Catholic Church in England and Wales
Westminster Cathedral, is the "Mother Church for Catholics in England and Wales"[1]
Classification	Catholic
Orientation	Latin
Scripture	Bible
Theology	Catholic theology
Polity	Episcopal
Governance	CBCEW
Pope	Leo XIV
President	Vincent Nichols
Apostolic Nuncio	Miguel Maury Buendía
Region	England and Wales
Language	English,Welsh,Latin
Headquarters	London, England
Founder	Augustine of Canterbury
Origin	c. 200s:Christianity in Roman Britain c. 500s:Anglo-Saxon Christianity Britain,Roman Empire
Separations	Church of England (1534/1559)
Members	6.2 million (baptised, 2023)
Official website	cbcew.org.uk

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TheCatholic Church in England and Wales (Latin:Ecclesia Catholica in Anglia et Cambria;Welsh:Yr Eglwys Gatholig yng Nghymru a Lloegr^[2]) is part of the worldwideCatholic Church infull communion with theHoly See. Its origins date from the 6th century, whenPope Gregory I through a Roman missionary andBenedictine monk, Augustine, laterAugustine of Canterbury, intensified the evangelization of theKingdom of Kent,^[3] linking it to the Holy See in 597 AD.

This unbroken communion with the Holy See lasted untilKing Henry VIII ended it in 1534.^[4][5] Communion with Rome was restored byQueen Mary I in 1555 following theSecond Statute of Repeal and eventually finally broken by Elizabeth I's 1559 Religious Settlement, which made "no significant concessions to Catholic opinion represented by the church hierarchy and much of the nobility."^[6]

For 250 years, the government forced members of the pre-Reformation Catholic Church known asrecusants to gounderground and seek academic training in Catholic Europe, where exiled English clergy set up schools and seminaries for the sons of English recusant families.^[7][8][9] The government also placed legislative restrictions on Catholics, some continuing into the 20th century, while the ban on Catholic worship lasted until theCatholic Relief Act 1791. The ban did not, however, affect foreign embassies inLondon, although serving priests could be hounded.^[10] During this time, the English Catholic Church was divided betweenthe upper classes, aristocracy and gentry, and the working class.^{[11][12][13][14]}

TheCatholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales claims 6.2 million members.^[15] That makes it the second largest single church if Christianity is divided into separate denominations.^[16] In the 2001 United Kingdom census, Catholics in England and Wales were roughly 8% of the population. One hundred years earlier, in 1901, they represented only 4.8% of the population. In 1981, 8.7% of the population of England and Wales were Catholic.^[17] In 2009, post the2004 enlargement of the European Union, when thousands of Central Europeans (mainly heavily Catholic Poles, Lithuanians, Slovaks, and Slovenes) came to England, anIpsos Morioka poll found that 9.6% were Catholics in England and Wales.^[18][19] In the 2021 census, the total Christian population dropped to 46% (about 27.6 million people).^[20][21][22]

InNorth West England one in five are Catholic,^[23] a result of the high number of Englishrecusants inLancashire^[24][25] and large-scale Irish migration in the 19th century particularly centered inLiverpool.

Much ofGreat Britain was incorporated into theRoman Empire during theRoman conquest of Britain, starting in 43 AD, conquering lands inhabited byCeltic Britons. The indigenous religion of the Britons under their priests, theDruids, was suppressed; most notably,Gaius Suetonius Paulinus launchedan attack onAnglesey (or Ynys Môn) in 60 AD and destroyed the shrine andsacred groves there. In the following years, Roman influence saw the importation of several religiouscults into Britain, includingRoman mythology,Mithraism and theimperial cult. One of these sects, then disapproved by the Roman authorities, was thePalestinian-originated religion ofChristianity. While it is unclear exactly how it arrived, the earliest British figures consideredsaints by the Christians areSt. Alban followed by SSJulius and Aaron, all in the 3rd century.^[26]

Eventually, the position of the Roman authorities on Christianity moved from hostility to toleration with theEdict of Milan in 313 AD, and then enforcement asstate religion following theEdict of Thessalonica in 380 AD, becoming a key component ofRomano-British culture and society. Records note thatRomano-British bishops, such asRestitutus, attended theCouncil of Arles in 314, which confirmed the theological findings of an earlier convocation held in Rome (theCouncil of Rome) in 313. TheRoman departure from Britain in the following century and the subsequentGermanic invasions sharply decreased contact between Britain and Continental Europe. Christianity, however, continued to flourish in theBrittonic areas of Great Britain. During this period certain practices and traditions took hold in Britain and in Ireland that are collectively known asCeltic Christianity. Distinct features of Celtic Christianity include a unique monastictonsure and calculations for the date ofEaster.^[27] Regardless of these differences, historians do not consider this Celtic or British Christianity a distinct church separate from general Western European Christianity.^[28][29]

During theHeptarchy, theEnglish people (referred to as theAnglo-Saxons) were converted to Christianity fromAnglo-Saxon paganism, from two main directions:

• Iona, through its subordinate houseLindisfarne (founded byAidan of Lindisfarne), linking theNorthumbrian element of the Church (and subsequentlyMercia throughChad of Mercia) to the culture of theChurch in Ireland; and
• in the south, first throughKent and then spreading out toWessex, theGregorian mission of the late 6th century, whenPope Gregory the Great sentAugustine of Canterbury (at the time, Prior of the Abbey of St. Andrew orSan Gregorio Magno al Celio) and 40 missionaries directly from Rome. This element, linked to the Continent through marriage alliances, had more of a Romano-Frankish orientation. Although theCeltic Britons (known mainly from the Middle Ages onwards as theWelsh)de facto retained their Christian religion even after the Romans pulled out, unlike the Gaels and the Romans the Welsh did not make any significant effort to evangelise the pagan Anglo-Saxons and indeed greatly resented them, as is related byBede in hisHistoria ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum.

TheGregorian mission, as it is known, is of particular interest in the Catholic Church as it was the first official Papal mission to found a church. With the help of Christians already residing inKent, particularlyBertha, theMerovingianFrankish consort of the then pagan KingÆthelberht, Augustine established an archbishopric inCanterbury, the old capital of Kent. Having received thepallium earlier (linking his new diocese to Rome), Augustine became the first in the series of Catholicarchbishops of Canterbury, four of whom (Laurence,Mellitus,Justus andHonorius) were part of the original band ofBenedictine missionaries. (The last Catholic archbishop of Canterbury wasReginald Pole, who died in 1558.)

During this time of mission, Rome looked to challenge some different customs which had been retained in isolation by the Celts (the Gaels and the Britons), due in part to their geographical distance from the rest of Western Christendom. Of particularly importance was theEaster controversy (on which date to celebrate it) and the manner of monastictonsure.Columbanus, his^{[clarification needed]} fellow countryman and churchman, had asked for a papal judgement on the Easter question, as did abbots and bishops of Ireland.^[30] This was particularly important in Northumbria, where the issue was causing factionalism. Later, in hisHistoria ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum,Bede explained the reasons for the discrepancy: "He [Columba] left successors distinguished for great charity, Divine love, and strict attention to the rules of discipline following indeed uncertain cycles in the computation of the great festival of Easter, because far away as they were out of the world, no one had supplied them with the synodal decrees relating to the Paschal observance."^[31] A series ofsynods were held to resolve the matter, culminating with theSynod of Whitby in 644. The missionaries also introduced theRule of Benedict, the continental rule, to Anglo-Saxon monasteries in England.^[32]Wilfrid, a Benedictine consecrated archbishop of York (in 664), was particularly skilled in promoting the Benedictine Rule.^[33] Over time, the Benedictine continental rule became grafted upon the monasteries and parishes of England, drawing them closer to the Continent and Rome. As a result, the pope was often called upon to intervene in quarrels, affirm monarchs, and decide jurisdictions. In 787, for example,Pope Adrian I elevatedLichfield to an archdiocese and appointedHygeberht its first archbishop.^[34] Later, in 808,Pope Leo III helped restore KingEardwulf ofNorthumbria to his throne; and in 859,Pope Leo IV confirmed and anointedAlfred the Great king, according toAnglo-Saxon Chronicle. Individual Benedictines seemed to play an important role throughout this period. For example, before Benedictine monkSt. Dunstan was consecrated archbishop of Canterbury in 960;Pope John XII had him appointed legate, commissioning him (along withEthelwold and Oswald) to restore discipline in the existing monasteries of England, many of which were destroyed by Danish invaders.^[35]

Control of the English Church passed from the Anglo-Saxons to theNormans following theNorman conquest of England. The two clerics most prominently associated with this change were the continental-bornLanfranc andAnselm, both Benedictines. Anselm later became aDoctor of the Church. A century later,Pope Innocent III had to confirm the primacy of Canterbury over fourWelsh churches for many reasons, but primarily to sustain the importance of the Gregorian foundation of Augustine's mission.^[36][37]

