Essay

Comment

Royalty

5 May 2023

5 min read

Coronation vows and the relationships they make

The coronation contains significant words that are cornerstones for the state and much more. M. Ciftci explores their implications.

M. Ciftci

Mehmet Ciftci has a PhD in political theology from the University of Oxford. His research focuses on bioethics, faith and politics.

A painting shows a young Queen Victoria, in her coronation dress, resting one hand on the bible, taking her oaths

Queen Victoria taking the coronation oath, by George Hayter..

George Hayter, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

What is the point of the coronation ceremony? Many, such as Orwell, have praised the monarchy for absorbing our desire to exult those who rule us, so that we do not fawn over the politicians who hold real power, as they do in some presidential regimes. Instead, we treat politicians with no fanfare, but as mere ministers of the Crown, and hence as ministers of the good of the entire country. But why do we need an explicitly Christian coronation ceremony, taking place in the middle of an Anglican service of Holy Communion?

We can find an answer in The Meaning of the Coronation, an appreciative essay written after the last coronation by two left-leaning sociologists, Edmund Shils and Michael Young. Every society, they claim, relies on an implicit consensus around certain moral values. “What are these moral values which restrain men’s egotism and which enables society to hold itself together? A few can be listed illustratively: generosity, charity, loyalty, justice in the distribution of opportunities and rewards, reasonable respect for authority, the dignity of the individual and his right to freedom.”

The apparently ordinary nature of these values should not deceive us.

“The sacredness of society is at bottom the sacredness of its moral rules, which itself derives from the presumed relationship between these rules in their deepest significance and the forces and agents which men regard as having the power to influence their destiny for better or for worse.”

Our sense that moral rules and values ought to be respected calls us to use all the power of rite and ritual to invest them with the authority of the sacred. The monarchy is eminently suited to serve this purpose, since “the monarchy has its roots in man's beliefs and sentiments about what he regards as sacred,” albeit in a vague, and hence more inclusive, way that can be appreciated without membership of the Church of England (to which I do not belong either), or Christian belief of any defined sort. Therefore, Shils and Young argue, the

“Coronation is exactly this kind of ceremonial in which the society reaffirms the moral values which constitute it as a society and renews its devotion to those values by an act of communion.”

We can better appreciate how the Coronation reaffirms various political and moral principles by considering some key parts of the ceremony. One of them is the taking of the Oath to “solemnly promise and swear to govern … according to their respective laws and customs” the UK and Commonwealth Realms. These words are the cornerstone of our tradition of common-law constitutionalism. As the Queen takes the Oath, according to Shils and Young, she “acknowledges that the moral standards embodied in the laws and customs are superior to her own personal will.” Historically, as H.L. Morton wrote,

“The king’s task was to uphold the law, not to make law, still less to govern by personal will as an autocrat.”

The Oath, then, stands in judgement over the ministers of the Crown: have they acted in accordance with existing laws, or did ministers rule by personal decree? A question always worth asking, as Lord Sumption reminded us during the pandemic.

Another key moment is the presentation of the regalia, the symbols of how the monarch should reign. The most important regalia to be handed to the King by the Archbishop are the Sceptre with Cross and the Sceptre with Dove. The Archbishop will then say a new and somewhat clumsy prayer to ask:

“that you might exercise authority with wisdom, and direct your counsels with grace; that by your service and ministry to all your people, justice and mercy may be seen in all the earth.”

By contrast, in 1953, the Archbishop said:

“Receive the Rod of equity and mercy. Be so merciful that you be not too remiss; so execute justice that you forget not mercy. Punish the wicked, protect and cherish the just, and lead your people in the way wherein they should go.”

This conveys more clearly and artfully the significance of the Sceptre and Rod, which is to circumscribe the purpose of the state, defined simply as that of upholding justice and public order. All those who act in the King’s name, such as parliamentarians, judges, magistrates, and members of the armed forces or police, are thus entrusted with authority to carry out the King’s Oath to “cause Law and Justice, in Mercy, to be executed”. By implication, if they do or desire anything that does not strictly serve this purpose, such as gaining power and influence for its own sake, or interfering with society arbitrarily, then they go beyond their commission.

