Editing Thomas More (section)

=== Anglican Communion ===
In 1980, despite their staunch opposition to the [[English Reformation]], More and Fisher were added as martyrs of the reformation to the [[Church of England]]'s [[Calendar of saints (Church of England)|calendar]] of "Saints and Heroes of the Christian Church", to be [[Commemoration (Anglicanism)|commemorated]] every 6 July (the date of More's execution) as "Thomas More, scholar, and John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, Reformation Martyrs, 1535".<ref name=CofEholyDays /><ref>{{Cite web|title=The Calendar|url=https://www.churchofengland.org/prayer-and-worship/worship-texts-and-resources/common-worship/churchs-year/calendar|access-date=2021-03-27|website=The Church of England|language=en}}</ref> The annual remembrance of 6 July, is recognised by all Anglican Churches in communion with Canterbury, including Australia, Brazil, Canada and South Africa.<ref name=RefRep>{{cite book|title=Reformation Reputations: The Power of the Individual in English Reformation History|year=2020|publisher=Springer International Publishing|editor=David J. Crankshaw, George W. C. Gross}}</ref>

In an essay examining the events around the addition to the Anglican calendar, scholar [[Bill Sheils]] links the reasoning for More's recognition to a "long-standing tradition hinted at in [[Rose Macaulay]]'s ironic debating point of 1935 about More's status as an 'unschismed Anglican', a tradition also recalled in the annual memorial lecture held at St. Dunstan's Church in Canterbury, where More's head is said to be buried."<ref name=RefRep/> Sheils also noted the influence of the 1960s play and film ''[[A Man for All Seasons (play)|A Man for All Seasons]]'', which gave More a "reputation as a defender of the right of conscience".<ref name=RefRep/> Thanks to the play's depiction,  this "brought his life to a broader and more popular audience" with the film "extending its impact worldwide following the Oscar triumphs".<ref name=RefRep/> Around this time the atheist Oxford historian and intellectual [[Hugh Trevor-Roper]] held More up as "the first great Englishman whom we feel that we know, the most saintly of Humanists...the universal man of our cool northern Renaissance."<ref name=RefRep/> In 1978, the quincentenary of More's birth, Trevor-Roper wrote an essay putting More in the Renaissance Platonist tradition, claiming his reputation was "quite independent of his Catholicism."<ref name=RefRep/> (Only, later on, did a more critical view arise in academia, led by Professor Sir Geoffrey Elton, which "challenged More's reputation for saintliness by focusing on his dealings with heretics, the ferocity of which, in fairness to him, More did not deny. In this research, More's role as a prosecutor, or persecutor, of dissidents has been at the centre of the debate.")<ref name=RefRep/>