During mediaeval times, England and Wales were part of western Christendom: monasteries and convents, such as those atShaftesbury andShrewsbury, were prominent institutions, and provided lodging, hospitals and education.^[38] Likewise, centres of education likeOxford University andCambridge University were important. Members ofreligious orders, notably theDominicans andFranciscans, settled in both universities and maintained houses for students. ArchbishopWalter de Merton foundedMerton College, Oxford and three different popes –Gregory IX,Nicholas IV, andJohn XXII – gave Cambridge the legal protection and status to compete with other Europeanmedieval universities.Augustinians also had a significant presence at Oxford. Osney Abbey, the parent house of the college, lay on a large site to the west, near the current railway station. Another Augustinian house, St Frideswide's Priory, later became the basis forChrist Church, Oxford.^[39]

Pilgrimage was a prominent feature of mediaeval Catholicism, and England and Wales were amply provided with many popular sites of pilgrimage. The village ofWalsingham in Norfolk became an important shrine after a noblewoman namedRicheldis de Faverches reputedly experienced a vision of the Virgin Mary in 1061, asking her to build a replica of theHoly House atNazareth. Some of the other holiest shrines were those atHolywell in Wales which commemorated StWinefride, and at Westminster Abbey toEdward the Confessor. In 1170,Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, was murdered in his cathedral by followers ofKing Henry II and was quickly canonised as a martyr for the faith. This resulted inCanterbury Cathedral attracting international pilgrimage and inspired theCanterbury Tales byGeoffrey Chaucer.

An Englishman, Nicholas Breakspear, becamePope Adrian IV (also known as Hadrian IV), reigning from 1154 to 1159. Fifty-six years later,CardinalStephen Langton, the first ofEnglish cardinals and later Archbishop of Canterbury (1208–1228), was a pivotal figure in the dispute betweenKing John and Pope Innocent III. This critical situation led to the creation ofMagna Carta in 1215, which, among other things, insisted that the English church should be free of ecclesiastical appointments fixed by the king.

The dynamics of the pre-Reformation bond between the Catholic Church in England and the Apostolic See remained in effect for nearly a thousand years. That is, there was no doctrinal difference between the faith of the English and the rest of Catholic Christendom, especially after calculating the date of Easter at theCouncil of Whitby in 667 and formalizing other customs according to the See of Rome. The designation "English Church" (Ecclesia Anglicana in Latin) was made, but always in the sense of the term as indicating that it was part of one Catholic Church in communion with the Holy See and localised in England. Other regions of the church were localised in Scotland (Ecclesia Scotticana), France (Ecclesia Gallicana), Spain (Ecclesia Hispanica), etc. These regional cognomens or designations were commonly used in Rome by officials to identify a locality of the universal church but never to imply any breach with the Holy See.^[40]

WhenKing Henry VIII "suddenly became alerted to the supposedly ancient truth" that he was truly the "Supreme Head of the Church within his dominions", he backed a series of legislative acts through the English Parliament between 1533 and 1536 that initiated an attack on papal authority and English Catholics. "The centrepiece of the new legislation was an Act of Supremacy of 1534."^[41] In some cases those adhering toCatholicism facedcapital punishment.^[42]

In 1534, during the reign of Henry VIII, the English church became independent of the Holy See for a period owing to "continued" innovations with Henry declaring himself its Supreme Head.^[43] This breach was in response to the Pope's refusal to annul Henry's marriage toCatherine of Aragon. Henry did not himself acceptProtestant innovations in doctrine or liturgy. For example, the Six Articles of 1539 imposed the Death Penalty on those who denied Transubstantiation.^[44] But on the other hand, failure to accept his break from Rome, particularly by prominent persons in church and state, was regarded by Henry as treason, resulting in the execution ofThomas More, former Lord Chancellor, andJohn Fisher,Bishop of Rochester, among others. TheSee of Rome Act 1536 legitimised the separation from Rome, while thePilgrimage of Grace of 1536 andBigod's Rebellion of 1537, risings in the North against the religious changes, were bloodily repressed.

All through 1536–41, Henry VIII engaged in a large-scaledissolution of the Monasteries in order to gain control of most of the wealth of the church and much of the richest land. He disbandedmonasteries,priories,convents and friaries in England, Wales and Ireland, appropriated their income, disposed of their assets, sold off artefacts stolen from them, and provided pensions for the robbed monks and former residents. He did not turn these properties over to his local Church of England. Instead, they were sold, mostly to pay for the wars. The historian G. W. Bernard argues that the dissolution of the monasteries in the late 1530s was one of the most revolutionary events in English history. There were nearly 900 religious houses in England, around 260 for monks, 300 for regular canons, 142 nunneries and 183 friaries; some 12,000 people in total, 4,000 monks, 3,000 canons, 3,000 friars and 2,000 nuns. One adult man in fifty was in religious orders in a country of two and one half million.^[45][46] In the Catholic narrative, Henry's action was sacrilegious, a national violation of things consecrated to God, and evil. The fate of the English Carthusians was one of the worst of the period. Thomas Cromwell had them "savagely punished" with their leaders "hanged and disembowelled at Tyburn in May 1535, still wearing their monastic habits."^[47] Even today, Henry's act is still considered controversial. Anglicans likeGiles Fraser have noted that the property "was stolen" from the Roman Catholic Church and that "this theft of land is the really dirty stuff – the original sin of the Church of England."^[48] Nevertheless, Henry maintained a strong preference for traditional Catholic practices and, during his reign, Protestant reformers were unable to make more radical changes to the practices and the "continued innovation" of his own "personally devised religious 'middle way.'" Indeed, Henry "cruelly emphasized his commitment" to his innovations "by executing three papal loyalists and burning three evangelicals."^[49]

The 1547 to 1553 reign of the boyKing Edward VI saw the Church of England become more influenced by Protestantism in its doctrine and worship. In 1550,John Laski—aPolish ex-Catholic cleric and nephew of the Polish primate, whose Catholic career came "to an abrupt end in 1540 when he married", and who later become aCalvinist^[50]—arrived in London and became superintendent of theStrangers' Church of London. He, among other Protestants, became an associate ofThomas Cranmer and ofJohn Hooper. He had some influence on ecclesiastical affairs during the reign of Edward VI.^[51] For instance, theTridentine Mass was replaced by the (English)Book of Common Prayer, representational art and statues in church buildings destroyed, and Catholic practices which had survived during Henry's reign, such as public prayers to the Virgin Mary, e.g. theSalve Regina, ended. In 1549 the Western Rising in Cornwall and Devon broke out to protest against the abolition of the Mass – the rebels called the 1549 Holy Communion Service, "commonly called the Mass", a Christian game. The rebellion—resistance to Protestantism—was put down ruthlessly.

UnderQueen Mary I, in 1553, the fractured and discordant English Church was linked again to continental Catholicism and the See of Rome through the doctrinal and liturgical initiatives ofReginald Pole and other Catholic reformers.^[52][53] Mary was determined to return the whole of England to the Catholic faith. This aim was not necessarily at odds with the feeling of a large section of the populace; Edward's Protestant reformation had not been well received everywhere, and there was ambiguity in the responses of the parishes.^[54]

Mary also had some powerful families behind her. The Jerningham family together with other East Anglian Catholic families such as theBedingfelds,Waldegraves,Rochesters together with the Huddlestons ofSawston Hall were "the key to Queen Mary's successful accession to the throne. Without them she would never have made it."^[55] However, Mary's execution of 300 Protestants by burning them at the stake proved counterproductive as this measure was extremely unpopular with the populace. For example, instead of executingArchbishop Cranmer for treason for supportingQueen Jane, she had him tried for heresy and burned at the stake.^[56][57]Foxe's Book of Martyrs, which glorified the Protestants killed at the time and vilified Catholics, ensured her a place in popular memory asBloody Mary,^[58] though some recent historians have noted that most of the Protestants Foxe highlights in his book, who were tried for heresy, were primarily Anabaptists, which explains why mainstream Protestants like Stephen Gardiner and William Paget (who were members of Philip's "consejo codigo") went along with it. These historians also note that it was Bartolome Carranza, an influential Spanish Dominican of Philip II's workforce, who insisted that Thomas Cranmer's sentence be put into effect. "It was Carranza, not Mary, who insisted that the sentence against Cranmer be carried out."^[59]

For centuries after, the idea of another reconciliation with Rome was linked in many English people's minds with a renewal of Mary's fiery stakes. Ultimately, her alleged harshness was a success but at the cost of alienating a fairly large section of English society which had been moving away from some traditional Catholic devotional practices. These English were neither Calvinist nor Lutheran, but certainly leaning towardsProtestant reformation (and by the late sixteenth century, were certainly Protestant).^[60]

When Mary died andElizabeth I became queen in 1558, the religious situation in England was confused. Throughout the alternating religious landscape of the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, and Mary I, a significant proportion of the population (especially in the rural and outlying areas of the country) were likely to have continued to hold Catholic views, or were conservative. Nevertheless, Elizabeth was a Protestant and the "very rituals with which the parish had celebrated her accession would be swept away".^[61] Thus Elizabeth's first act was to reverse her sister's re-establishment of Catholicism byActs of Supremacy and Uniformity.The Act of Supremacy of 1558 made it a crime to assert the authority of any foreign prince,prelate, or other authority, and was aimed at abolishing the authority of thePope in England. A third offence washigh treason became punishable by death.^[62] TheOath of Supremacy, imposed by the Act of Supremacy 1558, provided for any person taking public or church office inEngland to swear allegiance to the monarch asSupreme Governor of theChurch of England. Failure to so swear was a crime, although it did not become treason until 1562, when the Supremacy of the Crown Act 1562^[63] made a second offence of refusing to take the oath treason.

