Using These four passages and our on knowledge, assess the view that the Roman Catholics were a serious threat to Elizabeth I and the church she had established.

Elizabeth had inherited the throne of England in 1558 from a Catholic queen Mary who had attempted to re-convert England back to Catholicism and to allow the country to take part in the Catholic reformation of Europe. The accession of Elizabeth was met with anxiety and tension as to discover what she was to do in response to religion and how the Catholic powers of Europe as well as the Catholics within England at the time would treat any changes. The immediate rise to power was met with little hostility as Elizabeth had made very cautious changes to start with as she thought it wise not to provoke hostility from abroad considering the position of England at the time as a small, weak protestant nation. The start of Elizabeth’s reign was fairly peaceful however tensions rose and a Catholic threat seemed more imminent as her reign drew to the end.
In order to find out if the Roman Catholics were in fact a serious threat to Elizabeth and her church the essay must be split down into two main sub-sections, one to discover whether Catholics were a threat to Elizabeth herself and the other to decide whether they were a prominent threat to Elizabeth’s Church, however there is a very fine difference between the two as the majority of the rule of Elizabeth and her threats such as that from Spain were dominated by religion.
The four sources in question all debate the extent of the opposition that the Roman Catholics actually provided against Elizabeth I. The majority of the sources go into more detail about the strength of the opposition to the church rather than that to Elizabeth herself, however by looking at the sources and by comparing them to other information that I have studied I have been able to gain a good understanding of the opposition that the Elizabeth faced throughout her reign. Source B argues provides the most informative account of direct opposition to Elizabeth based upon political issues rather than issues relating directly to the church. The source depicts how Elizabeth had managed to rouse opposition from Ireland, Scotland and perhaps more importantly; Spain, France and the Pope. The source states that several conspirators within the early 1580’s had hoped to ensure ‘a religious war against England and the Liberation of Mary, Queen of Scots.’. This quote alone shows how there was active opposition aimed directly at Elizabeth in an attempt to dethrone her. It is undeniable that amongst the conspirators were a number of English Catholics including Francis Throckmorton who was named in interpretation B. The fact that there was opposition from within England by English Catholics is supported by all the other sources and so this shows that political opposition was not completely derived from abroad. Interpretation B focuses its attention on the plots that were aroused due to Mary Queen of Scots. The example that the passage gives can be used as evidence to suggest that the threat of Catholicism was still not that severe even though there were plots as Throckmorton was betrayed which suggests that people still remain loyal to Queen and country despite their religion. In 1586 a similar thing happened when letters were intercepted by a catholic double agent which helped to prevent the death of Elizabeth. This shows that Elizabeth was safe enough within England and commanded enough support to resist Catholic plots against her. Interpretation D however disagrees with the fact that Elizabeth was doing enough to deter Catholic uprising and support by stating that the government failed to ‘hinder the efforts of the priests’ although the information in the source is referring to events that occurred in 1582 and in 1585 new acts came to be against Jesuits and seminary priests. This act was introduced in order to counter the increasing amount of recusants and seminary priests that were in England yet remained unpunished. Interpretation C provides a different outlook on numbers and strengths of recusants in England. The passage puts forth the thesis that the Jesuit and seminary priests were too few in number and had a disproportional spread about the country, the information provided in this passage can help to explain why Catholic plots such as that mentioned in passage B failed. In the Northern earls rebellion in 1569 thousands had entered Durham to protest against the Queen. The Earls that had commenced the rebellion were Catholic which would suggest strong opposition from the Catholic side, however the rebellion was focused more on grievances about the Protestant leaders policies rather than Elizabeth and the majority of the people supporting were in fact not Catholic. This suggests that the Catholic opposition that existed at the time was more focused on the poor policies that Elizabeth and her Government had rather than simple issues with the Queen and her religion. As stated in Interpretation B Elizabeth had drawn attention from several powerful European states. The main problem for Elizabeth came with the war with Spain. Although Spain was Catholic, intentions for invading England were mainly political and financial as if Spain controlled the English channel they would reap many benefits in terms of trade. The most serious threat came in 1588 with the Spanish Armada however this was poorly planned and resulted in a colossal failure. The passages show that in terms of opposition to Elizabeth directly she did not suffer badly at the hands of the Catholics, although she had to deal with the occasional rebellion. This is of course expected in any reign, but the threat from Catholicism remained mild throughout the reign in terms of assaulting the Queen directly. However the second part of the essay will the more pressing issue of the effect that Roman Catholics had on the Church that Elizabeth had created.
