The Queen's Birthday

V. O Lord, save the Queen
R. And mercifully hear us when we call upon thee.

The Queen's Birthday

For many years, R.B. (a member of our parish) hosted a Tea for the Queen’s Birthday. It would be at a local park, complete with a brass quintet playing “Rule, Britannia” and other appropriate music. Ladies were expected to wear hats and gloves; gentlemen to wear ties and jackets. Expatriate Britons from hundreds of miles around came, along with many of us Yanks. It was always an Event of the first magnitude.

R.B.’s funeral was earlier this spring, so he did not make it to Her Majesty’s eighty-fifth birthday. But I would expect that he might have been looking on from the Upper Gallery seats in heaven, probably bursting with pride at young Prince William in his red uniform and bearskin hat, and the beautiful young Princess Catherine, the new Duchess of Cambridge.

R.B., we miss you.

I am an American. I am proud of our nation. Thomas Jefferson and George Washington are among my heroes. But sometimes I wish we had someone like Queen Elizabeth.

My favorite portrayal of her is outside Parliament in Ottawa, a statue which I have admired in person.

Ever a lover of horses, she is astride “Centennial,” who formerly served in the RCMP and was given to her by the people of Canada in honor of their centennial. Here is another photo.

Her role is almost entirely ceremonial; the reins of government are in other hands. But as Prime Ministers come and go, she has been a rock of stability, and, in her way, represents Great Britain to the world.

And she appears to take seriously her role as Fidei defensor, Defender of the Faith. A turning point for me in my appreciation of the monarchy was a day when I was browsing in the library at graduate school, and happened on a program from her coronation in 1953. It was an Anglican ceremony of Holy Communion complete with the Proper Preface for Coronations, a far cry from the manner in which we inaugurate Presidents.

I love the rubric at the beginning of the text that “Care is to be taken that the Ampulla be filled with Oil for the anointing, and together with the Spoon, be laid ready upon the Altar in the Abbey Church.” I can well imagine the Altar Guild at the Abbey seeing to this detail.

Archbishop: Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel?

Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?

Will you maintain and preserve inviolably the settlement of the Church of England, and the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government thereof, as by law established in England?

And will you preserve unto the Bishops and Clergy of England, and to the Churches there committed to their charge, all such rights and privileges, as by law do or shall appertain to them or any of them?

Queen: All this I promise to do.

There was much fine choral music, beginning with Parry’s “I was glad” and including the newly-composed settings of “O taste and see” and “All creatures that on earth do dwell” by Vaughan Williams.

We have nothing like this in the United States. I wish we did.

(I can hear Mr. Jefferson off in the distance muttering something about separation of Church and State…)

A prayer for the Queen’s Majesty (from the BCP services of Matins and Evensong)

O Lord, our heavenly Father, high and mighty, King of kings, Lord of lords, the only Ruler of princes, who dost from thy throne behold all the dwellers upon earth: Most heartily we beseech thee with thy favour to behold our most gracious Sovereign Lady, Queen ELIZABETH; and so replenish her with the grace of thy Holy Spirit, that she may alway incline to thy will, and walk in thy way. Endue her plenteously with heavenly gifts; grant her in health and wealth long to live; strengthen her that she may vanquish and overcome all her enemies; and finally after this life she may attain everlasting joy and felicity; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.