But law is also meant to be tempered with mercy. Hence one of the ceremonial swords, the curtana, carried into the Abbey at the beginning of the ceremony has a blunt tip. The ceremony is embedded with the Christian belief that we must be humbled by knowing we are sinners presuming to judge others. Our sense of justice is imperfect. What fallible judgements we mete out to others should, where possible, be open to reintegrating the wrongdoer back into society.

Finally, there is the anointing itself, the central act following the taking of the Oath and before the presentation of the regalia. This is the most archaic part of the rite, hearkening back to prophets, priests, and kings of Israel who, according to scripture, were anointed with oil to signify that God had dedicated them to perform a role for the good of the whole people.

The anointing was one of two moments in the ceremony that were not televised in 1953, a precedent that will be followed again this year. For the anointing is an act that is really a prayer – and who likes to have people gawping at them when praying? The King removes his Robes of State before the anointing because this is the moment when he asks humbly to be given divine aid to dedicate himself to the service of his people.

There are too many examples of failed and collapsed states to make us doubt that the continued existence of any state is not something we can guarantee by our ingenuity.

The Sovereign’s dedication to public service is one side to the covenant that binds the country together. Rather than a social contract between individuals to protect their self-interest, in our Constitution there is an exchange of vows, binding one to another with rights and obligations. The monarch and those acting on his behalf swear to serve us (and condemn themselves when they fail to do so), and we swear to bear true allegiance in return.

Whether those promises will be kept is not a matter of effort and skill alone. Just as in a marriage, the weightiness of the promises makes us naturally feel unequal to the task and in need of strength greater than we can muster. There are too many examples of failed and collapsed states to make us doubt that the continued existence of any state is not something we can guarantee by our ingenuity. Hence, at the heart of the Coronation is the unfashionable but humbling idea that to remain faithful to the vows pledged, and for there still to be a United Kingdom in future generations, are gifts given by something above us and beyond our ability to control.

Article

Assisted dying

Care

Comment

Politics

9 June 2025

5 min read

Suicide prevention groups are abdicating their responsibility on assisted dying

Not speaking out is a dereliction of duty to vulnerable people

Jamie Gillies

Jamie Gillies is a commentator on politics and culture.

Three posters with suicide prevention messages.

Samaritans adverts.

On Friday, Kim Leadbeater’s assisted suicide bill will return to the Commons for a second day of report stage proceedings – when MPs consider amendments. Third reading, when the House votes on the bill itself, is expected to take place the following Friday. Opponents of this controversial bill will be hoping that enough MPs feel uneasy about it to say ‘this far and no further’. They will need around 30 MPs to have changed their minds since a vote last year in order for a defeat of the legislation to be assured.

As politicians have weighed this issue, there’s been a conspicuous silence from one constituency you’d expect to have been outspoken: suicide prevention organisations. People might be surprised to know that Samaritans, perhaps the best-known suicide prevention charity in the UK, a cornerstone of prevention efforts since the 1950s, did not submit evidence on the bill before Westminster or a separate bill at Holyrood. Other groups like Suicide Prevention UK (SPUK) and Papyrus have also been silent. One has to wonder why, given the bearing a law change would have on their work.

Suicide prevention charities and their volunteer counsellors do incredible work. Over the years, millions of people in desperate circumstances have received life-changing support. Today, every person contacting a suicide prevention helpline is told that their life has value, and that there is hope in the bleakest of circumstances. Every caller without exception is also told not to harm themselves. But this couldn’t continue under an assisted dying law. A two-track approach would have to be devised, depending on a caller’s circumstances. A scenario helps to illustrate this point:

Caller: “I am thinking about ending my life”.

Adviser: “Please know that there is hope. I’m here to listen and I can offer support, so you don’t have to make that choice.”

