A generally good rule is that anything that is sneered at by the Guardian must have some intrinsic value even if that value is not immediately apparent.

The subject of rituals is something I find myself banging on about more and more these days. And I am of the opinion that throwing all rituals on the pyre for the sake of saying “we are a modern society” will not necessarily improve the human experience of the members of that society.
Abolishing the monarchy in exchange for an elected head of state is to exchange ritual for process. It would be more democratic and more in-keeping with modern trends – but would it really be the improvement we think it might be? Has modernity always changed our lives for the better, or is it just making us disconnected, unhappy and spiritually poorer? Both, I think.
I believe that the changes that are coming at us down the pike in the next years and decades will actually result in a renaissance of ritual. As the world order we have known crumbles and things we believed were hard and fast truths turn out to be illusions, people will turn to ritual (possibly even back to organised religion) to seek meaning and stability.
Will it bring a revival in interest for the monarchy? No idea. The coronation at least gives us chance to reawaken a sense of the importance of ritual – if only people are curious and open-minded enough to look to see what they might discover for themselves.
If you’re a republican, ambivalent, or just not that into it – I get it. But loudly and proudly proclaiming “WELL I’M GOING TO BE IN SAINSBURY’S!!!!” to anyone who might hear does rather signal your own spiritual poverty.

‘Two-thirds of respondents tell YouGov pollsters that they either don’t care very much or don’t care at all about the ceremony. Only 9% of Britons said they care “a great deal”, and that cohort tends elderly.’
I’m probably the only Gen-Zer in the 9% who ticked that option in the survey. My hope is that the attachment will grow as they get older. Anyway, I’ll be enjoying the coronation on Saturday.

nu britn is infested by people who have a visceral envy of anything that cannot be bought…

The anthropology is interesting but surely the ritual only makes sense in these terms, if the tribe buys into it.

Does it, is really the question now.

The idea of an elected head of state is democratic and superficially appealing. But we need to remember that a head of state is meant to be a unifying, neutral figure. If a politician is elected they will be hated by at least half the population. If drawn from the ranks of the great and the good, the only people sufficiently well known are likely to be actors and television personalities. They probably wouldn’t want to do a job they have no training for, and if they did want it they probably shouldn’t have it. The present system gives the monarch (who didn’t seek the role) the glory but no power, and gives the prime minister (who did seek it) the power but not the glory – an essential division of responsibility that acts as a restraint on corruption.
Please note that the points raised here are pragmatic, not sentimental or symbolic.

https://melaniephillips.substack.com/p/the-coronation-of-king-charles-wont

The best one-liner I’ve heard today. Mark Drakeford, who is attending tomorrow, said,

“Best wishes to King Charles for an occasion which shows the United Kingdom as it is – today.”

I marvel at your wonderfully stabilising monarchy. Thank you Britain, for protecting this institution.

On a slight tangent, did anyone else find it suspicious that Dimbleby’s assertion that Charles would find the idea of being revered ‘abhorrent’ only arose after it became clear that a significant section of the British populace find swearing allegiance to an individual – particularly such an undeserving one as Charles – equally abhorrent.
Trying to blame it on poor old Welsby was, I thought, a particularly cheap shot. After all if it was Welsby’s idea, what was stopping Charles from saying “Let’s not do that – I find the idea abhorrent.”
Dimbleby of course, has met Charles, and I have not (though I think Dimbleby’s description on the BBC website as being a ‘close friend’ of Charles as self-deluding hyperbole) but from the persona Charles projects to the public I find it difficult to imagine anyone more desperate to be revered. OK, Kim Jong-Un, perhaps.
But the North Korea demands oaths of allegiance from its citizens, doesn’t it?

Why is it that so many writers have a poor grasp of British history?
The writers ignores that the British and earlier Anglo Saxon monarchs had a sense of duty. The AS monarchs ruled through consultations and consent. William agreed to rule with the laws of Edward the Confessor. Henry I drafted The Charter of Liberties. Edward III said ” That which affects all must be consulted by all “. Edward III said his son must earn his spurs at Crecy. The Black Prince before Poitiers addressed the archers and says “I and my comrades will drink the same cup with you”..
Elizabeth I says no monarch has more loved the people than she. At Tilbury Elizabeth starts her address ” My loving people.. to live or die amongst you “.
As Orwell pointed out in his essays the aristocracy were prepared to die in WW2 and 20% of them did. Orwell pointed out that the greatest duty of of the public school boy was to die for Britain.Harrow has the record for th death rate , 27% of Harrovians who fougth in WW1 died.
During WW2, Queen Elizabth refused to leave her husband and allow her children to leave the country. When Buckingham Palace was bombed she said 2 I can now look the East End in the eye ” . As a mother she appreciated the trauma of those whose homes had been destroyed and the difficulty of bringing up children.
What we have today, as Glubb has stated in Fate of Empires is ruling class based upon the aristocracrcy whose justification for their existance is to die fighting for the country being replaced by a merchant class whose main focus is making money to intellectuals for whom their ideas are sacrosanct. Merchants and intellectuals can be cowards and traitors and not be ashamed. A king and or aristocrat who is a coward and traitor forfeits their position in a country.

Is the word SCOTCH the trigger for the Censor, may I ask?

Give me ritual, or give me death.

The most interesting fact to have emerged from the planning of this splendid occasion is that the fabled ‘Stone of Scone’ was NOT broken in two by Scotch vandals back in 1952 as I had thought, but by female terrorists* in 1914.

In July 1914 these ‘harpies’ placed substantial ‘nail bomb’ within the sacred precincts of Westminster Abbey, which when detonated split the ‘Stone’ in half, but mercifully killed nobody, due to rather amateur design.

(*Sometimes referred to as Suffragettes.)

I take the view that I will watch it as I’m paying for it. Also because I am interested in our history and enjoy Shakespeare’s ‘King’ plays. The music is well worth listening to. Admittedly I have not been ‘glued’ as I have it on record mode so dip in and out according to the Order of Service. I’m not ‘happy for them’ (in the way one says of couples on their wedding day) given their sneaky back story. The one blot on the landscape for me is old ‘furious face’ Welby! Only God knows why this snarky man exchanged a biz suit for religious robes!

God Save the King means this: only God can move the hearts of British citizens to find reverence for Charles’ authority and legitimacy. If Charles wants to retain and cultivate the respect and the loyalty of Brits, he will, himself, have to retain and acknowledge his dependence on the Lord of Lords. The Archbishop ought to whisper this message to the King when Charles is beneath the cloak of Coronation and Anointing.
Later, or perhaps the same day, Charles ought to make amends with Harry, and ultimately with Meghan as well. Such reconciliation–if it is possible– will set well with the British people.

A column in a desperate search for significance. As the author admits early on most people seem indifferent and I suspect those who avidly watch tomorrow will be viewing it in the same way as the final of Strictly Come Dancing or I’m A Celebrity…

The monarchy has become a soap opera, rather than something that has real meaning in everyday life, complete with pantomime villains (I read somewhere that there are 44 articles complaining about the awfulness of ‘Harry and Meghan’ on the Daily Express website), and they are largely used to sell newspapers and provide employment for the army of ‘Royal Experts’.

Folk I know put up with it only because the thought of a President Boris Johnson or some vulture from private equity who donated shedloads of wonga to the Tory Party would be worse.

So let’s not pretend it really matters any more than who wins Masterchef.

The coronation is worth watching for the same reason it is worth seeing the two-headed sheep at the fair.