Culture of England Catholic Church does not accept) and has been a distinct Anglican church since the settlement under Elizabeth I of England (with some disruption during the 17th-century Commonwealth of England period). The British Monarch is formally Supreme Governor of the Church of England. Its spiritual leader is the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is regarded by convention as the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion. In practice the Church of England is governed by the General Synod of the Church of England, under the authority of Parliament. The Church of England's mission to spread the Gospel has seen the establishment of many
History of the Church of England a commission of enquiry into the nature and value of all ecclesiastical property in 1535, which culminated in the Dissolution of the Monasteries (1536 – 1540). Many Roman Catholics consider the separation of the Church in England from Rome in 1534 to be the true origin of the Church of England, rather than dating it from the mission of St. Augustine in AD 597. While Anglicans acknowledge that Henry VIII's repudiation of papal authority caused the Church of England to become a separate entity, they believe that it is in continuity with the pre-Reformation Church of England. Apart from its