Religion & the Founding: Linda Colley's 'Britons' | National Catholic Reporter

Religion & the Founding: Linda Colley's 'Britons' | National Catholic Reporter by MSW.  MGB: Protestantism is not one religion - but several (even if the Curia calls them sects and not Church's - the kind of deliberate insult that keeps Protestants fired up).  That the religious change dovetailed quite nicely into rivalry with the French is a happy accident.  Britain had become mostly a republic and France was anything but.  Additionally, while the Church of England was tied up with the state, the French Church was part of the problem and supported the subjegation of the peasants.  While there were still lower class Brits, there was no longer an absolute monarchy.  Having freedom in politics and freedom in religion were thus tied together in Britain - although the freedom of religion had some problems, which is why my progenitor, George Allen, came to the Plymouth Colony and why his son, Ralph, became a Quaker.  As intersting was the participation of one of my family, the Earl of Arundal, in the Fawkes plot.  Probably another reason we are here.  An interesting battle in the Church of England was an English bible.  Until King James, you could be burned at the stake for such a thing.  Once the Bible was in English, however, Rome really began to fume and eventually followed suit.