The intermixing of government and religion has spent a lot of time in the forefront of our society these days. From laws regarding religious organizations having to cover birth control for their employees to bans on immigrants from primarily Muslim countries entering the United States, religion and government conflict more than we often like to admit. In light of the close company government and religion traditionally keep, perhaps our present time is not so very different from that of this week’s BP, A Man For All Seasons. And in the story of Sir Thomas More as related in the film, we can see our own struggle to follow conscience and uphold personal religious convictions even when faced with possible government sanctions and/or ostracizing as politics and religion slog it out in the oftentimes murky waters of the law.

The devout More leads his family in prayers before he departs on a political(-ish) errand.

Speaking of law, in More’s eyes it is (or should be) his salvation. In refusing to sign the Oath of Supremacy that names Henry VIII “Supreme Head of the Church of England” and breaks the power of the pope and the established Catholic Church over his realm, More commits high treason. Convinced that his king is in error both legally and before God, More resolves to keep his true opinions to himself on the matter of the king’s desired divorce from his first wife because, as he tells the conniving Cromwell, “The maxim of the law is ‘Silence gives consent.’” Not explaining his apparent treason, then, should lead people to assume More supports the king rather than opposes him—at least, that is the conclusion More comes to after all his years of studying and practicing law. Cromwell mocks this reasoning by asking More if the English people actually assume his support of the king (which they obviously don’t).

But while More employs the rhetoric and semantics of the law as a shield between his “deviancy” and the government’s persecution, his main struggle is with the fact that there are two kinds of laws: man’s laws and God’s laws. Undoubtedly, More would support Henry’s altering the laws of England, but the nature of the changes Henry makes breaks God’s laws about marriage and the supremacy of the Church, in More’s mind. More cannot abide a man—regardless of his title or the extent of his power—naming himself as the head of the country’s spiritual matters. Nor can More condone Henry’s manipulation of the Church’s policies regarding divorce and remarriage that follow his usurping of the pope’s power. Reluctantly, then, More must take his stand against his lord. (Spoiler alert!) Vowing to the very end of his life that he is “the King’s obedient subject,” More dies for his beliefs, the law in which he trusted failing to save him.

More at his trial during which he places his faith in the law to protect him.

For Me Then…

I dislike More’s reasoning that people should assume his approval from his silence. If his conscience prevented him from taking the king’s required oaths, then he should have spoken clearly (earlier) regarding his specific disagreement on religious grounds. It seems to me that it was a compromise of values to hope people saw him as a supporter of the king’s new church and wife when the stand he was making in his own mind and heart indicated otherwise.

But, I cannot fathom the agony of More’s position or the difficult decisions he had to make. And for one who loved and honored the law, who was convinced of his innocence and believed that his countrymen and his sovereign could never violate the sacrosanct laws of England, it must have come first as a great shock and then a horrific sorrow to realize that the religion he held dear and thought he shared with his lord and his peers was being subjugated to the king’s selfish desire to produce an heir.

This is a very frustrating film, yet it does make one think. In our own time, what would my choice be if faced with a dilemma such as Sir Thomas More’s? When government oversteps the laws of the land and tramples on God’s laws, is silence the right response? I think not. But trusting in the law for salvation rather than God’s ability to save is incorrect as well.