A 21C Problem

My natural inclination is to argue, as I have many times, that the European countries that have kept their monarchies are better places to live than the European countries that haven't. Throughout the 20th century, and perhaps even into the early years of this one, I think the truth of that assertion was pretty obvious. Today, however, with the governments of Poland & Hungary and perhaps also other Eastern European republics proving more resistant to the evils and dangers of our time than any Western constitutional monarchy, it's getting harder and harder to make that argument. I almost miss the Cold War.

A Christian EU?

As a monarchist who rejects the Italian, German, and French republics in principle, I'm not especially sympathetic to conservative arguments (though Metropolitan Hilarion has also made comments favorable to monarchy) that the European Project was founded by Devout Christians but only later went off track. Alcide De Gasperi, Theodor Heuss, Konrad Adenauer, and Robert Schuman were not acceptable substitutes for legitimate Christian kings. At a personal level, they remind me of the sort of people I used to argue with on Catholic forums who were dismissive of my monarchist beliefs. That they would probably be appalled by what the EU has become today doesn't mean their sort of "conservatism" wasn't part of the problem. That Western Europe, including its republics, was a superficially decent enough place to live during the second half of the 20th century (I'm not so sure about today) doesn't make the catastrophic political changes of the first half acceptable. France, Portugal, Germany, Austria, and Italy shouldn't _have_ presidents, no matter how "conservative" or "Christian." They should have kings. We can't bring the dead of the World Wars back to life. But we can rebuild buildings, and we can restore monarchies, and we should never give up on the real Europe which is Royal as much as it is Christian.