Defender of the Faith to confront Episcopal revolutionaries?
Posted March 22, 2007
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has reportedly refused to come to the United States, saying his schedule this year is already booked. However, the Defender of the Faith and the Supreme Governor of the Church of England will be crossing the pond later this spring.
Queen Elizabeth II will visit the United States in May, traveling to Jamestown for the 400th anniversary of the settlement of Jamestown, Virginia. Her majesty will also attend the Kentucky Derby in Louisville and will visit with the president in Washington.
It's unclear whether the titular head of the Church of England will worship while she's in the U.S. On a past visit, she attended services at St. John's Episcopal Church in Versailles, Kentucky. The congregation split after the ordination of openly-gay bishop Gene Robinson.
St. John's would undoubtedly welcome her majesty back -- as would the St. Andrews Anglican Church, a breakaway congregation which is aligned with the Church of Uganda. Or, the Queen could worship with President Bush at another St. John's Episcopal Church -- this one a stone's throw from the White House near Lafayette Square.
It's an awkward time for a visit. Earlier this week the House of Bishops rejected changes advocated by the Church of England and other members of the Anglican Communion saying the proposal “violates our founding principles as the Episcopal Church following our own liberation from colonialism.”
H/T: Caleb Powers
Comments
The National Cathedral is about as liberal and revisionist as it gets. I don't think that is the "faith" she is entitled to defend. In fact, John Chane et.al. don't represent "the Faith" as it is received from the Apostles.
The title "defender of the faith" is indeed one of the traditional hereditary titles of the monarch of England.
However, it was bestowed on Henry VIII by the then-pope because Henry had written a tract (well, okay, Thomas More wrote it, but Henry took credit for it) supporting Catholicism and rejecting the teachings of Martin Luther.
Of course, Henry later fell out with the Catholics, and became a protestant himself, but the title was never abandoned, even when Henry became titular head of the Church of England, a position held by all monarchs (other perhaps than his daughter Mary) since then.
So, defender of the faith she is; which faith is in some doubt. My bet is that she doesn't attend church here at all, or if she does, it's somewhere "neutral" like a special service at the National Cathedral, which, while Episcopal, is still considered ecumenical.