#or reading between the lines ; is that with some smudging elizabeth could *actually be considered in good faith by the papacy as well

[fideidefenswhore]

You mentioned that Mary, during her reign, did not consider her father's later marriages valid. Could it be because they were not under the Catholic faith? At least that's what I understood, correct me if I'm wrong

More specifically, none of these marriages (save his to Anne Boleyn's, ironically enough...although that was a conditional papal dispensation to be used in the specific circumstances of either the annulment of his first marriage granted by the papacy, or, by implication, the death of Catherine of Aragon) had the required papal dispensations (HVIII was related in some degree to all of them, specifically through Edward I at the least). HVIII and COA had the papal dispensation that was upheld explicitly by a later Pope and implicitly by the rest, Mary I and Philip II had the needed papal dispensation to wed.