How faith helped the monarchy flex

Understanding how the British monarchy has evolved, means understanding its foundation in faith. Ian Bradley explains.

Ian Bradley

Ian Bradley is Emeritus Professor of Cultural and Spiritual History at the University of St Andrews.

an etching shows William and Mary is a classical scene, priests stand to their right while dogs chew bones at their feet.

A broadsheet illustration celebrates William and Mary, and the Glorious Revolution of 1688.

Lambeth Palace Library.

Christian monarchy has played a central part in the history of the British Isles, promoting the rule of order, justice and mercy in conformity with the values of the kingdom of God and cementing a close alliance between the institutions of crown and church.

Both these aspects are well illustrated in the life and deeds of the first English king to convert to Christianity. Aethelbert, who ruled Kent from 587 to 616, seems to have come to faith through a combination of the influence of his wife, Bertha, the daughter of a Frankish Christian king, and the preaching of St Augustine, who arrived in Thanet in 597, having been sent from Rome by Pope Gregory. According to one account, 10,000 of Aethelbert’s subjects followed him in converting and underwent a mass baptism. Among his first actions as a Christian king were to issue the first set of laws in the English language and to grant land to Augustine on which to build an Abbey, which later became Canterbury Cathedral.

Reign responsibly

Exemplified by such figures as Arthur and Alfred, Christian kingship brought new titles as well as new responsibilities for Britain’s rulers. The first to be appropriated was that of ruling through the grace of God, or Deo Gratia, the idea that is still expressed on every coin of the realm through the abbreviation DG. The late eighth-century Anglo-Saxon king Offa described himself as ‘by the divine controlling grace king of the Mercians’. From the mid-tenth century, several English kings also began styling themselves Christ’s Vicar or deputy. Edgar, Alfred’s great grandson who ruled from 957 to 975, so described himself when founding a new monastery at Winchester in 966. Some years later Ethelred II stated that ‘the king must be regarded not only as the head of the church but also as a vicar of Christ among Christian folk’.

Cult kings

The Middle Ages saw the flowering of the cult of Christian monarchy as both splendid and servant-like, pious and chivalrous, full of knightly virtue, gung-ho triumphalism and miraculous powers, as exemplified in the widespread belief that the king’s touch could cure those suffering from scrofula. While Medieval monarchs cultivated magnificent splendour, they also espoused the theme of the servant-king and acknowledged their utter dependence on God’s grace. Both these elements were reflected in the civic triumphs staged around Epiphany or Advent for the entrance of monarchs into the cities of their realms with the king being portrayed as the type of Christ and the queen as the bearer of heavenly glory. Deliberately modelled on Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, they served as a reminder of the journey to be undertaken by all souls, including royal ones, towards death and the throne of heaven.

Moderate monarchy

The crown played a crucial part in the English Reformation which was initiated by Henry VIII with the help of his loyal lieutenant Thomas Cranmer. Together they created what was effectively a nationalised state church of a moderately Protestant hue with the monarch at its head, bishops and a conservative liturgy in English. Subsequent sovereigns made their influence felt on the emerging Church of England, with Edward VI steering it in a more Protestant direction and playing a key role in the preparation of the first English Prayer Book of 1549, and Elizabeth steadying it to produce the Anglican via media which has remained one of its distinguishing characteristics to this day.

The monarch's headship of the Church of England was a key part of the Reformation settlement. It was established in the 1534 Supremacy Act which declared King Henry VIII 'the only supreme head in earth of the Church of England' with full authority to intervene in its affairs. Elizabeth I modified the monarch’s title from ‘Supreme Head’ to 'Supreme Governor', which it has remained ever since. Alongside it goes the title of ‘Defender of the Faith’, represented on coins as F.D., originally given to Henry VIII by the Pope in 1521 for his defence of the traditional sacraments of the Catholic Church against the novel teaching of Martin Luther. Although revoked after the Reformation, it has continued to be used by and about all monarchs since, although its meaning has never been precisely defined.

