Mary Tudor - Anna Whitelock [124]
A week after his arrival in England, Pole appeared before both Houses of Parliament at Whitehall. Having expressed his gratitude for the admission into the realm of a man hitherto “exiled and banished,” he outlined the cause of his coming. The pope had, he claimed, “a special respect for their realm above all other.” While others nations had been converted gradually, “this island the first of all islands, received the light of Christ’s religion.”
It was a spurious appeal to English nationalism, a providential version of history, intended to make Roman Catholicism suitably English. England was, in Pole’s view, the chosen Catholic nation. God “by providence hath given this realm prerogative of nobility above other,” and Mary was deemed its savior. “When all light of true religion seemed utterly extinct, as the churches defaced and altars overthrown … in a few remained the confession of Christ’s faith, namely in the breast of the Queen’s excellency.” When people conspired against her and “policies were devised to disinherit her, and armed power prepared to destroy her … she being a virgin, helpless, naked and unarmed, prevailed, and had the victory over tyrants.” Mary was the Virgin Queen who had restored the national religion.
With carefully chosen words Pole assured Parliament that his commission was “not one of prejudice to any person”:
I come not to destroy but to build. I come to reconcile, not to condemn. I come not to compel, but to call again. I come not to call anything in question already done, but my commission is of grace and clemency to such as will receive it, for touching all matters that be past, that shall be as things cast into the sea of forgetfulness.6
Two days later, a delegation from Parliament presented themselves at Whitehall, where Gardiner made their supplication:
We the lords spiritual and temporal, and the commons of this present Parliament assembled, representing the whole body of the realm of England and dominions of the same, do declare ourselves very sorry and repentant of the schism and disobedience committed in this realm and the dominions of the same, against the said See Apostolic … that we may, as children repentant, be received into the bosom and unity of Christ’s church. So as this noble realm, with all the members thereof, may in unity and perfect obedience to the See Apostolic.7
At five in the afternoon of Saint Andrew’s Day, November 30, Pole was conducted in full pontifical robes from Lambeth Palace to Westminster. There, with the Lords and Commons and the king and queen kneeling before him in their robes of estate, he formally absolved the country from its years of schism:
We, by apostolic authority given unto us by the most holy lord Pope Julius III, his Vice-regent on earth, do absolve and deliver you, and every [one] of you, with the whole Realm and the Dominions thereof, from all Heresy and Schism, and from all and every judgement, Censures and pains, for that cause incurred; & also so we do restore you again unto the unity of our Mother the holy Church … in the name of the Father, of the son and of the Holy Ghost.8
According to John Elder, it “moved a great number of the audience with sorrowful sighs and weeping tears to change their cheer.” England had returned to the Catholic fold. It was a moment of high ceremony and emotion.
That evening Mary gave a banquet for the king and his gentlemen, and after supper there were dancing and masques. The king had that day shown “liberality to the ladies of the court, who were dressed in the gowns he had given them.”9 The news of England’s return to the fold quickly reached Rome, whereupon the pope ordered processions, “giving thanks to God with great joy for the conversion of England to his Church.”10
THE SUNDAY AFTER the reconciliation with Rome—the first day of Advent—Mary, Philip, and Pole attended a High Mass sung by the bishop of London at St. Paul’s Cathedral. The crowds “both in the