Although Romanism had been banished from Protestant Scotland, it would be naïve to say that there was no threat of its re-emergence. Despite the watchdogs for the reformed cause being alert, it was said that the Romanists were swarming home to Scotland ‘like locusts’, after the Romanist Council of Trent (1545-1563) had condemned the Reformation and had reinforced its unbiblical papal beliefs. Esmé Stuart was the favourite friend of the young King James VI, and although James had been nurtured in the Protestant faith, there were fears that Esmé’s Romanist inclinations might lead the young king astray. To allay any suspicions King James commissioned his chaplain, John Craig, to produce a short confession of faith which no Romanist would be able to sign with a clear conscience. For this reason, the Negative, or King’s Confession, as it was called, might sound more aggressive to us in its tone, than previous reformed documents. The original document was signed in 1580 by King James, Esmé Stuart, and the courtiers, and was accepted fully by the Assembly of the Church of Scotland the following year.
The document firstly reaffirms the Scots Confession of 1560, which had been ratified by the Church of Scotland, ‘the King’s Majestie’, and the three Estates of Scotland (the church leaders, nobility and burgesses), which had all been confirmed by Acts of Parliament. After this it launches into a diatribe against ‘the usurped authoritie of that Romane Antichrist upon the scriptures of God, upon the Kirk, the civill Magistrate, and consciences of men… againis our Christian libertie…’ The King’s Confession lists the unbiblical practices of the Romanist Church, such as transubstantiation, celibacy of the priests, praying to angels, Mary and the saints, worshipping images, relics and the cross, purgatory, prayers for the dead, performing the church service in Latin, which most people did not understand, justification by good works, rather than by Christ, the worldly papal pyramid power structure, and other such things. These the King’s Confession document roundly condemns.
Mention is made of the Pope’s ‘erroneous and bloodie Decreets made at Trente’, and all beliefs and practices which are contrary to the plain word of God. Most of the decrees made at the Council of Trent, which contained anathemas, or curses for those who would not accept them, were seen by the reformers as a total betrayal of Christ, the biblical New Testament teaching, and Christ’s gospel. The King’s Confession would also be copied out in its entirety and placed later in the first section of the National Covenant of 1638.
‘Contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints’ (Jude 3, NKJV).
Image: Unknown artist of the Scottish school; attributed to Adrian Vanson or the school of Alonso Sánchez Coello, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. King James was 20 at this time, in 1586.