For many Catholics, the Elizabethan "Golden Age" was an alien concept.
Following the criminalization of their religion by Elizabeth I, nearly
200 Catholics were executed, and many more wasted away in prison during
her reign. Torture was used more than at any other time in England's
history. While some bowed to the pressure of the government and new
church, publicly conforming to acts of Protestant worship, others did
not--and quickly found themselves living in a state of siege. Under
constant surveillance, haunted by the threat of imprisonment--or
worse--the ordinary lives of these so-called recusants became marked by
evasion, subterfuge, and constant fear. In God's Traitors, Jessie
Childs tells the fascinating story of one Catholic family, the Vauxes of
Harrowden Hall, from the foundation of the Church of England in the
1530s to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, and their struggle to keep the
faith in Protestant England. Few Elizabethans would have disputed that
obedience was a Christian duty, but following the excommunication of
Queen Elizabeth by Pope Pius V in 1570 and the growing anti-Catholic
sentiment in the decades that followed, it became increasingly difficult
for English Catholics to maintain a dual allegiance to their God and
their Queen. Childs follows the Vauxes into the heart of the underground
Catholic movement, exploring the conflicts of loyalty they faced and the
means by which they exerted defiance. Tracing the family's path from
staunch loyalty to the Crown, to passive resistance and on to increasing
activism, Childs illustrates the pressures and painful choices that
confronted the persecuted Catholic community. Though recusants like the
Vauxes comprised only a tiny fraction of the Catholic minority in
England, they aroused fears in the heart of the commonwealth. Childs
shows how "anti-popery" became an ideology and a cultural force, shaping
not only the life and policy of Elizabeth I, but also those of her
successors.