The evidence from the given passages concerning opposition to Elizabeth’s Church is much more apparent, however the sources disagree on the strength of Catholic opposition which makes the actual seriousness of opposition harder to detect. Interpretation D believes most that the opposition that Elizabeth endured under the hands of the Catholics was indeed a significant threat to Elizabeth’s Church and her religious policies. The interpretation leads one to believe that the government under Elizabeth had indirectly aided the Catholic drive by being too oppressive to the Catholics, which as a result led to an increase in belief of the faith and increased willingness of people to die for and to become more extreme in active worship of the faith. This interpretation of events is reflected in the end of passage A by stating ’for propaganda reasons at home and abroad it deliberately represented the victims as traitors and claimed that it put them to death not for their religion but for their politics.’ this shows how Elizabeth and her government were potentially worried about the support that could be roused for Catholicism by the executions and so they wished to portray them as enemies of the state to gain support for Elizabeth rather than as political martyrs for Catholicism. Elizabeth had attempted to prevent Catholic propaganda in England in a variety of ways such as making Catholic relics etc. illegal to own, however source D suggests that the methods used by Elizabeth were in fact pretty not working and that a lot of Catholic priests had managed to survive Elizabeth’s reign undetected ‘ninety-eight…put to death by 1603...less than a quarter of the 438 who were sent to England’ the source goes on to state that the surviving seminaries went on to become stronger and better organised and so found survival easier and resisted persecution. Interpretation D provides a lot of strong information on how many seminary priests had managed to remain undetected or managed to avoid paying recusancy fines. So this provides useful information to finding out how strict or efficient the government was in enforcing recusancy laws and treatment of Catholics. The main flaw in the argument that interpretation D attempts to provide however is that it fails to state how much of a threat they were to the church, or furthermore ways in which these Catholics that were being harboured in England actively opposed Elizabeth’s religious policy and attempted to re-convert the existing church. So although the source is very useful it doesn’t however show that there was any serious opposition to the Elizabethan church. Elizabeth was known to be fairly lenient towards Catholics and so this could be the reason that many Catholics thrived in England in this time period. It could also help to explain why more weren’t killed and how many got away without paying the recusancy fines. The number of Douay seminaries given in the source (438) is also not a very significant amount in comparison to the amount of protestants in England at the time and so this wouldn’t cause a major upset within the country as the vast majority of the population was in fact protestant. Figures taken at the end of Elizabeth‘s reign actually indicated that only 1-2% of the population was in fact protestant and so the information given in the source is taken out of context and so making minor issues appear to be very severe. Interpretation B is focused more on the view of Catholic opposition to Elizabeth politically and not as much in reference to her Church, however there is still a link between sources B and D in that Interpretation B states that in order for the Catholic plots and uprisings to occur the vital stage was to ‘rouse the English Catholics’, that is where lied the problem as the majority of the population of England was protestant, and of those that were Catholic very few were extremist and were yearning for a Catholic uprising and a Catholic take over. This of course meant that the plots failed against the Queen and her church due to a lack of support in England, which as mentioned before and in interpretation D is due to a very low level of Catholic influence within England. Although the Catholic plots with the support of Spain and France had the potential to be devastating for England, they never really got underway and due to poor planning all met with failure. Interpretation A puts across a viewpoint that differs to the others in many ways yet remains linked to all of them. This passage suggests that Catholicism is; a political threat yet is not a serious threat in a political sense, that Catholicism is an inherit evil and so the strong protestant leaders in government are removing it for the peoples salvation. It also suggests that Elizabeth is not concerned about the Catholic opposition, yet Elizabeth and her government still persist to cover up the fact that they are oppressing them for religious reasons as they fear gains in Catholic support if the people executed are seem as martyrs. Interpretation A is showing to me what parliament and what Elizabeth believed about the strength of the Catholic opposition. The information here corresponds to what I believe to be true as Elizabeth was an open minded woman and for political as well as personal reasons didn’t engage in a reign of thorough oppression to exterminate all Catholics. But it also shows how the more extreme protestant men in parliament as well as elsewhere in the country believed Catholicism to be ’a threat to men’s chances of eternal salvation.’ and so in stating this they believe that Catholicism was more of a force to fear being controlled by rather than an opposition group in a political sense and so sought to remove all hope of this Catholic threat no matter how small it was. Interpretation C is what I believe is the most accurate in sense of the gravity of a Catholic threat. It is in effect the counter-argument to source D in that it says that the Catholic missionaries that were sent across to England in order to inspire and to make Catholicism flourish within England failed completely in their tasks. The passage agrees with interpretation D on some levels as it says that the Jesuit priests met with some success in that managed to find shelter n some gentries houses and to influence some Catholic landlords to retain their Catholic faith. However the source goes on to say how the Jesuits made several fundamental errors. The Jesuits had massed in the wrong areas which meant that the majority of the priests were in areas with the minority of Catholics according to the source ‘in 1580 half of the missioners were working in Essex, London and the Thames valley, where only a fifth of recusants lived’. This shows that the ability that the Jesuits had to make people retain their faith was more limited as there was less people to focus on and as these areas were more protestant it would be harder for the priests to conceal themselves.
The problem faced with distinguishing the level of threat to Elizabeth’s church and to Elizabeth herself is that the two are very closely linked. The majority of political matters are driven by religion, her foreign policy is driven by religion and of course the church is driven by religion. The fact that almost every aspect of Elizabeth’s reign is almost bound to be over shadowed by religion shows that if Elizabeth did encounter any major problems it would almost certainly have something to do with Catholicism, as Elizabeth had a very successful reign in the sense that she managed to maintain the majority of domestic support and there weren’t any serious incidents involving her foreign policy shows that the Catholicism never truly threatened Elizabeth and her Church.
So in conclusion I believe that the success of her reign mirrors the answer to the question of whether Catholics were a serious threat. Elizabeth’s reign was not perfect as it met with some minor issues and events that could have ended up causing great problems for Elizabeth, but as shown in the four passages these events were either minor, dealt with very well or due too poor preparation did not achieve in what they set out to do. In answer to the of was Catholicism a threat to Elizabeth I and her Church. Interpretation A shows that Catholicism is believed to be more of a theoretical problem rather than a realistic one as it is not yet concerning people but is believed to be an obstacle or a hindrance to Protestantism as it is thought to be a form of a hostile anti-Christ. Interpretation B depicts the problems faced by Catholic plots and political opposition, it shows how Catholicism has the potential to be a serious threat in that England was massively out numbered in terms of strength against France, Spain and Rome but for these to be successful they required the support of English Catholics of which they didn’t have, and so all failed leaving the plots as a very minor threat. Interpretation C supports my thesis as it shows that the area in which Catholics could win support in England they failed to capitalise on and so left them as weak as before within England. Interpretation D gives a distorted view as to the true extent of Catholic strength. The passage attempts to make Catholicism appear much more prominent in England then it actually was and so when compared to other facts and information the passage is simply showing how low the support for Catholicism actually was in comparison to Protestantism, and that despite this apparent number of seminary priests it fails to say anything about what these priests managed to achieve in terms of gaining support. The Catholics had the potential to cause great problems for Elizabeth, and perhaps if the Spanish Armada had been planned more thoroughly then Catholicism would have been a major factor in opposition to Elizabeth and her Church.