From 'Defender of the Faith' to Excommunication

Henry VIII was an extraordinarily pious man his entire life. Seems like an odd way to describe the monarch who supplanted the Pope as the head of his church, but even that he did (partially) out of religious conviction.

The beginning of his reign coincided with the spread of religious reformation. To counter the impact of Martin Luther and other heretics, he wrote a book, Assertio Septem Sacramentorum (In Defence of the Seven Sacraments). Likely ghost written by his admired friend Thomas Moore, the book won him the title of Fidei Defensor (Defender of the Faith) from Pope Leo X. (This was rewarding for a man who, being a second son of a king, had been intended for religious life.)

A depiction of Henry from his personal Psalter
(from British Library)

Years later, driven by fatigue with his first wife and passion for his second, he began challenging the pope. Debate persists whether his religious scruples were genuine or merely a facade to justify his earthly desires, but he said his conscience was troubled because his first marriage was invalid.

Henry had rescued his brother Arthur's young widow by marrying her when Arthur died a few months into their marriage.

He fought for years to shirk his first wife. He cited the Book of Leviticus which calls marriage to a brother's wife unclean. After wrangling with the Roman Church to find a way to be granted an annulment, he was given a radical idea: why bother going through Rome at all?

A king's people should pay allegiance to him first, not to some foreign power (the Pope). And regardless of what the Pope says is legal liturgically, it's forbidden in the Bible (sort of). Can the pope overrule the Bible?

This is the question Henry put to the leading European universities, a masterful idea. When their verdicts came in, Henry interpreted the results as a liberation from the 'Bishop of Rome.'

Henry annulled his marriage (not divorced, since a marriage is invalid if against the law of God). Having thus circumvented the pope, he was excommunicated from the Catholic Church and thus heaven.

His upbringing was steeped in religion because as the second son of a king, he was intended for religious life. Even though his path changed on the untimely death of his brother the heir, he was a passionately religious man until the day he died.

Still up for debate: whether he purified the Church or tyranny and corruption, or used religion to justify and enable his earthly desires.