August 1535

August 1535 marks a decisive escalation in the conflict between Henry VIII and the Papacy: the Pope declared the king excommunicated, but suspended the sentence for two months while offering him a final chance to return to his marriage with Katherine of Aragon. In Margaret Pole’s account, the decision made a disputed marriage the test of who could command religious and political obedience in England—and brought the possibility of foreign intervention into view.

The crisis behind the decision

The conflict had developed through competing claims to authority. Henry VIII asserted control over the English Church and dismissed the Pope’s authority in England. When the Church surrendered to the king, Lord Montague told Margaret Pole and Princess Mary Tudor that the Pope was to be disregarded and that the king would rule the Church himself. Thomas More resigned as Lord Chancellor and returned the great seal rather than remain in office under the new arrangement.

The royal marriage remained at the center of the dispute. In 1534, the Pope had publicly ruled that Henry VIII’s marriage to Katherine of Aragon was valid and that the king should live with his wife. The king instead declared the marriage invalid and treated Anne Boleyn as queen. The succession oath demanded of the nobility required them to confront the king’s version of the marriage and inheritance settlement, even though Margaret Pole understood the Pope’s ruling to contradict it.

Reginald Pole’s August message

At the end of August, Reginald Pole wrote to his family that he had achieved the goal he had been working toward: the king was to be excommunicated. The sentence was not to take effect immediately. It was suspended for two months, during which Henry VIII could return to his marriage with Katherine of Aragon.

The reprieve made the declaration conditional, not conciliatory. If Henry VIII persisted in what the Pope regarded as sin, the Pope would call on the rulers of Spain and the Kingdom of France to invade England. Reginald Pole said that he would join their army and raise the English in support of it. The account thus connects a decision made in Rome to a possible campaign abroad and a rising within England.

Consequences and political meaning

Excommunication challenged the king’s religious standing and his claim to command obedience. In Margaret Pole’s interpretation, it announced that the king was no longer blessed or authorized by the Church, and that Christians need not obey or defend him; resistance against him could instead be framed as a crusade against a heretic. The decree therefore threatened to recast loyalty to the Crown as a question of religious allegiance.

The two-month suspension left a narrow interval in which the king could avert the threatened consequences, but it also made the stakes unmistakable: the marriage question could no longer be contained as a private or dynastic matter. It had become a contest among royal authority, papal judgment, and the consciences of those expected to serve the king. Reginald Pole’s promised return with an invading army gave that contest a military prospect, while the ongoing pressure on people such as Margaret Pole to accept the king’s settlement showed how sharply those authorities already divided the English political world.