Was John Donne a Catholic?: Conversion, Conformity, and Early Modern English Confessional Identities.

This article reevaluates the commonly held view that John Donne was raised as a recusant Roman Catholic and later converted to Protestantism, arguing instead that Donne's religious identity was shaped by conformity to the Church of England rather than conversion. Examining evidence from both his father's and stepfather's families, the article suggests Donne was likely baptized and raised within the Church of England's practices, despite his mother's Catholic sympathies. Unlike his brother Henry, whose commitment to recusant Catholicism is documented, John Donne's adult writings indicate he saw himself as having made a conscious, adult choice of religious allegiance rather than undergoing a conversion from Catholicism. The article emphasizes the complexity of religious identities in late Elizabethan England, highlighting that Donne's affiliation with the Church of England was a deliberate personal decision rather than an inherited or imposed status.