During the first years of her reign from 1558 to 1570 there was relative leniency towards Catholics who were willing to keep their religion private, especially if they were prepared to continue to attend their parish churches. The wording of the official prayer book had been carefully designed to make this possible by omitting aggressively "heretical" matter, and at first many English Catholics did in fact worship with their Protestant neighbours, at least until this was formally forbidden byPope Pius V's 1570 bull,Regnans in Excelsis, which also declared that Elizabeth was not a rightful queen and should be overthrown. It formally excommunicated her and any who obeyed her and obliged all Catholics to attempt to overthrow her.^[64]

In response, the "Act to retain the Queen's Majesty's subjects in their obedience", passed in 1581, made it high treason to reconcile anyone or to be reconciled to "the Romish religion", or to procure or publish any papal Bull or writing whatsoever. The celebration of Mass was prohibited under penalty of a fine of two hundredmarks and imprisonment for one year for the celebrant, and a fine of one hundred marks and the same imprisonment for those who heard the Mass. This act also increased the penalty for not attending the Anglican service to the sum of twenty pounds a month, or imprisonment until the fine was paid or until the offender went to the Protestant Church. A further penalty of ten pounds a month was inflicted on anyone keeping a schoolmaster who did not attend the Protestant service. The schoolmaster himself was to be imprisoned for one year.^[65]

England's wars with Catholic powers such as France and Spain, culminated in the attempted invasion by theSpanish Armada in 1588. The Papal bull had unleashed nationalistic feelings which equated Protestantism with loyalty to a highly popular monarch and made Catholics "vulnerable to accusations of being traitors to the crown."^[66] TheRising of the North, theThrockmorton plot and theBabington plot, together with other subversive activities of supporters ofMary, Queen of Scots, all reinforced the association of Catholicism with treachery in the minds of many, notably in middle and southern England.^[67]

The climax of Elizabeth's anti-Catholic legislation was in 1585, two years before the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, with theAct against Jesuits, Seminary priests and other such like disobedient persons. This statute, under which most of theEnglish Catholic martyrs were executed, made it high treason for any Jesuit or any seminary priest to be in England at all, and a felony for any one to harbour or relieve them.

The last of Elizabeth's anti-Catholic laws was the Act for the Better Discovery of Wicked and Seditious Persons Terming Themselves Catholics, but Being Rebellious and Traitorous Subjects. Its effect was to prohibit allrecusants from going more than five miles from their place of abode, and to order all persons suspected of being Jesuits or seminary priests, and not answering satisfactorily, to be imprisoned until they did so.^[68]

However, Elizabeth did not believe that her anti-Catholic policies constituted religious persecution, though "she strangled, disembowelled, and dismembered more than 200" English Catholics^[69] and "built on the actions of Mary."^[70] In the context of the uncompromising wording of the Papal Bull against her, she failed to distinguish between those Catholics in conflict with her from those with no such designs.^[71] The number of English Catholics executed under Elizabeth was significant, includingEdmund Campion,Robert Southwell, andMargaret Clitherow. Elizabeth herself signed the regicidal death warrant of her cousin,Mary, Queen of Scots, after 19 years as Elizabeth's prisoner.^[72] As MacCulloch has noted, "England judicially murdered more Roman Catholics than any other country in Europe, which puts English pride in national tolerance in an interesting perspective."^[73] So distraught was Elizabeth over Catholic opposition to her throne, she was secretly reaching out to the Ottoman SultanMurad III, "asking for military aid against Philip of Spain and the 'idolatrous princes' supporting him."^[74]

Because of the persecution in England, Catholic priests were trained abroad at theEnglish College in Rome, theEnglish College in Douai, theEnglish College at Valladolid in Spain, and at the English College in Seville. Given that Douai was located in theSpanish Netherlands, part of the dominions of Elizabethan England's greatest enemy, and Valladolid and Seville in Spain itself, they became associated in the public eye with political as well as religious subversion. It was this combination of nationalistic public opinion, sustained persecution, and the rise of a new generation which could not remember pre-Reformation times and had no pre-established loyalty to Catholicism, that reduced the number of Catholics in England during this period – although the overshadowing memory of Queen Mary I's reign was another factor that should not be underestimated (the population of the country was 4.1 million). Nevertheless, by the end of Elizabeth's reign probably 20% of the population were still Catholic, with 10% dissident "Puritan" Protestants and the remainder more or less reconciled to the Anglican church as "parish Anglicans". By then most English people had largely been de-catholicised but were not Protestant.^[75] Religious "uniformity," however, "was a lost cause," given the presence of Dissenting, Nonconformist Protestants, and Catholic minorities.^[76]

During Elizabeth's reign,Dorothy Lawson was a Catholic noblewoman who used her autonomy, financial independence and social status as a widow to harbour priests in her household.^[77][78] Another notable Elizabethan Catholic, possibly a convert, was composerWilliam Byrd.^[79]

The reign ofJames I (1603–1625) was marked by a measure of tolerance, though less so after the discovery of theGunpowder Plot conspiracy of a small group of Catholic conspirators who aimed to kill both King and Parliament and establish a Catholic monarchy. A mix of persecution and tolerance followed:Ben Jonson and his wife, for example, in 1606 were summoned before the authorities for failure to take communion in the Church of England,^[80] yet the King tolerated some Catholics at court; for exampleGeorge Calvert, to whom he gave the titleBaron Baltimore (his son,Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore, founded in 1632 theProvince of Maryland as a refuge for persecuted Catholics), and theDuke of Norfolk, head of theHoward family.

The reign ofCharles I (1625–1649) saw a small revival of Catholicism in England, especially among the upper classes. As part of the royal marriage settlement Charles's Catholic wife,Henrietta Maria, was permitted her own royal chapel and chaplain. Henrietta Maria was in fact very strict in her religious observances, and helped create a court with continental influences, where Catholicism was the official religion of many countries, and tolerated in others; even somewhat fashionable. Some anti-Catholic legislation became effectively a dead letter. TheCounter-Reformation on the continent of Europe had created a more vigorous and magnificent form of Catholicism (i.e.,Baroque, notably found in the architecture and music of Austria, Italy and Germany) that attracted some converts, like the poetRichard Crashaw. Ironically, the explicitly Catholic artistic movement (i.e., Baroque) ended up "providing the blueprint, after the fire of London, for the first new Protestant churches to be built in England".^[81]

While Charles remained firmly Protestant, he was personally drawn towards a consciously "High Church" Anglicanism. This affected his appointments to Anglican bishoprics, in particular the appointment ofWilliam Laud asArchbishop of Canterbury. How many Catholics and Puritans there were is still open to debate.^[82][83]

Religious conflict between Charles and other "High" Anglicans andCalvinists – at this stage mostly still within the Church of England (thePuritans) – formed a strand of the anti-monarchical leanings of the troubled politics of the period. The religious tensions between a court with "Papist" elements and a Parliament in which the Puritans were strong was one of the major factors behind theEnglish Civil War, in which almost all Catholics supported the King. The victory of the Parliamentarians meant a strongly Protestant, anti-Catholic regime, content for the English Church to become "little more than a nationwide federation of Protestant parishes."^[84]

The restoration of the monarchy underCharles II (1660–1685) also saw the restoration of a Catholic-influenced court like his father's. However, although Charles himself had Catholic leanings, he was first and foremost a pragmatist and realised the vast majority of public opinion in England was strongly anti-Catholic, so he agreed to laws such as theTest Act requiring any appointee to any public office or member of Parliament to deny Catholic beliefs such astransubstantiation. As far as possible, however, he maintained tacit tolerance. Like his father, he married a Catholic,Catherine of Braganza. (He would become Catholic himself on his deathbed.)

