Background
He was born at Bury St. Edmunds, Norfolk, around 1483. His father was a cloth-maker of "comfortable circumstances," and Stephen was sent to Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where he became a doctor of both canon and civil law (1520-1521).
clergyman politician statesman
He was born at Bury St. Edmunds, Norfolk, around 1483. His father was a cloth-maker of "comfortable circumstances," and Stephen was sent to Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where he became a doctor of both canon and civil law (1520-1521).
Two years later he entered government service as a legal expert to Cardinal Wolsey, soon becoming involved in the drama of Henry VIII's divorce from Catherine of Aragon, on the king's behalf, and thereby identifying himself with the break with the Catholic Church at Rome.
Stephen taught at Cambridge until taken up by Wolsey as a secretary in 1524. Two years later he entered government service as a legal expert to Cardinal Wolsey, soon becoming involved in the drama of Henry VIII's divorce from Catherine of Aragon, on the king's behalf, and thereby identifying himself with the break with the Catholic Church at Rome.
In recognition of his services, Gardiner was appointed to the Privy Council and made bishop of Winchester in 1531.
Gardiner was essentially a bureaucrat who received an ecclesiastical promotion for service to the state, not the church.
In 1535 he wrote De vera obedientia to put forth this position.
With the death of the king in 1547 and the swing to Protestantism under Edward VI, the bishop was promptly deprived of his see and imprisoned.
Gardiner could not accept the Protestant denial of the sacrificial nature of the mass, and he feared that the new faith would produce social revolution in England as it had in Germany during the Peasants' Revolt. During the last seven years of Henry's reign, Gardiner was the king's chief minister and the leader of the Conservative Party, which was trying to block further religious innovations.
He opposed Protestantism on two counts - one religious, the other political.
A description of his character from George Cavendish declared him "a swarthy complexion, hooked nose, deep-set eyes, a permanent frown, huge hands and a vengeful wit. He was ambitious, sure of himself, irascible, astute, and worldly. "