Posted on 03/01/2012 9:43:12 AM PST by marshmallow
Secret letter from Vatican archives unveiled
English nobles threatened "extreme remedies" against the Roman Catholic Church unless the Pope annulled Henry VIII's marriage to Catherine of Aragon, a letter from the Vatican Secret Archives discloses.
The nine-metre wide parchment, with 81 wax seals and red silk ribbons, made public for the first time this week, was sent on Henry's orders to Pope Clement VII in 1530. It was signed by members of the English Parliament, bishops, abbots and the archbishops of York and Canterbury.
They urged the Pope to annul the king's marriage to Catherine so that he could marry Anne Boleyn, one of her ladies-in-waiting, in the hope of producing a male heir. "If the Pope is unwilling, we are left to find a remedy elsewhere. Some remedies are extreme, but a sick man seeks relief in any way he can find," the lords wrote in a barely veiled threat.
The letter is one of the highlights of an exhibition of 100 documents chronicling more than 1,200 years of the Vatican's dealings with kings, conquerors and caliphates.
Henry had fallen in love with Boleyn in 1526 and was desperate for his first marriage to be annulled - a struggle that he referred to as his "great matter."
He married Boleyn in 1533 but Clement VII declared the union invalid and five years later the king was excommunicated. The confrontation led to a split from the Catholic Church and fuelled the English Reformation.
(Excerpt) Read more at vancouversun.com ...
Wolf Hall ping
Fascinating! Thanks for posting.
In those days, it’s hardly surprising — politics could get rough and personal, and the Pope was as much into the game as any king.
The Church has seen the likes of Obama everywhere throughout history. At this point, he is barely rising to the level of “nuisance” on their 2000 year old scale.
Clement VII was a Medici and was as adept at taking and maintaining power through force or murder as was Henry or any other monarch of the time.
Katherine nephew was Charlwes V of Spain, Emperor Of Austria
and Holy Roman Emperor
In 1527 his troops captured and sacked Rome, forcing the
Pope to flee and putting the fear of God into the Pope
Seems Pope Clement when considering threats put more weight
into Charles V than Henry
in the hope of producing a male heir.
______________________________________
Henry had already “produced a male heir” with Catherine..
a couple of them in fact...
One at least was a healthy boy who Henry insisted be taken out soon after he was born into the freezing weather to be baptized in the unheated palace chapel ...the baby caught cold and died...
Henry had about 6 children with Catherine of Aragon..
Only Mary survived past infancy..
Henry also closed down all the monasteries and oratories established to pray for the dead in England, confiscated their goods and property, and handed some of it out to his favorites. He said the monks were “greedy”—kind of like Obama closing down or raising taxes on coal and oil companies because they are greedy. Maybe some of them are, but not as greedy as the Absolute Monarch, which is what Obama thinks he is.
Then, when Henry VIII died, he asked in his will that the monks should pray for his soul in Purgatory. Unfortunately, there weren’t any monks left to do it. They had all been dispersed.
A very important moment in world history. I’d argue that Henry’s break from the Catholic Church led to the Anglosphere maintaining a world dominance economically and militarily for the last 400 odd years.
Nonsense! Nobody puts the fear of God into the Pope, but GOD. He’s concerned not with this life - which is why he refused the annulment, because he’s only concerned with pulling as many folks up there with him as possible and getting there himself.
Why would he flee? To keep a head of the Church around for the stability of the Church, until God decides he should die. You can’t escape when your number is up. Briebart, not only knows this well, but I pray, is immensely happier for it!
Henry's appeal for annulment of a twenty year marriage that had produced a daughter was a legal stretch in the best of circumstances anyway, but till his death he considered himself a better Catholic than the Pontiff. Protestantism did not have a firm grasp on the country till Elizabeth was able to survive several assassination attempts and a serious threat of Spanish invasion and turn the country into a power to be reckoned with.
Rough and personal indeed.
Just ask Saint Thomas More about that goon Cromwell.
True, especially during the times of the Medicis.
One note for interest: all those popes, even the worst, NEVER failed at their job, that is, preach the established dogmas/doctrines and moral codes from those Biblical/Apostolic tradition sources.
They may have failed as men and politicians but not as "popes."
Please read the book reviewed: Thomas Cromwell, Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantell.
Henry VIII lied to Wolsey, the Pope lied to Wolsey and Henry VIII. Ann Boleyn lied to everybody. Thomas More, the "Great Catholic Martyr" was a PIA who liked nothing better than torturing heretics. Henry VIII loved a good heretic roast, too. The only reasonable guy vis-a-vis your basic heretic was Cardinal Wolsey! He also comes off as the only sincere guy in this whole cast of characters, or at least more sincere than the others. And, one can see that it is through his incredibly brilliant efforts that England became a a creditable European power. He is also the guy that gave Henry the idea of, and the legal basis for "regulating" the monasteries!
Queen Catherine of Aragon was incredibly unreasonable, rejecting many a decent compromise offer from the Pope AND her husband. The confiscation of the monasteries sort of reminds me of the reassignment of assets carried out after the Soviet collapse. Once the nobles got their hands on those assets at knock-down prices, they were never about to give them up! It also meant the collapse of "social services" to the poor in England!
Read this. It is a brilliant psychological portrait of the times ... and it might even be true!
I was no fool----I always knew which side my bread was buttered on.
So, Since H8 was capable of fathering boy-children who lived, hje actually had some pretty good dynastic reason to dump Catherine of Aragon, or vice versa. One problem was that he had had to get a Papal Dispensation to marry her in the first place. And your Pope, he no lika change-a the deal once-a he gotta da money, capisce? Especially with a bunch of crazy Spaniards trying to burn Rome-town down! He did offer Queen Catherine a way out ... go to a nunnery! IMHO, she shoulda.
These annulments for big-time guys with heir problems were the norm, rather than the exception. I personally think that had H8 not been trying to prove what a brilliant theologian he was, the deal could have been done on the QT ... except for trying to swipe all that monastic property.
Ah well, it all worked out for the best. Those Anglicans have the best Church Jumble Sales! And their service can have enough ceremony, vestments, song, smells, and bells to satisfy any wandering Papist.
29.5 foot wide parchment. That must have been one hell of a letter!!
Ah, yes...have as many out-of-wedlock children, mistresses as you like.
Engage in as many assassinations as you like.
It doesn't matter. You still succeeded as religious leader of the world!!
If Catherine had accepted annulment and gone to a nunnery, her daughter Mary would have been declared a bastard and lost her opportunity to ever marry, and, of course, lost her right to inherit the throne. Catherine was protecting her only child, as any mother of that time would have done.
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