Charles' brother and heir James, Duke of York (laterJames II), converted to Catholicism in 1668–1669. WhenTitus Oates in 1678 alleged a (totally imaginary, a hoax) "Popish Plot" to assassinate Charles and put James in his place, he unleashed a wave of parliamentary and public hysteria which led to the execution of 17 Catholics on the scaffold, and the death of many more over the next two years, which Charles was either unable or unwilling to prevent.^[85] Throughout the early 1680s theWhig element in Parliament attempted to remove James as successor to the throne. Their failure saw James become, in 1685, Britain's first openly Catholic monarch since Mary I (and last to date). He promised religious toleration for Catholic and Protestants on an equal footing, but it is in doubt whether he did this to gain support fromDissenters or whether he was truly committed to tolerance (seventeenth century Catholic regimes in Spain and Italy, for example, were hardly tolerant of Protestantism, while those in France and Poland had practiced forms of toleration).^[86][87]

James earnestly tried "to improve the position of his fellow Catholics" and did so "in such an inept way that he aroused the fears of both the Anglican establishment and the Dissenters.^[88] In the process, he encouraged converts like the poetJohn Dryden, who wrote "The Hind and the Panther", to celebrate his conversion.^[89][90] Protestant fears mounted as James placed Catholics in the major commands of the existing standing army, dismissed the Protestant Bishop of London and dismissed the Protestant fellows of Magdalen College and replaced them with a wholly Catholic board. The last straw was the birth of a Catholic heir in 1688, portending a return to a pre-Reformation Catholic dynasty. Observing this was Princess Mary, James' daughter by his first wife, and her husband"'Stadhouder Willem,' whose wife stood to lose her future thrones through this new arrival."^[91]

In what came to be known as theGlorious Revolution, Parliament deemed James to have abdicated (effectively deposing him, though Parliament refused to call it that) in favour of his Protestant daughter and son-in-law and nephew,Mary II andWilliam III. Although this affair is celebrated as solidifying both English liberties and the Protestant nature of the kingdom, some argue that it was "fundamentally a coup spearheaded by a foreign army and navy".^[92][93][94]

James fled into exile, and with him many Catholic nobility and gentry. TheAct of Settlement 1701, which remains in operation today, established the royal line throughSophia, Electress of Hanover, and specifically excludes any Catholic or anyone who marries a Catholic from the throne. In 2013, this law was partially changed when the disqualification of the monarch marrying a Catholic was eliminated (along with male preference in the line of succession). The law was also changed to limit the requirement that the monarch "must give permission to marry to the six persons next in line to the throne."^[95][96] Still, Catholics today once again are permitted to hold Wolsey and More's office of Lord Chancellor as did Catholics before the Reformation.^[97] CardinalHenry Benedict Stuart, the lastJacobite heir to publicly assert a claim to the thrones of England, Scotland, and Ireland, died in Rome in 1807. Amonument to the Royal Stuarts exists today at Vatican City.^[98] In the 21st century,Franz, Duke of Bavaria, head of the Wittelsbach family, is the most senior descendant of King Charles I and is considered by Jacobites to be heir of the Stuarts.^[99] Though direct descendant of the House of Stuart, Franz has said being king is not a claim he wishes to pursue.^[100]

The years from 1688 to the early 19th century were in some respects the lowest point for Catholicism in England. Deprived of their dioceses, fourApostolic Vicariates were set up throughout England until the re-establishment of the diocesan episcopacy in 1850. Although the persecution was not violent as in the past, Catholic numbers, influence and visibility in English society reached their lowest point. The percentage of the population that was Catholic may have declined from 4% in 1700 (out of a population of 5.2 millions) to 1% 1800 (out of a population of 7.25 million) with absolute numbers halved.^[101] By 1825, however, the Bishop of Chester estimated that there were "about a half a million Catholics in England."^[102] Their civil rights were severely curtailed: their right to own property or inherit land was greatly limited, they were burdened with special taxes, they could not send their children abroad for Catholic education, they could not vote, and priests were liable to imprisonment. Writing about the Catholic Church during this time, historianAntonia Fraser notes:

The harsh laws and the live-and-let-live reality were two very different things. This world was divided into the upper classes, the aristocracy and the gentry, and what were literally the working classes. Undoubtedly, the survival of Catholicism in the past [up until 1829] was due to the dogged, but hopefully inconspicuous, protection provided by the former to the latter. Country neighbours, Anglicans and Catholics, lived amicably together in keeping with this "laissez-faire" reality.^[103]

There was no longer, as once in Stuart times, any notable Catholic presence at court, in public life, in the military or professions. Many of the Catholic nobles and gentry who had preserved on their lands among their tenants small pockets of Catholicism had followed James into exile, and others, at least outwardly in cryptic fashion, conformed to Anglicanism, meaning fewer such Catholic communities survived intact. For "obvious reasons", Catholic aristocracy at this time was heavily intermarried. Their great houses, however, still had chapels called "libraries", with priests attached to these places (shelved for books) who celebrated Mass, which worship was described in public as "Prayers".^[104] Interestingly, one area where the sons of working class Catholics could find religious tolerance was in the army. Generals, for example, did not deny Catholic men their Mass and did not compel them to attend Anglican services, believing that "physical strength and devotion to the military struggle was demanded of them, not spiritual allegiance".^[105] Fraser also notes that the role of the working class among themselves was important:

...servants of various degrees and farm workers, miners, mill workers and tradesmen, responded with loyalty, hard work and gratitude for the opportunity to practice the faith of their fathers (and even more importantly, in many cases, their mothers). Their contributions should not be ignored, even if it is for obvious reasons more difficult to uncover than that of their theoretical superiors. The unspoken survival of the Catholic community in England, despite Penal laws, depended also on these loyal families unknown to history whose existence is recorded as Catholics in Anglican parish registers. That of Walton-le-Dale parish church, near Preston in Lancashire in 1781, for example, records 178 families, with 875 individuals as 'Papists'. Where baptisms are concerned, parental occupations are stated as weaver, husbandman and labourer, with names such as Turner, Wilcock, Balwin and Charnley.^[106]

A bishop at this time (roughly from 1688 to 1850) was called avicar apostolic. The officeholder was atitular bishop (as opposed to a diocesan bishop) through whom the pope exercised jurisdiction over aparticular church territory in England. English-speakingcolonial America came under the jurisdiction of theVicar Apostolic of the London District. As titular bishop over Catholics in British America, he was important to the government not only in regard to its English-speaking North American colonies, but made more so after theSeven Years' War when theBritish Empire, in 1763, acquired the French-speaking (and predominantly Catholic) territory of Canada. Only after theTreaty of Paris in 1783, and in 1789 with the consecration ofJohn Carroll, a friend ofBenjamin Franklin, did the U.S. have its own diocesan bishop, free of the Vicar Apostolic of London,James Robert Talbot.^{[107][108][109][110][111]}

The introduction of Vicars Apostolic or titular bishops in 1685 was very important at the time and ought not be misprized. For example, when John Leyburn, formerly of the English College, Douai, was appointed as Vicar Apostolic of England, it was the first time a Catholic bishop had been present in England for nearly sixty years. Up until that time,Archpriests were overseeing the church.

In Leyburn's combined tour north and visitation to administer Confirmation, in 1687, some 20,859 Catholics received the sacrament.^[112] Most Catholics, it could be said, retreated to relative isolation from a popular Protestant mainstream, and Catholicism in England in this period was politically invisible to history. However, culturally and socially, there were notable exceptions.Alexander Pope, owing to his literary popularity, was one memorable English Catholic of the 18th century. Other prominent Catholics were three remarkable members of the Catholic gentry:Baron Petre (who wined and dinedGeorge III andQueen Charlotte at Thorndon Hall),Thomas Weld the bibliophile, (and friend ofGeorge III) who in 1794 donated hisStonyhurst estate to the Jesuits to establish a college, along with 30 acres of land, and the Duke of Norfolk, the PremierDuke in thepeerage of England and asEarl of Arundel, the PremierEarl. In virtue of his status and as head of the Howard family (which included some Church of England, though many Catholic members), the Duke was always at Court. It seemed the values and worth of aristocracy "trumped those of the illegal religion".^[113] Pope, however, seemed to benefit from the isolation. In 1713, when he was 25, he took subscriptions for a project that filled his life for the next seven years, the result being a new version of Homer'sIliad.Samuel Johnson pronounced it the greatest translation ever achieved in the English language.^[114] Over time, Pope became the greatest poet of the age, theAugustan Age, especially for his mock-heroic poems,Rape of the Lock andThe Dunciad.

Around this time, in 1720,Clement XI proclaimed Anselm of Canterbury a Doctor of the Church. In 1752, mid-century, Great Britain adopted theGregorian calendar decreed by PopeGregory XIII in 1582. Later in the century there was some liberalization of the anti-Catholic laws on the basis of Enlightenment ideals.

