The Act of Uniformity 1559 set the order of prayer to be used in the English Book of Common Prayer. Every man had to go to church once a week or be fined.
This act made up part of the Elizabethan Religious Settlement in England instituted by Elizabeth I who wanted to impose an Anglican Church upon the country. Other acts concerned with this settlement were the Act of Supremacy 1559 and the Thirty-Nine Articles (1563).
Elizabeth was trying to achieve a settlement after thirty years of turmoil during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and Mary I, in which England had swung from Catholicism to Anglicanism and back to Catholicism again.
See also
External links
The Act of Uniformity -- Full text of the Act of Uniformity 1559
