Altar and Throne

Decent Anglicans are horrified by the Bishop of Willesden's insulting online comments about the engagement of Prince William and Kate Middleton, in which he predicted the marriage would only last seven years and expressed his contempt for the royal family and monarchy in general, intending to plan a "republican holiday" to France. (Telegraph, Mail) Frankly I can't help wishing that Henry II or Henry VIII were around to deal with this neo-Jacobin creep. Lambeth Palace pathetically refused to censure the bishop, claiming that he is “entitled to his views.” Well, he may be entitled to any idiotic views he likes as an individual, but he is not entitled to be a bishop or use his stature to promote such treasonous nonsense. Pete Broadbent is supposed to be a bishop of the Established Church of which HM the Queen is Supreme Governor. As such he is obligated to pray for the Queen and Royal Family and to honour & obey her in all things but sin. There is no place for republicans in the hierarchy of the Church of England, the Church that King Charles the Martyr died to save. If Bishop Broadbent doesn't like that, perhaps he could find a better occupation--or better yet another country.

On a lighter note, this morning at my own parish guest preacher Joseph "Skip" Ryan (former pastor of Park Cities Presbyterian Church) gave an interesting sermon for Christ the King Sunday. He began by noting, unfortunately correctly, that Kingship is something that doesn't sit well with Americans, perhaps especially Texans, a statement that I would have to agree with if qualified by "most." Rev. Ryan went on to note that Americans tend to think of kings as being either ruthless despots or ineffectual figureheads, and jokingly wondered what our Canadian Rector (himself a loyal subject of the Crown) was thinking when he invited an Irish-American Presbyterian to preach on Christ the King. Such generalizations about "Americans" tend to make me feel that I don't really belong in this country, but I appreciated Rev. Ryan's subsequent comments critical of Oliver Cromwell; indeed, he later assured me privately that he is not anti-monarchist at all. During our own Rector's Greetings after the sermon, I got some unexpected free publicity when Bishop Burton, pointing out that the most famous Presbyterian in the world is Queen Elizabeth II of the Church of Scotland, introduced me as "the most stalwart monarchist in the United States" and encouraged the congregation to look for a "rebuttal" at my website, the URL to which I then provided at his request. I'm not sure this blog entry qualifies as a rebuttal, especially as I mostly agreed with the bulk of Rev. Ryan's sermon, but thanks Bishop Burton!