The Tudors: A show for Catholics

I avoided watching this one for a while.  I figured it'd be peppered with raunchy sex scenes (it is) and all-hail-Henry the Liberator.  That, I am stunned to say, it is not.  This show does nothing to celebrate Henry's megalomania, his selfish narcissism or his grasping tyranny.  It is not a flattering portrait of this most destructive monarch.

Having sat through so many seminars, academic talks and grad school chats where intellectuals fawn over Henry (or at least his "Reformation"), I am finding this presentation of his story--his butchery of England--fascinating.  In my mind, he was a stupid, easily-suggestible toddler, and that's exactly how he comes off in this show.

In addition to their very honest portrait of Henry's flaws and excesses--and how could you, by the way, find any way to gloss those? --whoever is in charge seems to be sympathetic to the Catholics in England whose faith was ripped from them.  Henry was not a angel from heaven liberating silly, superstitious papists (oh, do I love that particular Protestant myth):  out of selfishness, motivated by the most ridiculous purposes, he seized power and money from the Church because it was convenient and useful. Never once did this tyrant think of his people's souls, or truth, or good:  where was Henry ever concerned with the Gospel, or the work of the Church that Jesus Christ himself ordained?

No:  Henry acted from his own whims and vanity, and then surrounded himself with manipulative, zealous revolutionaries (Cromwell, Cranmer, etc).  He didn't care what they did to the priesthood, the faithful or the religious, so long as he was free to do whatever he pleased.  Some origin for "Reformation."  All of this is clearly evident in the show--so I continue to be amazed.

The show also draws sympathetic portraits of the famous Catholic martyrs:  Sir Thomas More, and even more surprisingly, Bishop Fisher.  We see More and Fisher resisting Henry's grasping and asserting the Truth that Jesus Christ himself gave us:  that he established one Church, and that he put one man in his place on earth for the good of our souls.  Their situations are closely examined, and their faithfulness and self-denial are skillfully juxtaposed to Henry's outrageous self-indulgence.

Henry himself is gross:  he is a lecherous, appetitive, unstable and unpredictable figure.  He is weak and easily manipulated, an unashamed slave to all of his passions and appetites.  There is nothing sympathetic about him in the least.  The sex--which I find lurid and unpleasant--only underscores these qualities in him.  On a side note, I am thankful that we stream these episodes, so we can fast-forward through all of his escapades.  Ick.

I've found myself disturbed and horrified by the destruction Henry wreaks:  all of it for a good lay, to be coarse!  He rends the Church, kills good men, ruins women, pollutes his country with zealotry and error, and all the while tends further and further into his own corruption and degradation--what a shameful existence!  What a legacy!

One of my favorite lines so far has come from the mouth of a Spanish envoy who assures Henry that no one will ever forget his reign . . . this show carefully examines every aspect of that legacy, and leaves me  aghast.  May God have mercy on that pathetic soul.