Everything about Regnans In Excelsis totally explained
Regnans in Excelsis was a
papal bull issued on
February 25,
1570 by
Pope Pius V declaring "
Elizabeth, the pretended
Queen of England and the servant of crime" to be a
heretic and releasing all her subjects from any
allegiance to her and excommunicating any that obeyed her orders.
The bull, written in
Latin, is named from its
incipit, the first three words of its text, which mean "ruling from on high" (a reference to
God). Among the queen's offences, "She has removed the royal Council, composed of the nobility of England, and has filled it with obscure men, being heretics."
Pius had previously reconciled with
Mary I, who returned the
Church of England to
Roman Catholicism. After Mary's death in November 1558, Elizabeth's Parliament passed the
Act of Supremacy of 1559, which re-established the
Church of England’s independence from
Rome.
Aftermath of the bull
The bull provoked the English government into taking more repressive actions against the
Jesuits because they feared were acting in the interests of
Spain and the papacy. This reaction soon seemed justified: it was the publication in England of Pius's exhortation that gave the impetus to the
Ridolfi plot, in which the
Duke of Norfolk was to kidnap or murder Queen Elizabeth, install
Mary Queen of Scots on the throne and then become
de facto king by marrying her.
To relieve the pressures on Roman Catholics in England,
Pope Gregory XIII issued a clarification in 1580, explaining that Catholics should obey the queen in all civil matters, until such time as a suitable opportunity presented itself for her overthrow. Nonetheless, in 1585 an Act "against Jesuits, seminary priests and other such like disobedient persons" was passed into law.
In 1588 Pope
Sixtus V, in support of the
Spanish Armada, renewed the solemn bull of excommunication against Queen Elizabeth I, for the
regicide of
Mary Queen of Scots in 1587 as well as the previously catalogued offences against the Roman Catholic Church. During the threat of invasion by the Spanish Armada, it transpired that most of the Roman Catholic residents in England remained loyal, and that those who were a real threat to the throne, like
William Cardinal Allen and
Robert Parsons, were already exiles.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Regnans In Excelsis'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://regnans_in_excelsis.totallyexplained.com">Regnans in Excelsis Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
