At this point, he needed to determine what its doctrines and practices would be in relation to the Church of Rome and the new Protestant movements in continental Europe.

The first attempt was the Ten Articles in 1536, which showed some slightly Protestant leanings – the result of an English desire for a political alliance with the German Lutheran princes.

During the reign of Edward VI, Henry VIII's son, the Forty-two Articles were written under the direction of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer in 1552.

These articles were never put into action, owing to Edward VI's death and the reversion of the English Church to Catholicism under Henry VIII's elder daughter, Mary I.

Although not the end of the struggle between Catholic and Protestant monarchs and citizens, the book helped to standardise the English language, and was to have a lasting effect on religion in the United Kingdom and elsewhere through its wide use.

In an attempt "to establish Christian quietness and unity", the Ten Articles were adopted by clerical Convocation in July 1536 as the English Church's first post-papal doctrinal statement.

[10] Justification – which was defined as remission of sin and accepting into God's favour – was through "the only mercy and grace of the Father, promised freely unto us for his Son’s sake Jesus Christ, and the merits of his blood and passion".

[11] The Articles also defended the use of a number of Catholic rituals and practices opposed by Protestants, such as kissing the cross on Good Friday, while mildly criticising popular abuses and excesses.

[16][17] When the synod met, conservatives were still angry that four of the traditional seven sacraments (confirmation, marriage, holy orders and extreme unction) had been excluded from the Ten Articles.

In agreement with the Eastern Orthodox and Huldrych Zwingli's church at Zurich, the authors of the Bishops' Book adopted the Jewish tradition of separating these commandments.

Nevertheless, the King was not entirely satisfied and took it upon himself to make a revised Bishops' Book, which, among other proposed changes,[25] weakened the original's emphasis on justification by faith.

[26] Because the Bishops' Book was never authorised by the Crown or Convocation, the Ten Articles remained the official doctrinal standard of the Church of England.

In May 1538, three Lutheran theologians from Germany – Franz Burchard, vice-chancellor of Saxony; Georg von Boineburg, doctor of law; and Friedrich Myconius, superintendent of the church in Gotha – arrived in London and held conferences with English bishops and clergy at the archbishop's Lambeth Palace through September.

[29] The bishops also refused to eliminate what the Germans considered abuses (e.g. private masses for the dead, compulsory clerical celibacy, and withholding communion wine from the laity) allowed by the English Church.

[36] Married priests had until 12 July to put away their wives, which was likely a concession granted to give Archbishop Cranmer time to move his wife and children outside of England.

To make the English Church fully Protestant, Cranmer also envisioned a reform of canon law and the creation of a concise doctrinal statement, which would become the Forty-two Articles.

[56] Convocation passed only 39 of the 42, and Elizabeth reduced the number to 38 by throwing out Article 29 to avoid offending her subjects with Catholic leanings.

[58] While not designed to be a creed or complete statement of the Christian faith, the articles explain the doctrinal position of the Church of England in relation to Calvinism, as well as Catholicism and Anabaptism.

[65] This was meant to counter the radical Protestant belief that a Christian could preach and act as a minister on his own initiative in defiance of church authorities.

[68] The five rites called sacraments by Catholics are identified in the articles as either corrupted imitations of the Apostles (confirmation, penance and extreme unction) or as "states of life allowed in the Scriptures" (holy orders and marriage).

This was meant as a repudiation of the popular medieval idea that the Mass was a sacrifice in which Christ was offered for the forgiveness of sins for the living and the dead in purgatory.

Starting in 1865, clergy affirmed that the doctrine contained in the Articles and the Book of Common Prayer was agreeable to Scripture and that they would not preach in contradiction to it.

Since 1975, clergy are required to acknowledge the Articles as one of the historic formularies of the Church of England that bear witness to the faith revealed in Scripture and contained in the creeds.

An important concrete manifestation of this is the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, which incorporates Articles VI, VIII, XXV, and XXXVI in its broad articulation of fundamental Anglican identity.

For example, in the ongoing debate over homosexual activity and the concomitant controversies over episcopal authority, Articles VI, XX, XXIII, XXVI, and XXXIV are regularly cited by those of various opinions.

The several provincial editions of Prayer Books (and authorised alternative liturgies) are, however, not identical, although they share a greater or smaller amount of family resemblance.

In 2003, evangelical Anglican clergyman Chris Pierce wrote: The Thirty-Nine Articles define the biblically derived summations of precise Christian doctrine.

In earlier times English and Irish evangelicals would have read Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, Ussher, and Ryle and would unreservedly agree with Dean Litton's assessment that (quoted by Dean Paul Zahl, in his work 'The Protestant Face of Anglicanism'), 'The Anglican Church, if she is to be judged by the statements of the Articles, must be ranked among the Protestant Churches of Europe.

[citation needed] In 1643, Archbishop of Armagh John Bramhall laid out a broader view of the Articles: Some of them are the very same that are contained in the Creed; some others of them are practical truths, which come not within the proper list of points or articles to be believed; lastly, some of them are pious opinions or inferior truths, which are proposed by the Church of England to all her sons, as not to be opposed; not as essentials of Faith necessary to be believed by all Christians necessitate medii, under pain of damnation.

The stipulations of Articles XXV and XXVIII were regularly invoked by evangelicals to oppose the reintroduction of certain beliefs, customs, and acts of piety with respect to the sacraments.