The Archbishop's Address

[Pontifex Maximus]

In a homily in Canterbury, the Archbishop of Canterbury assumed the pulpit to deliver a carefully prepared address. Copies and versions of it had already been published and would be distributed far and wide in English. A copy would also be sent to Pope Innocent VIII.

"Faithful, we are gathered here on the Feast day of St. Perpetua in a troubled Realm. The Queen remains outside the faith, a continued excommunicant. Many have dismissed this action that I have taken and described it as little more than a feud between families. The excommunication, however, was not based upon the imprisonment of my brother, but the Queen Regent shutting the doors of the Court and access to our King off to the Church. I believed that enforcing an interdict over London would force the Queen to bargain, but I was wrong. The Queen's heart is hardened against the plight of her people, and after weeks of intense prayer, God has revealed to me that my actions have been wrong with regards to interdict. I hereby order the interdict lifted. The faithful of London should not be denied the light of the Church and the grace of our Saviour due to the actions of a witch among us. Yes, a witch!"

The Archbishop paused for rhetorical effect and waited for the murmuring to die down.

"The Holy Father in Rome, my dear brother Innocent, has published Papal articles that acknowledge the existence of dozens, possibly hundreds, witches operating in Germany and the region of the Rhineland. Such witches have engaged in such depravities, but I shall let the Pope's words describe the situation:

'heedless of their own salvation and forsaking the catholic faith , give themselves over to devils male and female, and by their incantations, charms, and conjurings, and by other abominable superstitions and sortileges, offences, crimes, and misdeeds, ruin and cause to perish the offspring of women, the foal of animals, the products of the earth, the grapes of vines, and the fruits of trees, as well as men and women, cattle and flocks and herds and animals of every kind, vineyards also and orchards, meadows, pastures, harvests, grains and other fruits of the earth; that they afflict and torture with dire pains and anguish, both internal and external, these men, women, cattle, flocks, herds, and animals, and hinder men from begetting and women from conceiving, and prevent all consummation of marriage; that, moreover, they deny with sacrilegious lips the faith they received in holy baptism; and that, at the instigation of the enemy of mankind, they do not fear to commit and perpetrate many other abominable offences and crimes, at the risk of their own souls, to the insult of the divine majesty and to the pernicious example and scandal of multitudes.'

We are all aware that the Queen has imprisoned a multitude of Peers in the Tower, and has slowly begun to kill them. In the city of London, which has for so long been deprived of God’s light by my own fault, it has become a haven for such folk as the Pope describes. Faithful, it took weeks of prayer and fasting in order to finally understand that I never should have enforced an interdict upon London, for it played right into the hands of the Queen, whom I now strongly suspect of witchcraft. I must believe that I was under some spell cast by the Queen in order to give her a base of operations for her sorceries.
For my sins I must atone, beg repentance, and steel my soul against the persuasions and influences of further spells or bad humors. I shall do so by yearly doles of bread and food within Canterbury for the benefit of the poor. But more importantly I cannot afford to ignore the operations of witches within England. I invite the Inquisition to England and pledge to it my full cooperation, furthermore I charge Elizabeth Woodeville with Witchcraft, a charge she must answer for.”

Request rolls for unrest in London/tax/desertion penalties against the Queen/Woodeville faction.

+3 Charisma