An Interview with N.T. Wright on Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

This is an absolutely fascinating interview, as is this one with Gavin Ashendon.

Please understand that for most of us traditional Anglicans it is the institution, or the office, of the English monarchy that is hallowed, and not the House of Windsor per se. Most modern monarchs have been infected by modern Western liberal democracy and all that goes along with that, and His Majesty Charles III is no exception.

The thing is, an increasing number of us have come to the realization that secularism is an enemy of the Church. Why would we therefore not wish to separate ourselves from that godless Leviathan and wish instead to be governed by our fellow Christians, whether in a Christian monarchy or republic?

I do not accept the argument advanced by some that God's warning to Israel about desiring a king in I Samuel 8 means that God is a republican. There is Deut. 17:14 ff. to consider. The human Christian king is an icon of Christ's eternal kingship, just as the human Christian priest is an icon of his eternal priesthood and the human Christian prophet is an icon of his eternal prophetic ministry. Christ, according to our christology, is prophet, priest and king, and those 3 offices are hallowed in a temporal way as earthly reflections of his offices.

Have Christian monarchs sometimes been despotic? Absolutely, just as some Christian priests and prophets have sometimes proved unworthy. But it is the office that counts and not the oftentimes defective behavior of those who hold the office. This is something secularists just can't get their heads around, but that's because they are secularists and therefore think accordingly.

God rest the soul of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, and God save the King His Majesty Charles III. May he become a Christian king in the best sense of the word, but if he doesn't, may a better monarch take his place. May the English monarchy return to what it was, warts and all. It beats the rule of secularists.

Monarchy can easily be 'debunked,' but watch the faces, mark well the debunkers. These are the men whose taproot in Eden has been cut: whom no rumour of the polyphony, the dance, can reach - men to whom pebbles laid in a row are more beautiful than an arch. Where men are forbidden to honour a king, they honor millionaires, athletes, or film stars instead; even famous prostitutes or gangsters. For spiritual nature, like bodily nature, will be served; deny it food and it will gobble poison. - C.S. Lewis