It’s good to see that the future Supreme Governor of our state Church and its clerical head found that magic something that’ll create a lasting bond.
Both are Aston Villa fans, and what can bring two people together as surely as shared worship? Nothing, is the answer to that, especially when they both worship a provincial football team to which neither of them has any geographical links.
I picked up this fact, nay this understanding, from an article in The Times entitled Prince William Confirms Quiet Faith and New Commitment to Church.
The article describes a visit the Prince and Princess of Wales have paid to the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Dame Sarah Mullally. Their shared love of Aston Villa was mentioned twice in the article, each time as a factor in forging closer links between our two pivotal institutions.
I’d like to extend this foray into textual analysis by pointing out that one of my least favourite words, ‘relevant’, cropped up four times, as in “institutions must continue to remain relevant” or “English spiritual tradition that remains relevant in contemporary life”.
The thing about textual analysis is that it can also reveal words that one would think should be there but aren’t. In this case, the absent word is ‘God’, which is an odd omission in a longish article about the link between throne and altar.
An explanation is sorely needed, and the article helpfully provides it: “William, 43, is not a devout Christian nor a regular churchgoer like the King and the late Queen Elizabeth. His commitment to his Christian faith has long been questioned.”
I’m not surprised, and neither would anyone be who is familiar with the art of English understatement. For the first sentence in that quote really means that William is strictly a nominal Christian who doesn’t believe in God and only ever goes to church when royal protocol demands it.
One such occasion will come up in a few days, when Prince William will perform a duty traditionally assigned to the Prince of Wales by attending Dame Sarah’s official installation.
This has presented an opportunity for the prince to state what besides Aston Villa he believes in, and he duly obliged. His “personal faith” is in establishing “a strong and meaningful bond with the Church and its leadership”.
By inference, William must think that no such bond exists at the moment, which means he must have played truant when British constitutional history was taught. Even so, William was present at his father’s coronation. Unless he was surreptitiously doing an Easy Sudoku throughout, he couldn’t possibly have failed to espy the bond in question.
The British monarch is anointed, and his coronation is a lavish church ritual unmatched anywhere in Europe. The ceremony is always officiated by the Archbishop of Canterbury, with every church dignitary in attendance. On 6 May, 2023, also present were representatives of other Christian denominations and non-Christian faiths. That last part was a novelty, but King Charles felt such ecumenism behoved the head of the British Commonwealth.
So what, other than his support of Aston Villa, will William do to strengthen the bond that, as we’ve discovered, is already rather strong? The article explains: “His intervention signals that his relationship with the Church will ‘evolve’ [another dread word] from that of previous monarchs, whose strong faith underpinned their reigns.”
If I understand correctly, William’s relationship with the Church will be underpinned by something other than his strong faith. Since I’ve already milked the Aston Villa connection for all it’s worth, I struggle to think what that might be.
The prince’s spokesman didn’t elucidate the issue all that much. William, he said, “is keen to build a strong and meaningful bond with the Church and its leadership, one that respects tradition while speaking to a modern Britain, and reflects his broader belief that institutions must continue to remain relevant and connected to the people they serve.”
Since most Britons are atheists, the Church and its leadership may definitely become “relevant and connected to the people they serve” by de-emphasising God and becoming a sort of amalgam between Oxfam and social services. Is that what a relevant connection should look like?
A relevant connection emerging between Dame Sarah and Prince William is more clearcut: she is likely to officiate his coronation when the time comes, one hopes not soon. But the ceremony, says the article, will “look and feel quite different”.
And further: “He is really thinking, ‘How do we make his coronation feel most relevant in the future?’ He is mindful of the fact that … whenever his time comes, how can the coronation be modern but also unifying to the nation and the Commonwealth?”
Well, having a female Archbishop of Canterbury is a giant stride towards desired relevance. Dame Sarah’s clerical career is as relevant as relevant can be.
She served as Chief Nursing Officer until 2004, when she decided to pursue full-time ministry. A mere 14 years later she was consecrated as the Bishop of London, and after another six years as the Archbishop of Canterbury.
This was the most vertiginous such rise in modern times, although Thomas Becket’s record is hard to beat. Henry II appointed him Archbishop the day after his ordination, while poor Sarah had to wait over 20 years for her own elevation.
But at least she can console herself by knowing she became the first female Archbishop in history. When Dame Sarah was appointed, she highlighted a fight against misogyny as her prime mission, something Jesus Christ inexplicably left out of the Sermon on the Mount.
One has to remember that most, dare I say all, female priests have to be woke Lefties practically by definition. A woman seeking ordination thereby defies two millennia of church tradition in the name of feminism, which ipso facto is a clear statement of her take on life.
It’s no wonder that many Anglicans and other Britons are concerned about the future of the Church, committed as it seems to be to seeking relevance and fighting misogyny, rather than spreading Christ’s message to the world.