Media monarchy

Stuart monarchs tended to push Christian monarchy in a more absolutist direction, being enamoured of the doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings, although they also did much to forward Christianity in their realms. James VI of Scotland and I of England made a particularly valuable contribution in his patronage of the version of the Bible which still bears his name and is also known as the Authorised Version. He was adamant that it should not be a narrow reflection of a single theological position but rather an irenicon, or instrument of peace, breadth and moderation in the new United Kingdom over which he reigned.

Modified monarchy

The so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688-9, when James II was deposed because of his Catholicism and perceived absolutism and William of Orange invited by Parliament to occupy the vacant throne, effectively signalled the triumph of a covenant theory of monarchy over that of divine right. The constitutional settlement that followed it rested on a concept of limited monarchy and was based on an essentially secular concept of social and civil contract. However, neither the Reformation notion of the godly prince ruling the godly commonwealth nor the close connections between Crown and Church were swept away. Indeed, they were strengthened, with the role of the United Kingdom monarch as protector of Protestantism being expressed in the accession and coronation oaths still taken today.

Modern monarchy

Christian monarchy developed in nineteenth and twentieth century Britain to focus much more on philanthropy, civic duty and spiritual leadership demonstrated through attendance at religious services and public exhortation. The close relationship between the crown and the churches, and especially the Church of England, has remained strong while being extended in recent decades to other faith groups as the monarch has increasingly taken on the role of ‘Defender of Faith’. Television has made the monarch’s Christmas Day broadcast a significant national moment of spiritual reflection.

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Culture

Freedom

Liberalism

20 May 2023

6 min read

On liberty’s limits: why Mill was wrong about freedom

This month, it’s 150 years since philosopher JS Mill died. His definition of freedom remains hugely influential. But is it still the right one for healthy relationships and contentment amid the isolation of modern life?

Graham Tomlin

Graham is the Director of the Centre for Cultural Witness and a former Bishop of Kensington.

A copy of the Statue of Liberty, holding a stick of bread, stands outside a shop window displaying an 'Open 24 Hours' signs.

Photo by KC Welch on Unsplash.

You can tell what a society values by what it goes to war over. In the 17th century we fought our wars over religion. In the 19th it was empire. In the 20th and 21st, we fought our wars over freedom, either defending our own or trying to export our version of it to other parts of the world. We tend, of course, to assume we know what freedom is: the liberty to do what we like, as long as don’t harm other people. But we rarely know how time-conditioned and recent such a view of freedom is.

John Stuart Mill, child prodigy, colonial administrator, Member of Parliament and philosopher, who died 150 years ago this year, is one of the primary architects of our contemporary ideas of freedom. In his own words, his book On Liberty, published in 1859, was an exploration of the ‘nature and limits of the power that can legitimately be exercised by society over the individual’. Mill famously argues that the only valid reason for interfering with another person’s liberty of action is to protect them from physical harm. It is never justifiable to interfere with another person’s freedom to ensure their happiness, wisdom or well-being, because that is to determine what that person’s well-being is. Freedom is defined as liberty of conscience, thought, feeling and opinion, as ‘liberty of tastes and pursuits … doing as we like … without impediment from our fellow creatures, so long as what we do does not harm them’.

For Mill... individual liberty is vital, not just for the sake of the individual, but for the sake of human progress.

Mill is one of the great champions of nonconformity in thought and action. Even if just one person held a particular opinion while everyone else in the world held the opposite, there would be no justification in silencing that one voice. For Mill, one of the main ingredients of social progress is freedom from the traditions and customs imposed by others, both the past constraints of tradition, and the present ones of custom, which restrict the cultivation of individuality, which in turn ‘is one of the leading essentials of well-being’. Individual liberty is vital, not just for the sake of the individual, but for the sake of human progress. Without it there will be no originality or genius, no new discoveries or innovation. Civilisation cannot advance without individual freedom which encourages spontaneous expression, the development of new thoughts and ideas unconstrained by the patterns of the past.

