They were separating from the Church of England in order to practice religous freedom, their "purified" form of Christianity involving less Catholic components, in the New World.
Pilgrims were separatists.
Pilgrims
Pilgrims
strangers
The Pilgrims
Puritans
There were around 35 passengers on the Mayflower who were part of the Christian separatist group known as the Pilgrims.
The non-Separatist Puritans who sought refuge in the New World were known as the Pilgrims. They were dismissed by King James I and faced religious persecution in England. The Pilgrims eventually settled in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620.
They wanted to seperate from the English church.
The word means traveler in a foreign land.
The pilgrims were known as separatists because they did not believe in the teachings of the English church so they SEPERATED from it. They did this by coming to the Americas and starting their own colonies.
They are both separatist that left for religious freedoms the Puritans to purify the church and Pilgrims to practice there own religion.