Another aide tried to allay such fears, especially those springing from Prince William’s remarks: “At a time when institutions can be seen simply through a social or cultural lens, he understands that the Church’s role goes beyond this. It is not only part of the nation’s heritage, but a living expression of faith, rooted in prayer, compassion and a belief in grace and redemption.”
It’s good to know that our future king realises that the Church isn’t just an extension of social services. However, he doesn’t seem to feel the need to avail himself personally of those sacred things the Church has to offer.
Unfortunately, this is a rather widespread phenomenon, one I’ve observed even among my friends, some of whom are atheists or agnostics (a distinction without a difference). As intelligent and educated people, they understand how vital the Church is to Britain, socially, politically, institutionally and culturally.
They see it as an essential adhesive gluing a mass of individuals into a civilised nation, which it is. But those same people obviously place themselves above hoi polloi who might need the Church for solace and comfort.
They represent a relatively new type: clerical atheists. Everything about modernity is upside down, including this development. In the past, we had anti-clerical believers; now we have clerical atheists.
I’ve shouted myself hoarse trying to argue with them that the Church is only vital if people believe in the truth of its message. No successful society can be built on a lie, which atheists have to believe Christianity is.
I’d like to say that I won those arguments but, alas, I didn’t. My friends all have the courage of their atheist convictions, which is a wall against which my entreaties shatter like a flung baccarat glass. I must work harder on my rhetorical skills, I suppose.
P.S. Speaking of Christian virtues, Trump responded to the death of Robert Mueller, the former special counsel investigating Trump’s links to Russia, in a manner all his own: “I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!”
After getting to “So what… will William do to strengthen the bond?” I immediately thought he could refuse to attend the installation and state as his reason the fact that this (or any) woman cannot be a priest, certainly not a bishop! This was then covered in the second half of the article.
Every quote from the The Times is so much word salad. What possibly could be the “strong and meaningful bond” the prince wishes to build with the Church? If the bond is not his own belief and striving for eternal salvation, it is worthless and quite possibly harmful, not just to him, but to the nation. If he does not understand that such a bond has existed for centuries, how in the world will his new bond “respect tradition”? His belief that “institutions must continue to remain relevant and connected to the people they serve” shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the relationship between God and man. Anyone expecting God to remain relevant to man is more likely to encounter his direct adversary.
Surely there must be some rule denying an apostate the crown?
As long as he vows to uphold Protestant Christianity, he is in the clear. That is, assuming he’ll be required to take that vow — he does want to change everything.
To be fair, I had similar fears about his father, who, when he was younger, called himself not ‘defender of the faith’, a title English kings have had since Henry VIII, but ‘defender of faith’, meaning all faiths. At the time, I wrote ‘defender of all faiths, Supreme Governor of none.’ But when he acceded to the throne, Charles had a perfectly traditional coronation, if one slightly too ecumenical for my taste. But then, of course, for all his unfortunate wetness, Charles is a believer. I don’t think he sons are. Wait and see, that’s all I can say.
And, much as I’m sorry to say this, neither of his sons is exactly the sharpest chisel in the box. William may not sense the groundswell of republican sentiments in Britain, but they are there. And our politician show no veneration of traditional institutions. Give them a pretext, and they’ll debauch the monarchy with the same gusto the showed when debauching the House of Lords.
One of Princess Anne’s many merits is that she’s a Rugby fan, not a Soccer fan. She doesn’t miss many international games at Murrayfield. Peter Wright, who played at loosehead prop for Scotland and the British Lions, says that he was always nervous about meeting her, because she knew more about Rugby than he did. I wonder if any Aston Villa players are nervous for the same reason about meeting the Prince of Wales and Dame Sarah Mullally?
Neither the Crown nor the Church will be saved by a pretended interest in Soccer. Or by a pretended interest in Christianity.
Well, you see, my interest in soccer is as genuine as my ignorance of rugby is complete. But I have an excuse: I grew up in a country where everyone played footie and no one played rugby. Also, these days I’d be lost without watching association football regularly, and my English would suffer without valuable tuition provided by commentators. Just yesterday I learned a new word, or perhaps a new usage. A commentator (a professional journalist, not an ex-player) twice said that one of the coaches was ‘in comminicado’ with the referee. He meant the coach talked to the ref, but that didn’t sound ‘posh’ enough. ‘In communication’ would have been more accurate, but ‘in communicado’ was well posh, djamean? He must have heard the word ‘incommunicado’ and took it to be two words. And he may be right — who am I to question a native speaker?
I always write incomunicado with one M, and I pronounce the D the Spanish way too. My chances of becoming a Soccer commentator aren’t much enhanced by this habit, are they?
The last game of Soccer I remember watching on TV was, oddly enough, Scotland v USSR in the 1982 World Cup. I’ve always remembered it as a disaster, but Wikipedia tells me it was a 2-2 draw.