CLEP Western Civ I

Answer: D - Elizabeth was Protestant; she was tolerant of religious differences and generally believed that faith was private matter. In reference to that position, she one said that she was reluctant to open “the windows into men’s souls.” Her personal history was fraught by the Reformation’s more dramatic events, which likely compelled her tolerance on the issue. The English Reformation began because her father, Henry VIII, desired an annulment to his first marriage so that he could marry Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn, to secure the male heir that his first wife never bore. When Anne failed to produce a son, false charges were brought against her and Henry had her executed. When Henry’s successor, King Edward VI, died at 15, Elizabeth’s older half-sister, Mary I, became queen. Mary remained devout in her Catholicism (as had her mother, Henry’s first wife, before her), and she saw to the executions of numerous Protestants in England, earning her the moniker “Bloody Mary.” Like her sister, Elizabeth had always remained true to the religion of her mother. During Mary’s reign, she had Elizabeth imprisoned on suspicion of aiding Protestant rebels.