Religion in the Commonwealth (Cromwell the Great)

All Protestant sects enjoy full religious liberty, as states in the Instrument of Government (1653), and confirmed by the Humble Petition and Advice (1657) and the Constitutional Framework. England, Scotland, Ireland, and later Wales, have a national Church.

Besides the repealment of the episcopal polity and the Act of Uniformity of 1558 in 1646 and 1650 and the recognition of the Church of Scotland as national church, and the establishment of the commissions of triers and ejectors (1654), there were no further details of its structure or beliefs. It was left the Lord Protector and Parliament with wide discretion as to how to organized the national church either as a presbyterian or congregational policy. In the 1660s the main lines and principles were drawn for the three, and later four, national churches.

Mainly on the insistence of the Army, many independent churches were tolerated, although everyone still had to pay tithes for the maintenance of national churches and public preachers. Public and private worship is allowed and protected as long as it does not disrupt public peace, injures or molests other faiths, nor is contrary to the Holy Scripture. However toleration is not extended to catholics, episcopalians (or anglicans, until 1660s) and socinianism (unitarianism). There are no penalties for not going to church, or attending other acts of worship.