After the death of Henry VIII, a Reformer in his own way, who detached England from Rome’s Catholicism, and after the death of his son Edward VI, who followed his father’s footsteps, came MaryI who ruled purely as a Roman Catholic Monarch and persecuted Protestants so much so that she was often referred to as “Bloody Mary”. When she died, Elizabeth I came into power as the Queen of England and in a bid to create a balance between the two extremes of Catholicism and Protestantism, caused a Religious Settlement Act to be enacted in the Parliament. She also caused the “The book of common Prayer” to be re-written and ammended.
However, Puritanism seem to have risen out of discontent with the Elizabethan Religious Settlement which some radical Protestants thought had given in to “Poperry” (Roman Catholic Church). In Europe, Protestant movements had radically broken with Catholic types of church organization but the English Reformation brought the Church under the control of the monarchy whilst still leaving many of its religious practices intact. This made the Protestants feel that the Church was subservient to politics.
Although the Elizabethan Religious move was supposed to be what is known as “via media”, (middle way), some Puritans who had gone into exile during the time of Mary I of England and had come in contact with reformers in Calvinist Geneva and Lutheran Germany had their theological positions shaped by those contacts.
