Reform to 1564

Calvin + Reform to 1546 + Reform to 1572 + Reform to 1622

The period between the deaths of Henry VIII and Luther and the death of Calvin is marked in England by the consolidation of Reform under Henry's son Edward, and reversion to Catholicism under Mary Tudor, before the Elizabethan Settlement of 1559 and the early stages of the Anglican middle way - Reformed in theology, relatively Catholic in style.

In Europe Lutheranism was established in the north, and the Swiss Reformations associated with Zwingli and Bucer, acquire theological depth and a vision for a particular style of worship and church order through Calvin.

What links the English, Scottish, and Swiss reform movements together was not only the still universal scholarly language of Latin which had enabled the Dutch Erasmus and the German Bucer to teach English students in Cambridge, but the shared experiences of the exiles from persecution under Mary Tudor. Those who sat at the feet of Calvin returned home under Elisabeth with a clear vision of what they believed a pure Church of Christ ought to be.

Calvin's Geneva attracted refugees and scholars from around Europe. One may fairly say that in its first centuries Calvinism did not have an "overseas" missionary movement - but it was from early on a Church with a mission to Europe and established as an international faith alongside Catholicism and Lutheranism.

John Roxborogh