A restless activist who had at one point tried to point England in the direction of Calvinism. Fleeing England from Queen Mary I's bloody persecution of Protestants, John went to the continent where he developed the theory that Protestants had the right to resist, by force if necessary, any Roman Catholic ruler who tried to prevent their worship and mission. When civil war in Scotland broke out in 1559, Knox rushed home. When the Calvinists were in control of Edinburgh in the summer of 1560, Knox drafted the articles of religion which parliament accepted for the country, thereby abolishing Roman Catholicism. When Queen Mary of Scots returned to her kingdom she found it in the lap of Protestant "heresy".

[tags]BlogRodent, church-history, ChurchRodent, history, John-Knox[/tags]

In Scotland the Calvinists created something unique in sixteenth century Europe: a land of one religion ruled by a monarch of another. Mary Queen of Scots, an eighteen-year-old girl living abroad, married into the French royal family, and the Scots feared that she might deliver Scotland to the French. But John Knox preached everywhere that the people of Scotland could and should challenge the rule of their queen. In 1550, civil war broke out in Scotland. When Mary Queen of Scots returned the next year, a nineteen-year-old widow, she found it in the lap of Protestant "heresy". Over the next few years Knox, the passionate preacher of Calvinism, and Mary, the young queen of Scotland, came to symbolize the Reformation conflict: Protestant against Catholic. Events in Scotland moved in Knox's direction. Even though Mary and her descendants tried to turn back the clock, Scotland remained the most devoutly Calvinist country