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In the early 17th century, thousands of English Puritans settled in North America, almost all in New England.Puritans were intensely devout members of the Church of England who believed that the Church of England was insufficiently reformed, retaining too much of its Roman Catholic doctrinal roots, and who therefore opposed royal ecclesiastical policy.
The Puritan's main purpose was to purify the Church of England and to make England a more Christian country. History of the Puritans under Elizabeth I, 1558–1603; History of the Puritans under James I, 1603–1625; History of the Puritans under Charles I, 1625–1649; History of the Puritans from 1649; History of the Puritans in North America
In the United States, the Puritan settlement of New England was a major influence on American Protestantism. With the start of the English Civil War in 1642, fewer settlers to New England were Puritans. The period of 1642 to 1659 represented a period of peaceful dominance in English life by the formerly discriminated Puritan population.
The towns did not have courts; that was a function of the county, whose officials were appointed by the state government. [148] The Congregational church which the Puritans founded was not automatically joined by all New England residents because of Puritan beliefs that God singled out specific people for salvation. Instead, membership was ...
Puritans did not believe confirmation was necessary and thought candidates were poorly prepared since bishops did not have the time to examine them properly. [ 68 ] [ 69 ] The marriage service was criticised for using a wedding ring (which implied that marriage was a sacrament) and having the groom vow to his bride "with my body I thee worship ...
The decline of conversions and the division over the Half-Way Covenant was part of a larger loss of confidence experienced by Puritans in the latter half of the 17th century. In the 1660s and 1670s, Puritans began noting signs of moral decline in New England, and ministers began preaching jeremiads calling people to account for their sins.
He did, however, approve a few changes in the Book of Common Prayer: 1) the mention of baptism by midwives was to be eliminated; 2) the term "absolution" (which Puritans associated with the Catholic sacrament of penance, which was rejected by Protestants) was replaced by the term "remission of sins"; 3) confirmation was renamed "laying on of ...
King James I and Charles I made some efforts to reconcile the Puritan clergy who had been alienated by the lack of change in the Church of England.Puritans embraced Calvinism (Reformed theology) with its opposition to ritual and an emphasis on preaching, a growing sabbatarianism, and preference for a presbyterian system of church polity, as opposed to the episcopal polity of the Church of ...