Caller: “Well, I have terminal cancer you see…”

Adviser: “Oh, sorry, I need to put you through to a colleague. Your situation is a bit more, err, complex. You need to know your legal rights”.

Some proponents of assisted dying are quick to dismiss concerns about suicide prevention, arguing that assisted dying and suicide are wholly separate categories. However, this argument doesn’t hold water. Whilst campaigners use euphemistic terminology and employ Orwellian rhetoric about ‘exercising choice at the end of life’, and people ‘shortening their deaths’, it is clear that the bills they promote would permit suicide with the enablement of the state.

An assisted dying law would see doctors prescribing lethal drugs to certain patients which they can take to end their own lives. The dictionary definition of suicide — “the act of killing yourself intentionally” — has not changed. Neither has legislation giving expression to this idea. Logically and legally then, assisted dying involves suicide.

Samaritans is clear on this. A ‘policy brief’ on assisted dying published in November — the most recent statement on the issue by the organisation — begins by saying that it usually applies to terminally ill people and involves “assisting the person who is terminally ill to hasten their own death”, adding: “The act that kills them is performed by the person themselves”. Their death is a suicide, in other words.

You might assume an organisation that says, “every suicide is one too many”, whose stated aim is to see “fewer people die by suicide”, would be opposed to assisted dying - or at the very least concerned about it. However, Samaritans goes on to say that it does not “take a position on whether assisted dying is right or wrong, or on what the law should be on this matter”. Why? Because it “would involve making a range of judgements” that could compromise people’s “perception of our ability to provide non-judgemental emotional support”.

Samaritans and other suicide prevention organisations should be intensely interested in what the law says. The introduction of assisted dying in any part of the UK would mean suicides being condoned and enabled in healthcare settings for the first time — a radical departure from the existing approach. Professionals always counsel against suicide, no matter a person’s motivation for wanting to end their life. Every citizen is precious, and every life worth saving.

Prevention organisations must also realise that a change of this gravity will have a wider impact on culture. Research shows a rise in non-assisted suicides in countries that have introduced the practice. Sending a message that some suicides are permissible might make their prevention work harder. Organisations saying nothing in the face of all this is astonishing.

As noted above, assisted dying poses practical questions as well as philosophical ones. If the law changes, organisations will no longer be able to adopt a universal approach to suicide prevention. A call to a suicide prevention helpline from a terminally ill person will have to be handled differently to a call from a person who is not terminally ill. For some, suicide would be a healthcare ‘right’. How will organisations navigate this? Doesn’t it concern them?

There has been some advocacy from individuals engaged in suicide prevention, if not from organisations. In February 2024 psychiatrists wrote to The Times to warn that the Westminster assisted dying Bill would “undermine daily efforts to prevent suicide”, particularly among the elderly. Louis Appleby, the UK Government’s suicide prevention adviser has also spoken against a change in the law, arguing that it would harm efforts to drive down suicides.

Appleby explained, “once the principle behind suicide prevention has been set aside, once any part of the ground has been ceded — not only to allow suicide but to assist it — we have lost something we may not get back. There are countless causes of irremediable hardship, many reasons people may want to make despairing choices. Could they become exceptions to suicide prevention too?” This principled position is exactly what you’d expect from someone whose job is protecting hurting people, no matter their personal situations.

I’m loath to criticise suicide prevention groups as I deeply appreciate their work. However, by not contributing to the debate on assisted dying, they are abdicating their responsibility to shape a policy that would impact their mission, and the people they serve. A policy that would lead to state-sanctioned suicides and impact culture in profound ways. It’s terribly sad to see groups that fight to end suicides failing to stand against a policy that would harm their work. Failure to speak today may be viewed as a dereliction of duty in years to come.

With a final vote on Kim Leadbeater’s Bill days away, and the decisive vote on Scottish plans not due for months, there is still time for suicide prevention groups to enter the fray. I pray that they will.

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