In 1778 theCatholic Relief Act allowed Catholics to own property, inherit land and join the army, provided they swore an oath of allegiance.^[115] Hardline Protestant mobs reacted in theGordon Riots in 1780, attacking any building in London which was associated with Catholicism or owned by Catholics. TheCatholic Relief Act 1791 provided further freedoms on condition of swearing an additional oath of acceptance of the Protestant succession in theKingdom of Great Britain. This allowed Catholic schooling and clergy to operate openly and thus allowed permanent missions to be set up in the larger towns.^[116]Stonyhurst College, for example, was able to be established in 1794, as the successor establishment for the fleeing English Jesuits, previously at theColleges of St Omer, Bruges and Liège, due to a timely and generous donation by a former pupil,Thomas Weld (of Lulworth), as Europe became engulfed in war.^[117] This act was followed inIreland with theRoman Catholic Relief Act 1793, an Act of theIrish Parliament with some local provisions such as allowing Catholics to vote in elections to theIrish House of Commons and to take degrees atTrinity College Dublin.^[118]

In 1837,James Arundell, 10th Baron Arundell of Wardour, bequeathed to Stonyhurst the Arundel Library, which contained the vast Arundel family collection, including some of the school's most important books and manuscripts such as a ShakespeareFirst Folio and a manuscript copy of Froissart'sChronicles, looted from the body of a dead Frenchman after theBattle of Agincourt. Yet Catholic recusants as a whole remained a small group, except where they stayed the majority religion in various pockets, notably in ruralLancashire andCumbria, or were part of the Catholic aristocracy and squirearchy.^[119] Finally, the famous recusantMaria Fitzherbert, who during this period secretly married thePrince of Wales,prince regent, and futureGeorge IV in 1785. TheBritish Constitution, however, did not accept it and George IV later moved on. Cast aside by the establishment, she was adopted by the town of Brighton, whose citizens, both Catholic and Protestant, called her "Mrs. Prince". According to journalist Richard Abbott, "Before the town had a [Catholic] church of its own, she had a priest say Mass at her own house, and invited local Catholics", suggesting the recusants of Brighton were not very undiscovered.^[120][121]

In a 2009 study of the English Catholic community, 1688–1745, Gabriel Glickman notes that Catholics, especially those whose social position gave them access to the courtly centres of power and patronage, had a significant part to play in 18th-century England. They were not as marginal as one might think today. For example, Alexander Pope was not the only Catholic whose contributions (especially,Essays on Man) help define the temper of an early English Enlightenment. In addition to Pope, Glickman notes a Catholic architect,James Gibbs, who builtRadcliffe Camera^[122] and returned baroque forms to the London skyline, and a Catholic composer,Thomas Arne, who composed "Rule Britannia". According to reviewerAidan Bellenger, Glickman also suggests that "rather than being the victims of the Stuart failure, 'the unpromising setting of exile and defeat' had 'sown the seed of a frail but resilient English Catholic Enlightenment'."^[123] University of Chicago historianSteven Pincus likewise argues in his book,1688: The First Modern Revolution, that Catholics under William and Mary and their successors experienced considerable freedom.^[124]

After this moribund period, the first signs of a revival occurred as thousands of French Catholics fled France during theFrench Revolution. The leaders of the Revolution were virulently anti-Catholic, even singling out priests and nuns forsummary execution or massacre, and England was seen as a safe haven fromJacobin violence. Also around this time (1801), a new political entity was formed, theUnited Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, which merged the Kingdom of Great Britain with theKingdom of Ireland, thus increasing the number of Catholics in the new state. Pressure for abolition of anti-Catholic laws grew, particularly with the need for Catholic recruits to fight in theNapoleonic Wars.

Despite the resolute opposition ofGeorge IV,^[125] which delayed fundamental reform, 1829 brought a major step in the liberalisation of most anti-Catholic laws, although some aspects were to remain on the statute book into the 21st century.^[126] Parliament passed theRoman Catholic Relief Act 1829, giving Catholic men almost equal civil rights, including the right to hold most public offices. If Catholics were rich, however, exceptions were always made, even before the changes. For example, American ministers to theCourt of St. James's were often struck by the prominence of wealthy American-born Catholics, titled ladies among the nobility, like Louisa (Caton), granddaughter ofCharles Carroll of Carrollton, and her two sisters,Mary Ann and Elizabeth. After Louisa's first husband (Sir Felton Bathurst-Hervey) died, Louisa later marriedFrancis D'Arcy-Osborne, 7th Duke of Leeds (then Marquess of Carmarthen as heir of the 6th Duke of Leeds), and had theDuke of Wellington as her European protector. Her sister Mary Ann marriedRichard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley, the brother of the Duke of Wellington and then theLord Lieutenant of Ireland; and her other sister Elizabeth (Lady Stafford^[127]) married another British nobleman.^{[128][129][130][131]} Although British law required (until 1837) an Anglican marriage service (after theClandestine Marriages Act 1753), each of the sisters and their Protestant spouses had a Catholic ceremony afterwards. At Louisa's first marriage, the Duke of Wellington escorted the bride.^[132]

In the 1840s and 1850s, especially during theGreat Irish Famine, while much of the large outflow of migration from Ireland was headed to the United States to seek work, hundreds of thousands of Irish people also migrated across the channel to England and Scotland and established communities in cities there, including London,Liverpool,Manchester andGlasgow, but also in towns and villages up and down the country, thus giving Catholicism in England a numerical boost.

At various points after the 16th century hopes had been entertained by many English Catholics that the "reconversion of England" was at hand. Additionally, with the arrival of Irish Catholic migrants (Ireland was part of the UK until the partition, in 1922), some considered that a "second spring" of Catholicism across Britain was developing. Rome responded byre-establishing the Catholic hierarchy in 1850, creating 12 Catholic dioceses in England from existingapostolic vicariates and appointing diocesan bishops (to replace earlier titular bishops) with fixed sees on a more traditional Catholic pattern. The Catholic Church in England and Wales had had 22 dioceses immediately before the Reformation, but none of the current 22 bear close resemblance (geographically) to the 22 earlier pre-Reformation dioceses.^[133]

The re-established Catholic episcopacy specifically avoided using places that were sees of the Church of England, in effect temporarily abandoning the titles of Catholic dioceses before Elizabeth I because of theEcclesiastical Titles Act 1851, which in England favoured a state church (i.e., Church of England) and deniedarms and legal existence to territorial Catholic sees on the basis that the state could not grant such "privileges" to "entities" that allegedly did not exist in law. Some of the Catholic dioceses, however, took the titles of bishoprics which had previously existed in England but were no longer used by the Anglican Church (e.g. Beverley – later divided into Leeds and Middlesbrough, Hexham – later changed to Hexham and Newcastle). In the few cases where a Catholic diocese bears the same title as an Anglican one in the same town or city (e.g., Birmingham, Liverpool, Portsmouth, and Southwark), this is the result of the Church of England ignoring the prior existence there of a Catholic see and of the repeal in 1871 of the Ecclesiastical Titles Act 1851. The act applied only to England and Wales, not Scotland or Ireland; thus official recognition afforded by thegrant of arms to theArchdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, brought into being by Lord Lyon in 1989, relied on the fact that theEcclesiastical Titles Act 1851 never applied to Scotland.^[134] In recent times, the former Conservative Cabinet MinisterJohn Gummer, a prominent convert to Catholicism and columnist for theCatholic Herald in 2007, objected to the fact that no Catholic diocese could have the same name as an Anglican diocese (such as London, Canterbury, Durham, etc.) "even though those dioceses had, shall we say, been borrowed".^[135]

A proportion of the Anglicans who were involved in theOxford Movement or "Tractarianism" were ultimately led beyond these positions and converted to the Catholic Church, including, in 1845, the movement's principal intellectual leader,John Henry Newman. More new Catholics would come from the Anglican Church, often via high Anglicanism, for at least the next hundred years, and something of this continues.^[136]

As anti-Catholicism declined sharply after 1910, the church grew in numbers, grew rapidly in terms of priests and sisters, and expanded their parishes from inner city industrial areas to more salubrious suburbs. Although underrepresented in the higher levels of the social structure, apart from a few old aristocratic Catholic families, Catholic talent was emerging in journalism, literature, the arts, and diplomacy.

A striking development was the surge in highly publicised conversion of intellectuals and writers including most famouslyG. K. Chesterton, as well asRobert Hugh Benson andRonald Knox,^[137]Maurice Baring,Christopher Dawson,Eric Gill,Graham Greene,Manya Harari,David Jones,Sheila Kaye-Smith,Arnold Lunn,Rosalind Murray,Alfred Noyes,William E. Orchard,Frank Pakenham,Siegfried Sassoon,Edith Sitwell,Muriel Spark,Graham Sutherland,Oscar Wilde,Ford Madox Ford,^[138] andEvelyn Waugh.^[139] Pre-1900 famous converts included Cardinals Newman andHenry Edward Manning,^[140] the less famous likeIgnatius Spencer^[141] as well as the leading architect of theGothic Revival,Augustus Pugin, historianThomas William Allies,^[142] andJesuit poetGerard Manley Hopkins.^[143]G. E. M. Anscombe was also a notable convert during the early 20th century.

Prominent cradle Catholics included the film directorAlfred Hitchcock, writers such asHilaire Belloc,Lord Acton andJ. R. R. Tolkien and the composerEdward Elgar, whose oratorioThe Dream of Gerontius was based on a 19th-century poem by Newman.

