On taking the throne in 1603, James I had to navigate between the Puritan and Catholic faiths of his kingdom. Puritans sought to “purify” the Church of England of any remaining Catholic elements after Elizabeth I’s religious settlement of 1559. Despite having been baptized by a radical Protestant, James was too pragmatic to abandon the center ground established by Elizabeth.
In 1611 James I banned the Puritans’ bible and published his own, the King James Bible. Some Puritans, such as John Winthrop who later became the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, opted to leave and settle in the New World. On the Catholic question, James began his reign by ending fines levied on Catholics who did not attend church.
Following the Gunpowder Plot, the state persecuted clandestine Catholic priests such as Father Oldcorne, executed in 1606. With regard to lay Catholics, however, James did not order a crackdown. Later, his warm relations with Spain perturbed many Protestants. After James died in 1625, Catholic-Protestant tensions, far from being resolved, continued to deteriorate.
