Elizabeth Barton (known as The Nun of Kent, The Holy Maid of London or The Holy Maid of Kent; 1506? – April 20, 1534) was executed for prophesying that if King Henry VIII of England married Anne Boleyn against the wishes of the Pope, he would die within six months. 1506 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... April 20 is the 110th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (111th in leap years). ... Events February 27 - Group of Anabaptists of Jan Matthys seize Münster and declare it The New Jerusalem - they begin to exile dissenters and forcible baptize all others May 10 - Jacques Cartier explores Newfoundland while searching for the Northwest Passage. ... Prophecy, in a broad sense, is the prediction of future events. ... Henry VIII (28 June 1491 – 28 January 1547) was King of England and Lord of Ireland (later King of Ireland) from 22 April 1509 until his death. ... A portrait of Anne painted some years after her death. ... The Pope (from Greek: pappas, father; from Latin: papa, Papa, father) is the head of the Roman Catholic Church. ...

Little is known of Barton's early life, although she appears to have come from a poor background, as she was working as a servant when her visions first began in 1525. During that year she suffered from severe unknown illness, and she claimed to have received revelations from God. Barton's revelations either predicted future events (such as the death of a child living her household), or more frequently took the form of pleas for people to follow the teachings of the Catholic Church. In particular she urged people to pray to Mary and go on pilgrimages. It should be noted that such behavior was not uncommon during the period; people would not have jumped to the conclusion that she was mentally unbalanced. The name Catholic Church can mean a visible organization that refers to itself as Catholic, or the invisible Christian Church, viz. ... A pilgrimage is a journey by a religious person to a place that is sacred according to his or her religion. ...

Shortly after she had begun receiving visions, she entered a convent and became a nun. She rapidly became popular among both the masses and the elite leadership that controlled England. Barton held a private meeting in 1528 with Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the most powerful man in England after the King, and shortly thereafter met with the King himself on two occasions. Barton was tolerated by the government because her prophecies did not challenge the existing order, but rather supported it. Cardinal Thomas Wolsey (c. ...

Unfortunately for Barton the existing order changed when Henry VIII, in order to receive an annulment from his wife, Catherine of Aragon, decided to break off the church in England from the Pope, and create the protestant Church of England. Barton was incredibly opposed to the Henrician Reformation, and around 1532 Barton began prophesying that if the King would remarry he would die shortly thereafter. Remarkably, Barton went unpunished for her opposition to the King for nearly a year, in large part because she appears to have been more popular than the King. In fact, Barton was only tried for treason after supporters of the King had severely damaged her reputation by spreading rumors that Barton was engaged in several sexual relationships with her priests. Other critics also began to argue that Barton suffered from madness. With her reputation damaged, in 1533 the crown arrested her and either got Barton to make a confession or fabricated one. According to the confession presented by the crown, Barton admitted that she had made up her revelations on the insistence of several priests. In 1534 she was executed for treason. Annulment is a legal procedure for declaring a marriage null and void. ... The recently-widowed young Catherine of Aragon, by Henry VIIs court painter, Michael Sittow, c. ... The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England, and acts as the mother and senior branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion, as well as a founding member of the Porvoo Communion. ... The English Reformation was the process whereby the external authority of the Roman Catholic Church in England was abolished and replaced with Royal Supremacy and the establishment of a Church of England outside the Roman Catholic Church and under the Supreme Governance of the English monarch. ... In law, treason is the crime of disloyalty to ones nation or state. ...

References

Ethan H. Shagan, Popular Politics in the English Reformation, Cambridge UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003: chapter 2, "The Anatomy of opposition in early Reformation England: the case of Elizabeth Barton, the holy maid of Kent," p. 61-88.