In 1994,Katharine, Duchess of Kent became the first member of theBritish royal family to convert to Catholicism since 1685.^[144]

Former Prime MinisterSir Tony Blair also converted to the Catholic Church, doing so in December 2007 after he had left office.^{[145][146][147][148]}

English Catholicism continued to grow throughout the first two-thirds of the 20th century, when it was associated primarily with elements in the English intellectual class and the ethnic Irish population. Numbers attending Mass remained very high in contrast with some Protestant churches (though not the Church of England).^[149] Clergy numbers, which began the 20th century at under 3,000, reached a high of 7,500 in 1971.^[17]

By the latter years of the twentieth century low numbers of vocations also affected the church^[150] with ordinations to the priesthood dropping from the hundreds in the late 20th century into the teens in 2006–2011 (16 in 2009 for example) and a recovery into the 20s thereafter, with a prediction for 2018 of 24.^{[151][152][153]}

As in other English-speaking countries such as the United States and Australia, the movement of Irish Catholics out of the working-class into the middle-class suburban mainstream often meant their assimilation with broader, secular English society and loss of a separate Catholic identity. TheSecond Vatican Council has been followed, as in other Western countries, by divisions betweenTraditionalist Catholicism and a more liberal form of Catholicism claiming inspiration from the council. This caused difficulties for not a few pre-conciliar converts, though others have still joined the Church in recent decades (for instance,Malcolm Muggeridge,Alec Guinness, andJoseph Pearce). And public figures (often descendants of the recusant families) includeTimothy Radcliffe, former Master of the Order of Preachers (Dominicans) and writer. Radcliffe is related to three late cardinals –Weld,Vaughan andHume (the last because his cousin Lord Hunt is married to Hume's sister) – and his family is connected to many of the great recusant English Catholic families, the Arundels, Tichbournes, Talbots, Stourtons, Stonors, Welds and Blundells.^[154] There were also the families whose male line has died out such as the Grimshaws, the de la Barre Bodenhams or the Lubienski-Bodenhams.^[155] Among others in this group arePaul Johnson;Peter Ackroyd; Antonia Fraser;Mark Thompson,Director-General of the BBC;Michael Martin, first Catholic to hold the office ofSpeaker of theHouse of Commons since the Reformation;Chris Patten, first Catholic to hold the post ofChancellor of Oxford since the Reformation;Piers Paul Read; Helen Liddel, a former British High Commissioner to Australia; and former Prime Minister's wifeCherie Blair. These have no difficulty making their Catholicism known in public life. The former Prime MinisterTony Blair was received into full communion with the Catholic Church in 2007.^[156]Catherine Pepinster, editor ofTablet, notes: "The impact of Irish immigrants is one. There are numerous prominent campaigners, academics, entertainers (likeDanny Boyle the most successful Catholic in showbiz owing to his film,Slumdog Millionaire), politicians and writers. But the descendants of therecusant families are still a force in the land."^{[157][158][159]}

Since theSecond Vatican Council (Vatican II) the Church in England has tended to focus on ecumenical dialogue with the Anglican Church rather than winning converts from it as in the past.^{[citation needed]} However, the 1990s have seen a number of conversions from Anglicanism to the Catholic Church, largely prompted by the Church of England's decision to ordain women as priests (among other moves away from traditional doctrines and structures).^{[citation needed]} The resultant converts included members of the Royal Family (Katharine, Duchess of Kent, her sonLord Nicholas Windsor and her grandsonBaron Downpatrick),Graham Leonard (former Anglican Bishop of London),Frances Shand Kydd (maternal grandmother ofWilliam, Prince of Wales andPrince Harry, Duke of Sussex), and a number of Anglican priests. Converts to Catholicism in Britain occur for any number of reasons, not least from "the mystical buoyant instinct" within each person to grow toward a profounder expression of what they believe.^[160] In 2019, Charles Moore, former editor ofThe Spectator,The Daily Telegraph, and authorized biographer ofMargaret Thatcher, noted that his conversion in 1994 to Catholicism followed the Church of England's decision to ordain women, "unilaterally". The Church of England's "determination to do this," he said, "willy-nilly, come what may, meant that they weren't serious about Christian unity, because the Catholic and Orthodox had a different view."^[161] This view seems to match Graham Leonard's view and many other former Anglican clerics who, according to John Jay Hughes, have noted: "It is about authority, or lack of it, of the Church of England unilaterally to initiate a radical change in the priesthood, since it does not have its own, but only the priesthood of the whole Catholic church of which it had always claimed to be a part."^[162]

The spirit of ecumenism fostered by Vatican II resulted in 1990 with the Catholic Church in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland joiningChurches Together in Britain and Ireland as an expression of the churches' commitment to work ecumenically. In 2006, for example, a memorial was put up to StJohn Houghton and fellowCarthusian monks martyred at theLondon Charterhouse, 1535. Anglican priest Geoffrey Curtis campaigned for it with the current archbishop of Canterbury's blessing.^[163] Also, in another ecumenical gesture, a plaque in Holywell Street, Oxford, now commemorates the Catholic martyrs of England. It reads: "Near this spotGeorge Nichols,Richard Yaxley,Thomas Belson, andHumphrey Pritchard were executed for their Catholic faith, 5 July 1589."^[164] This action, however, did not please some Catholics, as the chair of the Latin Mass Society, Joseph Shaw, noted in a letter dated 2020: "As Mgr. Ronald Knox pointed out: 'Each of them [martyrs] died in the belief that he was bearing witness to the truth; and if you accept both testimonies undiscriminately, then you are making nonsense of them both.'"^[165] And at Lambeth Palace, in February 2009, the Archbishop of Canterbury hosted a reception to launch a book,Why Go To Church?, by Fr Timothy Radcliffe OP, one of Britain's best known religious and the former master of the Dominican Order. A large number of young Dominicanfriars attended. Fr Radcliffe said, "I don't think there have been so many Dominicans in one place since the time of Robert Kilwardby, the Dominican Archbishop of Canterbury in the 13th century."^[166]

Currently, along with the 22Latin Church dioceses, there are two dioceses of theEastern Catholic Churches:^[167] theUkrainian Catholic Eparchy of Holy Family of London and theSyro-Malabar Catholic Eparchy of Great Britain. ThePersonal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, for Anglican-tradition converts to Catholicism, was erected byPope Benedict XVI in 2011.

The Church's principles of social justice influenced initiatives to tackle the challenges of poverty and social inclusion. In Southampton, Fr Pat Murphy O'Connor founded the St Dismas Society as an agency to meet the needs of ex-prisoners discharged from Winchester prison. Some of St Dismas Society's early members went on to help found the Simon Community in Sussex then in London. Their example gave new inspiration to other clergy, such as the Revd Kenneth Leech (CofE) ofSt Anne's Church, Soho, who helped found the homeless charityCentrepoint, and the Revd Bruce Kenrick (Church of Scotland) who helped found the homeless charityShelter. In 1986 CardinalBasil Hume established the Cardinal Hume Centre^[168] to work with homeless young people, badly housed families and local communities to access accommodation, support and advice, education, training and employment opportunities.

TheCaritas Social Action Network (CSAN), created with the merger of previous organisations, federates the different Catholic actors active in the social field in England and Wales. Its counterpart for international development and humanitarian aid is theCatholic Agency for Overseas Development (CAFOD). Both organisations are members ofCaritas Internationalis andCaritas Europa. Diocesan social welfare agencies exist in various dioceses, such as Nugent, an affiliate of the Archdiocese of Liverpool named after FrJames Nugent (1822-1905),^[169] Fr Hudson's Society in the Archdiocese of Birmingham, and Catholic Care in the Diocese of Leeds.^[170]

In 2006 CardinalCormac Murphy-O'Connor instituted an annual Mass in Support of Migrant Workers^[171] at Westminster Cathedral in partnership with the ethnic chaplains of Brentwood, Southwark and Westminster.

As of June 2024^[update] there are over 2,100 Catholic places of education – nurseries, schools,special schools, colleges, and universities – in England and Wales. The Catholic Church operated the largest network ofacademies in England.^[172]

On 3 November 2016, John Bingham, Head of Media at the Church of England, reported inThe Daily Telegraph that CardinalVincent Nichols officially acknowledged that the Catholic Church in England and Wales had pressured young unmarried mothers in the country to put their children up for adoption in agencies linked to the Catholic Church throughout the decades following World War II and offered an apology.^[173]

In November 2020 theIndependent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse reported that between 1970 and 2015, the church in England and Wales had received more than 900 complaints involving more than 3,000 instances of child sexual abuse, made against almost 1,000 individuals, including priests, monks and church associates. In light of such serious and persistent allegations over decades, the Inquiry had hoped to gain the cooperation of the Vatican. In the event its repeated requests were thwarted. As a result, there have been calls for resignations of prelates in leadership roles both from victims, their families and supporters. The inquiry has not spared criticism of the church for prioritising its reputation over the suffering of victims. Cardinal Nichols was singled out in the inquiry report for lack of personal responsibility, or of compassion towards victims. However he has indicated he would not be resigning as he was "determined to put it right".^[174][175] In another article by Pepinster, she notes that the late Cardinal Basil Hume was "remembered for showing empathy to survivors but offered only pastoral care and kindness."^[176]

The Catholic Church in England and Wales has fiveprovinces: Birmingham, Cardiff, Liverpool, Southwark and Westminster. There are 21dioceses which are divided intoparishes (for comparison, the Church of England and Church in Wales currently have a total of 50 dioceses). In addition to these, there are four dioceses covering England and Wales for specific groups which are theBishopric of the Forces, theEparchy for Ukrainians, theSyro-Malabar Catholic Eparchy of Great Britain and thePersonal Ordinariate for former Anglicans.

