Grace on William Laud

William Laud (Grace Kujak)

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William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born on October 7, 1573. Besides being the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1633-1645, one of the most important spiritual leaders in England, he was also an adviser to Charles the 1^st. He went to St. John’s College at the University of Oxford, and was both a pastor and academic. He eventually held multiple official influential roles in the church and the government as well, and was very vocal in politics – he was one of the major influences that helped caused the English Civil War. Charles the 1^st immediately liked him, when he came into power, because Laud encouraged his belief in the “divine right of kings.”

Laud hated Puritans with a passion – he personally felt that the church should keep to strict ceremony and tradition, and reinforced this belief brutally. He put stringent rules in place in the Church of England about what to wear, how to set up the church, and when to bow. When Puritan publishers printed a pamphlet against him, he had their ears cut off and then branded their foreheads in punishment. He didn’t believe that church and state should be separated, at all, and had no qualms about trying to influence the king so he could keep persecuting Puritans. The public, however, was behind the Puritans, especially given Laud’s tactics.

Laud’s big mistake was, in the end, trying to control the Scottish church as well as the English one – the Scots were not having that, and they utterly refused to listen to him, escalating tensions with England. Finally, in 1640, Parliament (which had been disbanded) met to change regulations for Laud’s church, in which they said that all his rules for church were more for ceremony’s sake than actually necessary to be “saved.” Later that year, he was accused of high treason and popery (which means, of course, acting like a pope) and locked in the Tower of London – he stayed there for four years until his trial finally began, and he was beheaded in 1645.

Sources:

Pennington, D.H. “William Laud.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 4 Jan. 2018, www.britannica.com/biography/William-Laud.

Sparkes, Abigail. “The Life and Death of William Laud.” Historic UK, Historic UK Ltd., www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofEngland/The-Life-and-Death-Of-Wiliam-Laud/.