We are told, by my distinguished colleague Robert Hardman, that Prince William has no great interest in the Christian religion. He will go to Church at the great festivals, and for major ceremonies, but does not attend regularly. I see no reason to doubt this.
British people in his age group tend to feel this way. His own tragic family background cannot help. It has been decades since the Royal Family has been an example of Christian living. The culture in which he has grown up is indifferent to Christianity. The idea that religious belief matters, or is central to thought and life, has disappeared.
Well, yes. As one of the vanishing minority who still attend Church regularly, I can quite understand this. Many churches, with their babytalk modern services, Ladybird Bibles, trite preaching and kindergarten happy-clappy music, seem designed to drive away any thoughtful person.
The worldly, utopian political stances of leading church figures suggest that they themselves have little idea of what it is they are preaching. I can think of one or two whose personal actions, and unrepentant failure to acknowledge bad mistakes, unfit them for their positions (you know who you are, Bishop).
Yet the more modern and secular they become, the more they deck themselves in embroidered robes and silly hats. They also tend to preach a flabby 'non-judgmental' religion in which Hell was abolished some time in the 1960s. Somehow I suspect this is the sort of thing which former Post Office chief Paula Vennells embraces, though I'd welcome it if she got in touch to tell me otherwise.
We are told, by my distinguished colleague Robert Hardman, that Prince William has no great interest in the Christian religion. He will go to Church at the great festivals, and for major ceremonies, but does not attend regularly. I see no reason to doubt this.
British people in his age group tend to feel this way. His own tragic family background cannot help. It has been decades since the Royal Family has been an example of Christian living. The culture in which he has grown up is indifferent to Christianity. The idea that religious belief matters, or is central to thought and life, has disappeared.
But behind all this is a dark, hard truth which remains unchanged down all the years. We all die, and may be judged. We live in a universe which man still struggles to explain. We do not even know why it is there at all. If it is – as the indifferent and the atheists like to claim – the outcome of a vast cosmic car crash, it is odd that it is so intricate, and that it operates to such fine tolerances.
There's also another problem. What is the real source of justice and power? As the Post Office and Blood scandals show all too well, neither law nor politics are much good at helping the wronged and oppressed. Everyone wonders why it took a TV drama to win justice for the Sub Postmasters and Postmistresses, and is still needed to sort out the Blood scandal. I will tell you.
Drama awakens the conscience, another mysterious feature of the cosmos, which cannot really be explained by Richard Dawkins etc. That is why the idea of Kingship and religion are so closely bound together, and why this is the last country on earth which holds a Christian coronation of its head of state.
In the 16th Century prayers which the modern Church of England has inherited but hates to use, God is referred to as 'the only ruler of princes'. In prayers for the monarch, the King is urged to act in that light 'knowing whose minister he is'. The clear implication is the unwelcome and increasingly despised idea that the King is chosen by God, and rules in God's name.
The man who wrote these prayers, Thomas Cranmer, was not stupid or naive or unworldly, but a deft politician who lived and died at the heart of power. He annulled Henry VIII's marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and so earned the lifelong hatred of Catherine's daughter, the future Queen Mary. She had him burned alive. If this stuff is not true, or is marginal, or if we do not really believe it, then there is no purpose in having a King, or a Prince of Wales. We might as well have a President in a nice suit.
In the 16th Century prayers which the modern Church of England has inherited but hates to use, God is referred to as 'the only ruler of princes'. In prayers for the monarch, the King is urged to act in that light 'knowing whose minister he is'. The man who wrote these prayers, Thomas Cranmer, was not stupid or naive or unworldly, but a deft politician who lived and died at the heart of power
If William cannot be bothered with the Church, then he cannot really be bothered with monarchy either. And if he does not believe in it, why should anyone else?
His grandmother, beyond doubt, lived very close to power in all its often ugly and fearsome forms for her whole life. She grew more devoted to her faith as she learned the limits of secular things. The same is obviously true of King Charles. William has perhaps a little time to change his mind, but we never know how much time we have in such matters.
I suggest that, from time to time, he slips anonymously into one of our majestic cathedrals and sits behind a convenient pillar to hear the great and ancient service of Evensong. He may come to see things in another light.