The Catholic bishops in England and Wales come together in a collaborative structure known as theCatholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales. Currently theArchbishop of Westminster,Vincent Gerard Nichols, is thepresident of the Bishops' Conference. For this reason in the global Catholic Church (outside England), he isde facto Primate of England though not in the eyes of English law and the established Church of England. Historically, the avoidance of the title of "Primate" was to eschew whipping up anti-Catholic tension, in the same way the bishops of the restored hierarchy avoided using current titles of Anglican sees (Archbishop of Westminster rather than "Canterbury" or "London"). However, the Archbishop of Westminster had certain privileges: he was the only metropolitan in the country until 1911 (when the archdioceses of Birmingham and Liverpool were created) and he has always acted as leader at meetings of the English bishops.

Although the bishops of the restored hierarchy were obliged to take new titles, such as that of Westminster, they saw themselves very much in continuity with the pre-Reformation Church. Westminster in particular saw itself as the continuation of Canterbury, hence the similarity of thecoat of arms of the two sees (with Westminster believing it has more right to it since it features thepallium, no longer given to Anglican archbishops). At the back of Westminster Cathedral is alist of popes and, alongside this, a list of Catholic Archbishops of Canterbury beginning with Augustine of Canterbury and the year they received the pallium. After Cardinal Pole, the last Catholic incumbent of Canterbury, the names of the Catholic vicars apostolic or titular bishops (from 1685) are recorded and then the Archbishops of Westminster, in one unimpaired line, from 597 to the present, according to the Archdiocese of Westminster.^[177][178] To highlight this historical continuity, dating back to Pope Gregory I's appointment of Augustine and his sequent bestowal of the pallium on the appointee, the installation rites of pre-Reformation Catholic Archbishops of Canterbury and earlier Archbishops of Westminster were used at the installation of the current Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Gerard Nichols.^{[179][180][181]} He also became the forty-third of theEnglish cardinals since the 12th century.

Many dioceses operate specialist youth service provision, such as the Youth Service of theDiocese of Leeds,^[182] the Youth Ministry Team in theDiocese of Hexham and Newcastle,^[183] the Brentwood Catholic Youth Service,^[184] and the Youth Service in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton.^[185]

In October 2009, following closed-circuit talks between some Anglicans and theHoly See, Pope Benedict made a relatively unconditional offer to accommodate disaffected Anglicans in the Church of England, enabling them, for the first time, to retain parts of their liturgy and heritage underAnglicanorum coetibus, while being in full communion with Rome. By April 2012 the UK ordinariate numbered about 1200, including five bishops and 60 priests.^[186][187] The ordinariate has recruited a group of aristocrats as honorary vice-presidents to help out. These include the Duke of Norfolk, the Countess of Oxford and Asquith and the Duchess of Somerset. Other vice-presidents include Lord Nicholas Windsor, Sir Josslyn Gore-Booth and the Squire de Lisle, whose ancestorAmbrose de Lisle was a 19th-century Catholic convert who advocated the corporate reunion of the Anglican Church with Rome. According to the first Ordinary, Mgr Keith Newton, the ordinariate will "work on something with an Anglican flavour, but they are not bringing over any set of Anglican liturgy".^[188] The director of music at Westminster Abbey (Anglican), lay CatholicJames O'Donnell, likens the ordinariate to a Uniate church or one of the many non-Latin Catholic rites, saying: "This is a good opportunity for us to remember that there isn't a one size fits all, and that this could be a good moment to adopt the famous civil service philosophy – 'celebrating diversity'."^[189] In May 2013 a former Anglican priest, Alan Hopes, was appointed the new bishop of East Anglia, whose diocese includes the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham.^[190] In 2021, the former Anglican bishop of Rochester,Michael Nazir-Ali, joined the Ordinariate, noting: "I believe that the Anglican desire to adhere to apostolic, patristic and conciliar teaching can now best be maintained in the Ordinariate."^[191] Nazir-Ali also shared with Dr. Foley Beach, chairman of the Global Anglican Future Conference, "his willingness to continue to assist" that movement "in any way that might be suitable."^[192] In April 2022, Pope Francis granted Nazir-Ali the title "Prelate of Honour." He may now be addressed as "Monsignor."^[193]

There exists theApostolic Exarchate for Ukrainians which serves the 15,000 Ukrainian Greek Catholics in Great Britain, with a cathedral and various churches across the country.

The Maronite Church in the United Kingdom is under the jurisdiction of the Maronite Eparchy of Europe. TheLebanese Maronite Order (OLM) is in charge of serving the Maronite Catholics in the UK and it is a registered Charity in England and Wales.^[194] The OLM is an order of theMaronite Catholic Church. Father Fadi KMEID is the parish priest for Maronites. The OLM runs a few churches, for example Our Lady of Lebanon in Paddington serving the Lebanese Maronite community and the church of The Holy Family of Nazareth serving the Cypriot Maronite community.

There are also Catholic chaplains involved in the ministries ofEastern Catholic Churches (of Eritrean, Chaldean, Syriac, Syro-Malabar, Syro-Malankara, and Melkite communities). For information about the Syro-Malabar chaplaincy within theDiocese of Westminster in London, see Syro-Malabar Catholic Church of London.

At the 2001 United Kingdom census, there were 4.2 million Catholics in England and Wales, some 8.3 per cent of the population. One hundred years earlier, in 1901, they represented only 4.8 per cent of the population (approximately 1.8 million people).^[195] In 1981, 8.7 per cent of the population of England and Wales were Catholic.^[17] In 2009, an Ipsos Mori poll found that 9.6 per cent, or 5.2 million persons of all ethnicities were Catholic in England and Wales.^[196] Sizeable populations includeNorth West England where one in five is Catholic,^[197] a result of large-scaleIrish immigration in the nineteenth century^[198][199] as well as the high number of English recusants in Lancashire.

Migration from Ireland in the 19th and 20th centuries and more recentEastern European migration have significantly increased the numbers of Catholics in England and Wales, although Pew Research data and stats of 2018 point to other factors at work. According to Pew researchers, 19% of UK adults identify as Catholic.^[200] The Eastern European members are mainly fromPoland, with smaller numbers fromLithuania,Latvia, andSlovakia. According to theWorld Factbook as of 2020^[update], the ethnic/racial composition of UK was "white": 87.2%; "non-white": 12.8%.^[201] A 2022 report, however, noted the "white" population of England and Wales had dropped from 86% in 2011 to 81.7% in 2021.^[202]

On theaccession of Poland to the European Union in 2004 there has been large-scale Polish immigration to the UK, up to 900 000 people as of 2017 have come.^[203] ThePolish Catholic Mission reports that only about 10% of the newly arrived Poles attend church regularly.^[204] For those it has around 219 branches and pastoral centres with 114 priests.^[205] The Vicars Delegate who manage the "chaplaincy" of the Polish Catholic Mission since then have been Mgr. Tadeusz Kukla up to 2010, succeeded by the Mgr. Stefan Wylężek.^[206] In Poland, the Polish Bishops Conference has a bishop Delegate, with special responsibility for the spiritual needs of émigré Poles. The postholder since 2011 has been Bishop Wiesław Cichowski.The Tablet reported in December 2007 that the Polish Catholic Mission as stating that its branches follow a pastoral programme set by the Polish conference of bishops and are viewed as "an integral part of the Polish church".^[207]

Polish-speaking Catholics first arrived in the United Kingdom in some numbers after the 19th century nationalinsurgencies in1831 and 1863 which had arisen, especially in the Russian sector, in the wake of thePartitions of the Lithuanian – Polish commonwealth during the late 18th century. In 1864 through the efforts of generalZamoyski andCardinal Wiseman, Rev. Chwaliszewski was invited to come to London and lead services in the Polish chapel at St. Peter'sHatton Garden. Worthy of note in this period was the Polish figure ofThe VenerableBernard Łubieński (1846–1933) closely associated withBishop Robert Coffin and who, after an education atUshaw College, in 1864 entered theRedemptorists atClapham and spent some years as a missionary in the British Isles, before returning to his native land.^[208]

ThePolish Catholic Mission was placed on a permanent footing in 1894 byCardinal Vaughan, the thenArchbishop of Westminster. The nucleus of the mission and its chaplaincy was formed byBlessedFranciszka Siedliska (1842–1902), founder of theCongregation of the Holy Family of Nazareth and its spiritual director, rev. LechertCR. Sr. Siedliska and two sisters started a Polish language primary school. From then on Polish services were regularly held in a chapel first in Globe Street, then in Cambridge Heath Road inBethnal Green in theEast End of London, where most exiled Poles were living at the time.^[209]

AfterWorld War I, the Polish chaplaincy was in the rented Polish church in Mercer Street in North London. In 1928 the local authority condemned the building as unsafe. That same year the exiled community was visited by cardinalAleksander Kakowski with bishop Przeździeński from the diocese ofSiedlce and Polish ambassador,Konstanty Skirmunt. After an extended search, a building was bought from theSwedenborg Society in Devonia Road, Islington.Cardinal Bourne of Westminster, helped the mission with a £1000 loan for refurbishment. It became the first Polish-owned ecclesiastical building in the British Isles. It was consecrated on 30 October 1930 by cardinalAugust Hlond, primate of Poland in the presence of cardinal Bourne. In 1938 rev. Władysław Staniszewski became chaplain to the mission.

