Abdication?

23rd Nov 21 - Abd 

Rev dear Rev: We in the Church of England are very close to our monarchy, and I was wondering if from your catholic parish point of view, whether there is any mileage in the idea that the Queen should now abdicate in favour of Charles, or maybe in favour of William if Charles is too eccentric a king? How does your catholic parish feel about such a prospect? Do you have any statistics on the question that are reliable and up to date, any gauge of the public feeling outside of the Church of England?

Well, none of our business really. The Queen of England is the temporal governor of the Church of England over which she presides benignly alongside Bp Justin and Dr Sentamu and others, so it is none of our business what happens in this connection. We are the alternative society, though most catholics are very loyal, not that it is difficult to be loyal to such nice royals, especially the Queen, since after all she has done such a good job until recently. None of our business - no, really.

Curious that this Question to be Answered, this Quaesitum Respondendum came in, and from an anglican Church of England lady over at Northampton, because, and I shall share this Report anyway just out of information, I had just finished leafing through a Report of a Twitterpoll on this very subject. The results? Well - 60% of people polled via Twitter said Yes to abdication of Elizabeth II and Charles III on the understanding that the Crown would go to the next in line, so a coronation of William V and his young queen, and 40% said No. This Twitterpoll was conducted recently very freshly too, on the 21st of November 2021. So there we are. Commentators included young people and young couples who were interviewed afterward. The commentaries on the media channel that reported this Poll also revealed the general feeling and the reasonings of the public decision as per the following:

Re: CHARLES III

- Charles is eccentric, what with his watercolours and his friendship with the Dalai;

- Charles is an Eco-warrior, period - not much support there among young people;

- Charles is something of a Social Justice Warrior too, many young couples find this irksome;

- Charles tends to support the Green view that over-population is a problem in the world;

- Some young people, not all of them catholic, are concerned he would cue in Parenting Licences;

- Also irksome is the view that he does not wish to be the Head of the Church of England;

- Charles was very very keen on Cop-26 in Glasgow, not everybody enjoyed the experience;

- Charles is not that popular even with the older and more conservative rumps of society;

- Charles is not all that popular because of his eccentricity, but Queen Camilla especially not so;

- Camilla is largely blamed by the grey suits for the Diana Disaster - not the French secret service;

- But the people at Cop26 and G-20 Roma still hung on his every word, so times do change.

Re: WILLIAM V

- William and his young queen are massively popular, like huge on the fashion circuits;

- They both demonstrate extreme popularity, especially for their ordinariness;

- They are both adored by the central fashion houses of Paris, even William;

- They have surprised everybody as they did not intend to be glamorous ab initio;

- They have shown great restraint and loyalty toward the old Queen;

- They would make a very moderne and populist monarchy, saving the whole outfit 100x over;

- But they are both very very young indeed, easily manipulated maybe in the future, so we shall see.

So, like I say, from the parish point of view, this is none of our business, since not all of our people are fully paid up members of the Oxford Royal & Commonwealth Society like yours truly, and besides the whole coronation thing might well not impact the catholic community so much as the Sikh and Moslem and Hindu and Janist communities especially after the runaway success of the Abdul movie starring Judie Dench. Either way, it matters not so much to us, but I shall share the above Poll and Survey from the 21st of November in the hope that it might provide some useful pointers as to the general British feeling about the idea of abdication of the grande old lady Elizabeth II. She has done well, she now deserves a quiet retirement at Balmoral Castle, her private Barcaldine. Floreat regina.