In this essay, I’m going to explain why henry broke with Rome. This means that Henry made himself head of England. In the first few years, Henry didn’t mind the pope being the head of the church and Henry was even praised by the Pope for defending him from the criticism given to him by a protestant called Martin Luther. But this all changed when him and the pope had a fight about the divorce over Henry VIII and Catherine Of Aragon who failed to give him the son that he wanted to please his dead father with.
The pope refused to accept the divorcement with Henry because the holy roman emperor was related to Catherine and refused to let the pope let him divorce her as Charles controlled the pope. Henry had had enough and had an idea that he could make himself the head of the church and then he can divorce himself. Henry had many reason of doing this and here are all the reasons.
After getting a divorce with Catherine of Aragon, Henry was desperately in need of a son to make his father happy and so he could take on his power when he died so got attracted to Anne Boleyn who also failed to give him a son. He wanted to be the head of the church so badly so then he could get a divorce with Catherine of Aragon and do whatever he likes to the women.
Henry had only just fought in a war against France. He used all his money to get the new weapons and swords. Henry used all the money on this and really needed money. At this time the church was rich because they took money off people for taxes. To Henry it looked easy to become the head of church to get this money but he was wrong, so he got parliament to help him and they did and he closed all the monasteries and took their money. He also became the head of the church. Moreover the monks were becoming greedy and un-religious .They were stealing money from the church. He would get a bad reputation if he opened all the monasteries. He could not get involved with the monasteries because the churches protected them he wanted to break with Rome so then he would be able to sort this problem out.
The pope was also breaking the church rules. He was caught running off with women and doing nepotism But Henry also wanted to have power all his life and the church was very powerful in the Tudor time. It would control the whole of England .Henry VIII really wanted the churches power so if he took control of the church he could have that power. In conclusion, the main points that Henry wanted to break with Rome was for the love, power, money and faithfulness. Overall I think the main point was love because then he could have the son to carry on his position of authority and carry on the power. I think the least important point was faith because all Henry wanted was to be rich and a son and he didn’t really mind about the churches at the time as long as he got the money from it.