AfterWorld War II, the pastoral task had swelled to almost 200,000displaced people – mainly soldiers. Many Polish servicemen were unable to return to their homeland following the annexation of half of Poland's territory by theUSSR and the imposition of a communist regime in the newly reconfigured Poland. ThePolish Resettlement Corps was formed by the British government to ease their transition into British life. They were joined by several thousand Displaced Persons (DPs), many of whom were their family members. This influx of Poles gave rise to thePolish Resettlement Act 1947 which allowed approximately 250,000 Polish Servicemen and their dependents to settle in Britain.Many assimilated into existing Catholic congregations.^[210] Among them were also 120Military chaplains and priests, along with a minority ofOrthodox,Lutheran andArmenian Christians with their own chaplains. There was also a minority Jewish contingent and a handful ofMuslims among the soldiers.

In 1948, following a visit to Poland the previous year for talks with cardinal Hlond, and after consulting with the Catholic episcopate of England and Wales, CardinalBernard Griffin nominated the rector of the Polish Catholic Mission, rev. Staniszewski asVicar delegate for civilian Poles in England and Wales, with the powers of anOrdinariate. Around this time Archbishop Hlond had nominated BishopJózef Gawlina, also aDivisional general and based inRome, to be responsible overall for thePolish diaspora.^[211] Between them, this enabled the then rector in England to engage priests and organize regular pastoral care across 18 dioceses in England and Wales. The Catholic hierarchy in England and Wales agreed to the appointment of aVicar Delegate, nominated by the Polish Episcopate, with ordinary power over the Polish clergy throughout England and Wales, with certain exceptions relating tomarriage.

On the pastoral front, the temporary Polish parish hosted inCentral London by the fathers ofBrompton Oratory was able to be moved westward in 1962 to the newly acquiredSt Andrew Bobola church inShepherd's Bush, the second Polish owned church in London since 1930. It is regarded as an unofficial garrison church with memorials to many historicalPolish Army regiments.^[212] The Mission was boosted by the integration of male religious orders, the PolishJesuits inWillesden, north-west London,^[213] theMarian fathers inEaling and formerly the college atFawley Court.^[214][215] Latterly, these have been joined by theSociety of Christ Fathers, dedicated to minister to thePolish diaspora, who run a parish inPutney in London.^[216]

Since the original agreement between the English and Polish church hierarchies in 1948, whenever a Polish Catholic community emerges within England and Wales, the vicar delegate appoints a Polish priest to organise a local branch of the Polish Catholic Mission. A priest thus appointed is the Catholic version of a "priest in charge", but he is not actually a parish priest. There are strictly no Polish parishes orquasiparishes in England and Wales (in accordance withCanons 515 §1 and 516 §1) with the exception of the original church on Devonia Road inIslington. A Polish community is sometimes referred to as a "parish", but is not a parish in the canonical sense. Hence the Polish community attending a "Polish church" is not a "judicial person". The canonical judicial person which represents the interests of all Polish communities of worship is vested in the Polish Catholic Mission.^[206]

In December 2007, CardinalCormac Murphy-O'Connor said: "I'm quite concerned that Poles are creating a separate Church in Britain – I would want them to be part of the Catholic life of this country. I would hope those responsible for the Polish Church here, and the Poles themselves, will be aware that they should become a part of local parishes as soon as possible when they learn enough of the language." Mgr Kukla stressed that the Polish Catholic Mission continues to have a "good relationship" with the hierarchy in England and Wales and said "Integration is a long process".^[217]

The Polish Catholic Mission co-operated with the English hierarchy's 2008 research inquiry into the needs of migrants in London's Catholic community. The inquiry had been commissioned by theArchdiocese of Westminster, ArchbishopKevin McDonald ofSouthwark and BishopThomas McMahon ofBrentwood. Around 1000 people attending Mass in three London dioceses were surveyed using anonymous questionnaires available in Polish, Lithuanian, Chinese, French, Spanish, Portuguese and English. The congregations were drawn from mainstream diocesan parishes, ethnic chaplaincies and churches of the Polish vicariate. The report findings described how 86% of eastern Europeans said the availability of Mass in their mother-tongue was a reason for their choosing to worship in a particular church. One of the report's recommendations emphasised cooperation with key overseas bishops conferences, dioceses andreligious institutes on the recruitment and appointment of ethnic chaplains.^[218][219]

A number of events which Catholics hold to bemiracles are associated with England.

A number ofMarian apparitions are associated with England, the best known are the following;

• Our Lady of Mount Carmel, associated withSimon Stock atAylesford
• Our Lady of Walsingham, associated withRicheldis de Faverches atWalsingham
• Our Lady of theImmaculate Conception, associated with Helsim the Abbot in theNorth Sea
• Our Lady of Evesham, associated withEgwin of Evesham atEvesham
• Our Lady of Canterbury, associated withDunstan andAnselm atCanterbury
• Our Lady of London, associated withThomas Becket andHildegard von Bingen atLondon
• Our Lady of Jervaulx, associated with Abbot John Kingston of Byland atJervaulx
• Our Lady of Durham, associated withGodric of Finchale atDurham
• Our Lady of Ipswich, associated with Anne Wentworth atIpswich

Augustine Camino, ending atPugin's Church and Shrine of St. Augustine,Ramsgate^[220][221]

A number of cases of allegedincorruptibility of some Catholic saints are associated with England;

• Æthelthryth of Ely, hand discovered in 1811
• Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, relics destroyed under Henry VIII
• Werburgh of Chester, relics destroyed under Henry VIII

Now believed to be buried beneath her shrine in Chester cathedral.

• Wihtburh of East Anglia, relics destroyed under Henry VIII
• Winibald of Wessex, tomb found empty in 1968
• Guthlac of Crowland, relics destroyed by Vikings
• Ælfheah of Canterbury, buried at Canterbury Cathedral
• Edward the Confessor, bodily allegedly intact in 1269, skeleton by 1685
• Hugh of Lincoln, tomb pillaged in 1364, shrine destroyed under Henry VIII
• Edmund of Abingdon, taken toPontigny Abbey in France
• John Southworth, returned toWestminster Cathedral in 1927

Two cases of allegedstigmata are associated with England, neither have been approved by the Vatican;

• 1880:Teresa Helena Higginson,Servant of God, atGainsborough, Lincolnshire
• 1986: Patricia de Menezes, atSurrey

SeeCatholic Church in the United Kingdom for English Saints, English Catholics declaredBlessed,Venerable, and Servants of God, past and present. The list includes Welsh, Scot, Irish, and English saints.^[222]

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• Beck, George Andrew, ed.The English Catholics, 1850–1950 (1950), scholarly essays
• British Catholic History biennial journal of theCatholic Record Society published byCambridge University Press
• Corrin, Jay P.Catholic Progressives in England After Vatican II (University of Notre Dame Press; 2013) 536 pages;
• Dures, Alan.English Catholicism, 1558–1642: Continuity and Change (1983)
• Glickman, Gabriel.The English Catholic Community 1688–1745: politics, culture and ideology (2009)
• Harris, Alana.Faith in the Family: A Lived Religious History of English Catholicism, 1945–1982 (2013); the impact of the Second Vatican Council on the ordinary believer
• Heimann, Mary.Catholic Devotion in Victorian England (1995)onlineArchived 3 February 2019 at theWayback Machine
• Hughes, Philip.The Catholic Question, 1688–1829: A Study in Political History (1929)
• McClain, Lisa. "On a Mission: Priests, Jesuits," Jesuitresses," and Catholic Missionary Efforts in Tudor-Stuart England."Catholic Historical Review 101.3 (2015): 437–462.
• McClelland, Vincent Alan.Cardinal Manning: the Public Life and Influences, 1865–1892 (1962)
• Mathew, David.Catholicism in England: the portrait of a minority: its culture and tradition (1955)
• Mourret, Fernand.History of the Catholic Church (8 vol, 1931) comprehensive history to 1878. country by country.online free; by French Catholic priest.
• Mullet, Michael.Catholics in Britain and Ireland, 1558–1829 (1998) 236pp
• Watkin, E. IRoman Catholicism in England from the Reformation to 1950 (1957)

• Mullet, Michael.English Catholicism, 1680–1830 (2006) 2714 pages
• Newman, John Henry.Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England (University of Notre Dame Press, 2000) 585pp; based on 6th edition of 1889

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