The conclusion asks whether the exile women religious were English women who happened to be Catholic, or were they Catholic women who happened to be English? It argues that there is a far stronger case for the latter interpretation. Yes, they kept an English element of identity but this was as part of the transnational Church. It challenges a historiographical approach to the English convents and women religious that prioritises their position as communities of women or interprets them through a lens of nationality, considering them simply as communities of English. It stresses that there is a need to reorientate our understanding of the convents towards Catholic Europe and its centres, with Rome predominant but also acknowledging the importance of Spanish and French religious trends. The English convents were self-consciously Catholic communities, not isolated but fully committed parts of the universal Catholic Church and this is the core identifier that underlined their very existence.