Religious conflict is a recurring idea. For centuries, tensions in Europe between traditional Roman Catholics and reform-minded Protestants were a particularly destructive arena in which absolutely certain individuals fought devastating moral, political, spiritual and even military conflicts. According to The Six Wives, this Catholic/Protestant warfare played out at Henry's court, across England, and throughout the known world of the timeāit was the chessboard across which kings, queens, courtiers, and families all moved and were moved, the battlefield where they all strove for earthly control over what was essentially a spiritual concern.