The Reformation failed comprehensively and absolutely in Ireland before the end of Elizabeth’s reign: contemporaries estimated the number of Irish Protestants at between forty and 120 individuals. The debate about that failure has been long running, yet inconclusive. After a short historiographical review, this paper considers a range of factors which may have been pertinent in shaping Irish responses to the Reformation policies of Henry VIII and his Protestant children. It shows that Elizabeth’s Reformation in Ireland was stymied by the absence of indigenous support, which meant that religious change was neither propagated by local clergymen nor enforced by the local elites in Irish parishes. It points to the strength and persistence of Catholic resistance to the Reformation in different forms from the very start of Elizabeth’s reign in Ireland, contradicting the unsubstantiated notion that passive ‘church papistry’ was general. Nonetheless, it argues that it was only from the 1580s, when the Catholic church in Ireland was reorganised as a disestablished ‘people’s church’, and infused with the confidence inspired by the Counter-Reformation, can it be stated that the Reformation had failed in Ireland definitively.

中文翻译：

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为什么爱尔兰的宗教改革失败了

在伊丽莎白统治结束之前，爱尔兰的宗教改革彻底而彻底地失败了：同时代的人估计爱尔兰新教徒的人数在 40 到 120 人之间。关于那次失败的争论由来已久，但尚无定论。经过简短的历史回顾后，本文考虑了一系列可能与爱尔兰对亨利八世及其新教子女的宗教改革政策的反应有关的因素。它表明伊丽莎白在爱尔兰的宗教改革因缺乏土著支持而受到阻碍，这意味着宗教变革既不是由当地神职人员传播的，也不是由爱尔兰教区的当地精英强制执行的。它指出了从伊丽莎白在爱尔兰统治一开始，天主教以不同形式抵抗宗教改革的力量和持久性，与被动的“教会纸质书”是普遍存在的未经证实的概念相矛盾。尽管如此，它辩称，只有从 1580 年代，爱尔兰的天主教会被重组为一个不成立的“人民教会”，并充满了反宗教改革所激发的信心，才能说宗教改革在爱尔兰绝对。