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176 Stephen Dunford: The Journey of The IrIsh
Ireland and the possession of her lands- religion or strategic location had not come into the equation as yet. Now, however, these heretofore unfamiliar sources of contention reared their embittered heads, adding further acrimony to an already acrimonious struggle.
Early in the sixteenth century a great fragmenting religious revolution broke out in many countries throughout Europe, most especially in Germany. As a result, several powerful princes and influential families split from the authority of the Pope in Rome and the Catho- lic Church-these dissidents were afterwards collectively known as Protestants. Headstrong and willful, yet energetic and capable, the Catholic Henry V111, this immensely formidable figure who became King of England in 1509, and who once held the Vatican-bestowed epithet ‘Defender of the Faith,’ was in the early years of his reign opposed to Protestanism. But later, when Pope Clement V11 refused to annul his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, thereby refusing him permission to marry Anne Boleyn, Henry determined to break with the church. In 1534 he had an Act passed in the English Parliament abolishing the author- ity of the Pope in England and in the following year, by the Act of Supremacy, Henry took the title of “Supreme Head on Earth of the Church of England.” He then set about the suppression of all the English monasteries and convents, confiscated their property, and bestowed their lands on his court favourites and principal supporters. In addition, from then on, all the taxes hitherto paid to the Pope now went to Henry!
Henry was not content to be the head of the Church in England only; he determined to make himself head of the Church in Ireland also, and in 1536 he sent over officials to promote, “the royal will and pleasure of his majesty in spiritual matters.” As a result, the Viceroy, Lord Leonard Grey, summoned a Parliament at Dublin. Known as “The Reforma- tion Parliament,” this assembly passed, not without some resistance, it must be said, an Act of Supremacy, similar to the English one, declaring the King, his heirs and successors, to be ‘Supreme Head of the Church in Ireland,’ and decreeing that in future, no person could hold any public position without taking the Oath of Allegiance. As one historian noted ‘the first-fruits of the Irish bishoprics were now vested in Henry, and an order was made for the suppression of several Irish monasteries.’
So it came to pass that Henry undertook the dissolution of the Irish monasteries and convents, of which there were about 500 in the country. Initially, he easily succeeded in closing the religious houses within the Pale and in English-controlled lordships but more than a hundred years were to elapse, however, before all the remainder were closed. Noth-
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