who came after did not--the very UN-Roman Catholic "Westminister Confession" of Presbyterianism was formulated by Puritan Anglicans, who also made the Church of England unquestionably very traditionally Protestant (not quite Presbyterian though...) in its core beliefs.
The confusion is that most modern Protestants aren't used to the high-church/liturgical style of worship found in Anglican churches, and since that part does resemble Roman Catholic worship, we assume their beliefs are also similar...when in fact they are not.Also from the very beginning the Church of England, being a national church, had a "big tent" philosophy--having people that were practically Roman Catholic in beliefs (like Henry) to those who could have easily been Lutheran or Presbyterian. (I suspect Blair is like England's first Protestant monarch. Let's hope his religious descendents are more like Elizabeth I, and not like bloody Mary...)
Function does not always follow form.
My wife (raised Methodist) and I "church shopped" for some time and finally found a home in a Disciples of Christ congregation. It's a very personal decision and one conclusion I got from the process was that finding the right congregation and minister is the hard part.
The fact that Blair takes his faith seriously conflicts with my image of a leader of the Labour Party, but I'm glad he does. It may be the main thing that has created what seems to be a sincere personal bond between him and Bush.