1D - Religious changes: religious toleration and changes to the position of Anglicans, Protestants and Catholics
The religious settlement after 1688 protected Protestant monarchy and allowed some dissenting worship, while preserving unequal civil rights. Learn how the positions of Anglicans, other Protestants and Catholics changed, and why the three kingdoms did not receive one uniform settlement.
Religious relief and royal power
James II's Indulgences of 1687 and 1688 offered relief from religious penalties to Catholics and Protestant dissenters. Some welcomed the ability to worship more freely and hoped for removal of the Test and Corporation restrictions. Others distrusted a policy introduced by suspending laws through royal prerogative. The same act could offer a practical benefit and threaten the legal basis on which future security depended.
James tried to build an alliance outside the Anglican establishment. Yet Catholics and Protestant dissenters did not form a naturally united bloc. Their doctrines differed, and nonconformists might suspect that the King valued their support chiefly as a means of securing Catholic influence. Some dissenters supported repeal; others preferred cooperation with Anglicans against arbitrary government. It is misleading to describe their reaction as uniformly grateful or uniformly hostile.
The order to read the Indulgence in Anglican churches in 1688 made the disagreement sharper. The Seven Bishops' petition challenged the method of suspending law, while their prosecution threatened the institution which had preached loyalty. Resistance temporarily brought Anglicans and many dissenters closer together. Once James was removed, however, agreement against his policies did not settle whether the Church should absorb dissenters or permit separate worship.
Toleration without civil equality
The Toleration Act of 1689 allowed qualifying Protestant dissenters to worship publicly outside the Church of England. They had to meet legal conditions including loyalty declarations and registration of places of worship. The Act made a significant difference: religious meetings could have a recognised lawful existence rather than depending on royal indulgence or the magistrate's willingness to overlook an offence.
It did not grant freedom to everyone. Catholics and those denying the Trinity were excluded. Quakers received arrangements accommodating their objections to oaths, but legal recognition did not remove all disabilities. The Test and Corporation Acts remained, keeping Anglican sacramental requirements for relevant offices. Dissenters also continued to face obligations connected to the established Church, including financial support through tithes and rates where applicable.
Toleration and equality
Toleration permits specified religious activity despite disagreement with it. Civil equality removes religious distinctions in legal and political rights. The 1689 settlement provided limited toleration without full civil equality.
This distinction prevents an exaggerated account of change. A Presbyterian congregation could worship legally while its members still faced restrictions on public office. Protection of worship mattered in daily life, but it did not make denominational identity politically irrelevant. Some dissenters used occasional Anglican communion to satisfy officeholding tests; the practice showed both the continuing legal barrier and attempts to work around it.
Anglican security and internal division
The Church of England retained its established position, parish organisation, bishops and influence in public life. The Protestant succession removed the immediate prospect that a Catholic sovereign would reorganise its position from above. William and Mary ruled through an establishment which remained legally privileged, so toleration did not mean disestablishment.
Plans for comprehension, widening the Church's terms so that some moderate dissenters could join it, were not achieved. This made toleration outside the institution more important. Anglican reluctance to dilute its requirements and differences among Protestants prevented a fully united national church. The settlement acknowledged religious plurality while maintaining institutional inequality.
Anglicans themselves divided over allegiance. Nonjurors, including senior clergy, refused the oath to William and Mary because they believed their oath to James still bound them. They lost their positions when they would not comply. A church which had helped resist James thus experienced new disruption when government required loyalty to his successors.
There were also differences of emphasis. High Church interests defended the Church's distinct authority and privileges; more accommodating churchmen were readier to accept Protestant diversity. These tendencies became connected to Tory and Whig politics, though neither denomination nor church position dictated every person's party. By 1702 the Church was secure as an establishment but could no longer plausibly claim that every Protestant worshipped within it.
Catholics after the Revolution
Catholics lost the favourable royal patronage which some had enjoyed under James. The Bill of Rights excluded Catholics from the Crown, and the Act of Settlement of 1701 reaffirmed a Protestant succession. These rules treated the sovereign's religion as a constitutional safeguard, making Catholic exclusion central to the new regime rather than a temporary wartime measure.
Fear of France and Jacobitism reinforced discrimination. A Catholic might be suspected of supporting the exiled James or Louis XIV even without evidence of disloyal activity. From the 1690s English Catholics faced measures such as double land taxation and further restrictions concerning Catholic worship, education and property. Their position was therefore very different from the legal space conceded to Protestant dissenters.
Policy and experience should still be distinguished. Some Catholic families retained wealth and practised privately; local enforcement varied. Survival does not cancel legal inequality, while discriminatory statutes do not prove that every Catholic suffered the same penalty at all times. Nor does Catholic identity establish Jacobite activity. A careful explanation examines the regime's fears, the laws it adopted and the different resources available to those affected.
The settlement created an important paradox. Parliamentary restraints could protect subjects against arbitrary royal religious policy while Parliament itself enacted religious exclusions. Greater parliamentary influence was compatible with a narrow definition of those entitled to protection. Religious change was not an uncomplicated movement towards equal liberty.
Three religious settlements
Scotland's settlement restored Presbyterian government to the established Church in 1690. Here the principal change was the removal of episcopal authority associated with the restored Stuarts. Presbyterians gained institutional power, while episcopal supporters could be alienated or connected to Jacobite opposition. Applying England's Anglican settlement to Scotland would reverse the meaning of the change.
Ireland retained an established Anglican Church of Ireland in a country with a Catholic majority. Williamite victory protected Protestant landownership and rule. Penal legislation from the 1690s restricted Catholics in areas including arms and education, while Irish Protestant dissenters did not automatically receive the same statutory settlement as English dissenters. The conflict's military and property consequences made Ireland's position particularly unequal.
Compare 1660 with 1702 by group and activity. Anglican England retained establishment, but licensed Protestant dissent made enforced national uniformity less achievable. English nonconformists gained a firmer basis for worship without equal officeholding. Catholics were more securely excluded from the political settlement. Scottish Presbyterians gained an establishment; Irish Catholics experienced a strengthened Protestant ruling order.
The original practice claim “1689 brought religious freedom to Britain” is partly convincing if it refers to the changed legal status of qualifying English Protestant worship. It is unconvincing as a statement of universal rights across the kingdoms. Testing an interpretation requires choosing evidence relevant to its geographical and social scope, rather than allowing one beneficial Act to stand for every religious community.
The Revolution secured Protestant monarchy and permitted limited dissenting worship. The extent and direction of change depended on kingdom, denomination and whether the issue was worship, officeholding or institutional power.