My weekly Lenten reflections will be on a wife of Henry VIII each week – although not in order
These seek to not retell their stories, but to look at them with a spiritual eye
The asymmetrical bulk of Peterborough Cathedral rises out of the flatlands today as much as it did in the 1500s. Through one of its three high portals, you are faced with arguably the purest Norman interior of any British greater church, but at the far end of the vaulted aisles, nearest the sacred spot of the high altar, are the resting places of two queens. They are 50 years and almost as many feet apart, parallel as much as their siting. The younger grave – the subject of our last service – is empty, translated by the son who did nothing to prevent the execution of his mother to the crowded mausoleum that is Westminster Abbey, near to the woman who sent her there. On the north side is Katherine of Aragon whose daughter – another Mary – also came to the throne and yet did not have mistreated mum reinterred in the beaver tail-shaped chapel of her grandfather where she herself lies.
But Katherine’s presence, I’m told, and influence helped save this great abbey with its unique facade, and she and Mary of Scots rather have it to themselves, rather than sharing with the jostle of dynasties and curated poets and scientists. I hear that hardly a day passes without flowers being laid.
Mary Stuart and Katherine of Aragon were both royal children who grew up in Europe and came to Britain as teenagers. Both were swiftly widowed, in their teens; but whereas Mary came ‘home’, Katherine stayed in her adopted land. Both were passionately Catholic, and both were wronged by the Tudors, who had them live effectively under house arrest until the end of their lives. Both were called to sham trials; but Mary was murdered – martyred – and Katherine was left to demise slowly; that too is martyrdom of a kind. Both took their leave of the world in the western edge of the East of England, hence their burial at Peterborough.
It could be argued that both were faithful ‘til the end, believing themselves rightful queens but also in adhering to what they saw as the true church.
Yet Katherine’s religious background was different to what I’ve heard of Mary Stuart’s, which was one of finding a path of tolerance and co-existence. Katherine was the youngest daughter of Isabella and Ferdinand, who united the kingdoms of Spain. Their rule was not unlike the Tudor and Stuart aspiration: making a landmass one state under single leadership. They also wished to press one church on that divergent populace, by force. They presided over the Inquisition, under the Pope, trying to make Jews and Muslims ‘convert’, but ferreted out pretend conversions. This is the antithesis of my understanding of conversion and spreading the faith: not by persuasion, example, or the working of the Holy Spirit, but by fear. It predicates that there is not only one true belief, but that no others will be tolerated. You were punished if you erred, but confessing sooner may make the punishment lesser than if you’re found, or ratted out, later. This was a gambling game; a game of conformity; of having to appear to be genuine when you might have been cajoled. This may have influenced Katherine’s daughter, Mary; it is also traceable in her second husband’s Anglicising campaign, even though it ironically was a campaign that excluded Katherine and her Catholic faith.
The blogger The Exploress (Kate J Armstrong) draws out Katherine’s notions of pious paragon to wayward men, and how she looked to the Queen of Heaven as a model of how she as earthly queen should mediate between the people and the king. It’s said that Katherine saw Mother Mary as obedient and chaste, but Katherine – Catarina in her homeland – also saw the BVM as a role model of strength, which she emulated. Katherine’s response to being summoned to court, assisted by her legal education, is pure judicial theatre and brilliance.
Even if you’re Protestant and team Anne Boleyn, it’s pretty impressive.
(Whose team I’m on may well evolve over this Lent and year).
Like so many whom we’ll consider this year, Katherine was seen as a bartering tool. As a toddler, she was engaged to a boy whom she’d not meet until after she married him – by proxy. We’d consider the newly weds minors today. When widowed within 6 months, Katherine had 7 years of waiting for her future, which was being decided over like a long chess game by anyone but her.
Then, says author Karen Lindsey, Katherine made the decision to steer her own destiny.
This is a truly queenly moment, and one-regardless of our family pedigree – we can all emulate.
I wish to emphasise that Katherine’s second marriage – to Prince Arthur’s younger brother Henry – had lasted for almost 20 years, and quite happily, before troubles began.
I’ve thought of the wounds that different historic figures carry: Katherine’s would be that of rejection, being supplanted even after many faithful and happy years. Of course, I’ve just described many others, and the later cruelty of not only being expected to pretend that 24 years of your life didn’t happen (by being known as Princess Dowager – the title she held after Arthur’s death) but being parted from your daughter are deep lacerations indeed.
Katherine had also seen her mother, sisters and maids treated badly by men. Katherine wasn’t just put aside for Wife 2 – who is not next week’s topic – but because of Henry’s wrangling over the lack of children as a possible divine punishment. Katherine’s way of placating God, if I’ve rightly been told and understood her, was to wear uncomfortable hair shirts, fast, and be often at services. Being pious for her seemed to be about having strict rules for yourself and your servants.
Might I gently suggest that Katherine, whom I have mostly compassion for (save regarding the Battle of Flodden), was trying to please God in the way of the Old Religion: and I mean biblically.
The Old Testament way was about keeping rules; being seen to oft be in the house of the Lord; about giving up…and self harm was a way to appease, post animal sacrifice, an angry fickle God. The Catholic church embodied the pre-Jesus teaching, and it is not alone. Perhaps our sacrifices may not include infliction of physical pain but we may still feel that discomfort and going without makes us holy and more likely to have our prayers answered, and if we dare not truly believe in earning God’s love, at least His favour.
God did answer Katherine and Henry’s prayer: they had a living child: a girl. He also answered in the same way in Henry’s next marriage. Henry’s pursuit of what he saw as the only way which God could bless him meant the loss of lives and great pain for several women, and I think ultimately, himself.
That Katherine stayed loyal to this monstrous monarch, refusing offers of rebellion against him, is something which I find hard to comprehend. Accounts I’ve read suggest that she had a misguided trust in her father and her husband. It is hard to find a positive end to this life which ended in January 1536, but I understand that Katherine also loved God – perhaps in a parallel way; I’m sure that he loved her, as it’s claimed that her adopted people did, right until the end – and some still do.
Did Katherine play out an old world trope of female fidelity and piety for the world stage?! Was her role necessary for the transmutation that began during her queendom? I no longer see Protestantism as an improvement, and certainly not a more holy way. What of her daughter, and her royal in-law friends? We’ll be thinking about them on 19th March’s service.
Elspeth R - A skewed world view 