Portal:Reformed Christianity/Selected article/15

Scottish religion in the seventeenth century includes all forms of religious organisation and belief in the Kingdom of Scotland in the seventeenth century. During the sixteenth century, Scotland had undergone a Protestant Reformation that created a predominately Calvinist national kirk, which was strongly Presbyterian in outlook. James VI favoured doctrinal Calvinism, but also episcopacy. His son Charles I authorised a book of canons that made him head of the Church and enforced the use of a new liturgy, seen as an English-style Prayer Book. In the resulting rebellion the Scottish bishops were formally expelled from the Church and representatives of various sections of Scottish society drew up the National Covenant. In the subsequent Bishop's Wars the Scottish Covenanters emerged as virtually independent rulers. Charles I's failure led indirectly to the English Civil War (1642–1646). The Covenanters intervened on the side of Parliament, who were victorious, but became increasingly alienated from the Parliamentary regime. The Scottish defeats in the subsequent Second and Third civil wars, led to English occupation and incorporation in a Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland led by Oliver Cromwell from 1652 and the imposition of religious toleration for Protestants. The Scottish Covenanters divided into parties of Resolutioners and Protesters.