In English history, Recusant was generally synonymous with nonconformist. They were people who wilfully absented themselves from the Church of England, the church that was established by law in England. Recusants were subject to various civil disabilities and penalties under the penal laws. Some recusants were Protestant dissenters whose faiths arose out of the Puritan movements, although with the growth of these churches after the Restoration of Charles II they tended to go by the name "Non Conformist".

Most were Roman Catholics, and the name tended to stick to Roman Catholics. Because of the sometimes severe and expensive penalties and the difficulty of organising churches without private means, recusants tended to be more aristocratic or landed than was the norm for English society. Recusant families tended to send their children abroad for education as Catholic schools were illegal in Britain, and many Catholic public schools such as Stonyhurst[[1]] and Ampleforth had their origin overseas. All Catholic seminaries were overseas, with the sole English survivors being the Venerable English College in Rome and the Royal English College in Valladolid.

Today Recusant tends to apply to English Catholics who were not converts or descended from immigrants.