Archbishop Thomas Cranmer is known for many things, but, surprisingly, not for his most influential act. In 1549, Cranmer completed The Book of Common Prayer, the all-English, Reformationist revision of the Roman Catholic church service. He kept the wedding rite that some Catholic service books had included for centuries, but tweaked it. His most important change was to add the words “to love and to cherish.” The words sound familiar today, but back then they broke with tradition.
Both professionally and personally, Cranmer’s life was all about marriage. After his first wife died during childbirth, he became a priest. In Nuremberg, in 1532, seeking doctrinal support for annulling King Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, Cranmer envied Protestant clerics’ ability to marry. Even though he was a Catholic priest and forbidden from marrying, he secretly wed the niece of a theologian. Shortly after, he was surprised to be summoned to England to serve as Archbishop of Canterbury—a position that would make his marriage all the more scandalous.
