LATIMER, Hugh – Anglican bishop, one of the leaders of the English “Reformation,” b. at Thurcaston (Leicestershire) c. 1480-90, d. at Oxford in 1555. Initially an opponent of the Protestant “Reformation,” he received his bachelor’s degree with a dissertation against Melanchthon (1524), but soon after inclined toward Protestantism. He soon gained fame as a preacher. The bishop of Ely, West, suspended him from preaching (1525), but he was able to continue in an Augustinian convent before a very large audience. Many of his statements caused a great stir.
In 1530 he was Lenten preacher at court and preached before Henry VIII. The following year he obtained the parish of Westoning (Wiltshire), and thanks to the royal favor he had gained, he avoided a sentence of condemnation that seemed certain because of his heretical preaching. The English schism brought him to a position of prominence. In 1535 he became archbishop of Worcester and supported the work of T. Cromwell. Opposed to the “Articles of Uniformity,” which he refused to subscribe to, he was deposed and lived for some time in retirement until 1548, when, with the accession of Edward VI, he resumed his preaching. His sermons from that period remained famous for certain themes of social importance that were addressed, such as the sustained immorality of certain aspects of the English agrarian economy. By 1548 Latimer could be considered practically a Calvinist. With the accession of the Catholic Mary (v.), he was summoned to London. He did not flee: he presented himself at a public disputation where he declared his convictions. After failed attempts to make him recant, on 16 Oct. 1555 he was sent to the stake.