Why People Stare at the Concept of a Monarch

The Coronation of King Charles III: A Fascinating Display of Power and Religion

Last weekend, the English-speaking world watched in awe as King Charles III was crowned at Westminster Abbey. As I watched the delayed broadcast on YouTube, I was struck by the extraordinary religious observance of the ceremony. The name of Jesus was invoked numerous times, readings from the Bible occurred, a communion service unfolded, and the new king and queen partook in the sacrament.

A Conflation of Sacerdotal and Kingly Roles

Behind screens, Charles was anointed in the manner of a priest or bishop at his ordination, and afterward, he was clothed in what looked like priestly robes. The conflation of the sacerdotal and kingly roles was remarkably redolent of Old Testament figures such as Saul, David, and Solomon.

The Fear of Power

While we are beguiled by power and those who exercise it, we are also legitimately afraid of it. Kings, emperors, warlords, princes, and dictators, permitted to exercise their authority in an arbitrary way, have wreaked havoc on untold millions and have been responsible for the piling up of mountains of corpses. This terror of power was, of course, uppermost in the minds of the founders of our country, which explains why they adopted a network of checks and balances in our government, assuring that no individual or representative body could capriciously impose its will on the collective.

The Placing of Power within a Hierarchy of Moral Values

The only finally satisfactory answer to our difficulty is the placing of power within a hierarchy of moral values, culminating in the supreme good who is God. This means that we understand that power serves the basic goods of life: knowledge, friendship, art, play, etc. It is meant to foster those ends and is, accordingly, legitimate only when it moves outside the ambit of the ego-needs of the one who exercises it. And those moral goods, in turn, are grounded in the nature of God, the ultimate good.

• Power is under God or it is tyranny.
• Abraham Lincoln knew that our much-cherished American freedom loses its meaning when unmoored from moral truth.
• Those who exercise freedom without consideration for moral purpose become, in short order, lethally dangerous.

The English Monarchy and the King of Kings

Though we Americans have thrown off our allegiance to the British monarch, we remain stubbornly fascinated with him and his family. It might be a salutary exercise, as we watch all of the colorful pageantry, to remark that this new English king, by his own admission, serves under the authority of the King of Kings.

Word on Fire founder Bishop Robert Barron is bishop of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester (Minnesota) and an acclaimed author, speaker, and theologian. Follow him on Twitter: @BishopBarron