It is a powerful argument. On Liberty is full of the fear of Victorian conformity – the individualist’s reaction to a stifling society with a high degree of social control. It is very much a book of its time, assuming the cultural superiority of the modern age. It also breathes an elitism that looks down on the mediocrity of what it calls ‘average men’.

But more than that, there is, I think, a deeper flaw in this way of thinking about freedom. If freedom is essentially my liberty to say or do what I like, as long as I don’t tread on the toes of my neighbour, then what does that do to my relationship with my neighbour? He or she becomes at best a limitation, or at worst a threat to my freedom. There may be all kinds of things I want to do – play music loud on a summer’s night, or drive my car at 100 mph on a quiet suburban road – but I can’t because I might disturb my neighbour’s peace or risk crashing into an oncoming bus. Or even worse, my neighbour might want to play her music too loud for me, or drive her car too fast in my direction, thus invading my personal space. This approach keeps the peace between us, but at the cost of making us see each other either as irritating limitations to our desires which of course define our self-chosen goals in life, or threats to our own precious autonomy.

The German sociologist Hartmut Rosa argues that

“the ethical imperative that guides modern subjects is not a particular or substantive definition of the good life, but the aspiration to acquire the resources necessary or helpful for leading one.”

In other words, in the individualised world imagined by Mill, we are all left to dream our own dreams, choose our own ambitions, and are all caught up in the fight to get hold of the money, rights, friends, looks, health, and knowledge that will enable us to get to our self-chosen destination. It therefore makes us competitors with each other, not only seeing each other as rivals in this race for resources, but also as potential threats who might stand in the way of our freedom to pursue our dreams.

There is however another, older view of freedom, rooted more in character and virtue than in individualised personal goals. This version, found in classical literature, sees liberty not as freedom from the limitations and social expectations that stop us following our self-chosen desires, but freedom from the passions. The Greeks viewed the soul as like a ship which should sail serenely towards the harbour of such virtues as prudence, courage and temperance. It was guided on this journey by paideia, or education in virtue, yet was at the same time buffeted by the winds of irrational and destructive impulses such as envy, anger or lust that threaten to blow it off course. For them, our passionate inner desires are not the sacrosanct moral guide to our true selves but are a distraction from the true path of virtue.

True liberty is freedom from anything that would stop us becoming the person we were created to be.

This version was developed further by Christian thinkers such as St Paul, St Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. For them, true liberty is freedom from anything that would stop us becoming the person we were created to be: someone capable of love for what is not ourselves – for God and our neighbour. True liberty is freedom from internal urges such as the greed, laziness or pride that turn us in upon ourselves rather than outwards towards God and each other. It is also freedom from external forces such as the grinding poverty that dangles the temptation to steal in order to survive, or an economy that constantly tells us that if you don’t acquire as much stuff as your neighbour you are a failure. It is not so much freedom for ourselves, but freedom from ourselves: freedom from self-centred desires, or the crippling self-absorption that makes us think only of our own interests. It is freedom to create the kind of society where we are more concerned with our neighbours’ wellbeing than our own.

In this view of freedom, my neighbour becomes not a limitation or a threat, but a gift – someone without whom I cannot become someone capable of the primary virtue of love. Putting it bluntly, if I am to become someone capable of other-centred love, I need someone to practice on.

This Christian understanding of freedom offers a vision of society where you might begin to trust other people to look after your own needs, because they are looking out for yours. It is also a vision of freedom that delivers personal happiness better than the libertarian view. Becoming the kind of person who has learnt, as St Paul once put it, to ‘look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others’ is in fact a recipe for healthy relationships and contentment rather than the increasing isolation of much modern life.

Mill may have had a point in the stifling conservatism of Victorian Britain, but in an age of increasing loneliness, isolation and anxiety, his view of freedom doesn’t help build good neighbourhoods, families or communities. We need a better version - one that brings us together, rather than drives us apart.