Act of Six Articles

Six Articles, Act of, 1539 (31 Hen. VIII c. 14). The Act gave legal and penal authority to a set of highly reactionary statements on issues of church belief and practice. The Six Articles upheld

(a) the catholic doctrine of transubstantiation;
(b) the view that one need not receive both bread and wine in the communion;
(c) the obligation of priests to remain celibate;
(d) the binding character of vows of chastity;
(e) private masses; and
(f) auricular confession.

Bishops Shaxton of Salisbury and Latimer of Worcester resigned their sees in protest. The passing of the Act seems to have resulted from a temporary ascendancy in the king's council of conservative opponents of Thomas Cromwell, especially the duke of Norfolk and Bishop Stephen Gardiner. It was repealed in the first Parliament of Edward VI in 1547.