The clergy and people resented generally the wholesale rights of
reservation exercised by the Pope in regard to English benefices, the
appointment of foreigners to offices in England, the heavy taxes
levied by the Roman Curia directly or indirectly in the shape of
Annats or First Fruits, the withdrawal of comparatively trivial cases
from the local courts, and the exercise of jurisdiction over the
highest dignitaries of England by the legates commissioned by the Holy
See. But it is one thing to criticise the actual working of papal
supremacy as interpreted by Roman officials, or to seek to limit its
exercise in the every-day life of any particular church, and another
to call in question the supremacy itself. The English clergy and
people did, indeed, object to allow papal supremacy to be pushed too
far in what they regarded as purely domestic affairs, but even in the
most prolonged and heated discussions they never once questioned the
fact that the Pope was Supreme Head of the Church in England, or that
he was Supreme Head of the Catholic Church throughout the world.

The Statute of Provisors (1350-1), by which all appointments to
English benefices were to be made by canonical election or by the
nomination of lay patrons to the exclusion of papal provisions, is
cited sometimes as a proof that the English nation disregarded the
claims of the Holy See, but with equal justice and for a similar
reason it might be maintained that the Council of Trent rejected the
Supremacy of the Pope (Session xxiv., chap. 19). The Statute was
called for, owing to the spiritual and economic losses inflicted on
the country by the appointment of foreigners, and its passage was
secured mainly by the lay patrons, whose rights of patronage were
infringed by the constant stream of papal provisions. It was neither
inspired by hostility to the Holy See, nor by any doubt about the
supremacy of the Pope, and in itself it was a piece of legislation