70 years ago today, on the 6 February 1952 Princess Elizabeth was staying in Kenya with her husband, Prince Phillip when she heard of the death of her father King George VI. Returning home without delay, her succession to the throne was proclaimed at an Accession Council in St James Palace. Aged just 25, she was proclaimed as Queen. And she has fulfilled this role for the past 70 years, still a working monarch aged 95, with a fidelity to her promises, which is unprecedented. Her Majesty the Queen has had and is having a unique and powerful impact. As a very young woman, just 21 years old, Princess Elizabeth said ‘I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service. God help me to make good my vow’. This has been her vocation, to which she has been faithful, all her life.
10 years ago with the Queens Diamond Jubilee, I was Dean of Birmingham and we invited the communities of the city, in all their super diversity to come and sign a letter of thanks to Her Majesty. And we were so surprised by the response: queues formed and instead of just signatures, most people left messages. Sometimes the tone was perhaps a little over-familiar, ‘Well done!’, ‘Queenie you rule, High five!’ And a couple of messages were rude (but that’s freedom of speech for you), but overwhelmingly, there were messages of thanks and appreciation for the Queens stability and service to the nation, and her faithfulness and loyalty – to us. (She signed her message to the nation, reported today, in this way: ‘Your Servant’.)
This faithful service, inspired by her Christian faith and understanding, is one of those highly significant, but easily overlooked things that together form a stable background to our national life, to the values that undergird and support our common life, and enable us to live together. We can so easily take these things for granted, like the rule of law, democratic government, the Church of England, fairness, tolerance…. The messages left in Birmingham Cathedral brought to the surface a deep and genuine sense of gratitude for HM the Queen, what she does, and the self-effacing way in which she does it.
Her service to the nation is exemplified, it seems to me, in her dress. The Queen wears bright colours in order to be easily seen amidst crowds, her hats are shaped to reveal her face. Personal preferences are sublimated to role, she wears beautifully thoughtful and detailed uniform of office, never fashionable, nor unfashionable. In his letter to the Colossians, St Paul urges his readers to strip themselves of the old life with its practices, and instead, to forgive one another and clothe themselves with virtue, above all with love. This metaphor of clothing, with the putting on Christ’s character might seem slightly odd to us moderns who tend to see faith as an inner matter, a personal experience, resulting in outer practices. But clothing oneself, putting on Christ, chimes well with older notions of practicing religion, of choosing to be obedient to the daily habits and patterns of life as set out by Benedict, for example, in which it’s not so much inspiration as practice and persistence that’s the path to God because it opens us to God’s mercy and grace.
This daily and disciplined choosing of faithful Christian life is exemplified in the approach of our Queen who has said, ‘Each day is a new beginning, I know that the only way to live my life is to try to do what is right, to take the long view, to give of my best in all that the day brings, and to put my trust in God.”
However, not all monarchs take this path. The ancient Hebrew Scriptures show a wariness of earthly kings and princes, who all too often forgot the Lord and gave in to delusions of grandeur. Called to seek Divine Wisdom, the governing principle of the universe and the source of all political wisdom, too often earthly leaders preferred to go their own way. Hebrew kings gave up the struggle to choose what Godly was and wise and instead sought superficial pleasures, instant gratification, delusions of power.
And, sadly, as we still discover, superficial pleasures and selfish choices don’t actually satisfy, like passing fashions we look back at them with embarrassment. The former chief Rabbi, Jonathan Sacks once wisely said:
‘The passing idols of today are unmistakeable: self-esteem without effort, fame without achievement; sex without consequences; wealth without responsibility; pleasure without struggle; experience without commitment.’
No wonder that the virtues and values embodied by the Queen have sometimes been at odds with contemporary life, even seemed unfashionable.
Lots of girls like to dress up as princesses, and the surface of royalty is glittering, but beneath the pomp and pageantry of royalty, the robes and symbols are profoundly serious: they indicate self-sacrifice and service. At the Coronation Service the Queen received the golden orb, symbol of the world, surmounted by the cross, and the Queen received her crown, encrusted with jewels, and at the apex is the cross of Christ. Over everything that the world offers, are the demands of the cross: and a calling to sacrifice and service.
There is so much we can take for granted in our common life, the Platinum Jubilee celebrations this year will enable us to reflect on what is truly important, what we value and what we rely on, and remind us as the Queen herself has so often reminded us, of the part we have to play.
As we give thanks this year for the faithfulness and service of HM the Queen to the nation and commonwealth, we thank the one who inspires her and gives us the supreme pattern of service, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, in whose service is perfect freedom, to him be power and glory.
Amen
