Written by C.Huxley for Catholic Unscripted

Hidden within the Sovereign Grant Report (2025-26) published last week is the following sentence: ‘His Majesty is Supreme Governor of the Church of England and protects the space for Faith within the multi-faith nation.’ This marks a dramatic shift from previous reports, which only mentioned his formal role as ‘Head of the Church of England and Defender of the Faith’.

It might be easy for Catholics to dismiss such a change on the grounds that the title itself is a counterfeit of the original title ‘Fidei Defensor’ given to King Henry VIII by Pope Leo X in recognition of his theological treatise ‘Assertio Septem Sacramentorum’ (Defence of the Seven Sacraments) in 1521. This was a passionate defence of the supremacy of the Pope and Catholic doctrine against Martin Luther. Just 15 years later, in an attempt to validate his new marriage to Anne Boleyn, he issued Ten Articles, which recognised only Baptism, the Eucharist and Penance as sacraments, conveniently leaving out Matrimony. A utilitarian work-around that contradicted his earlier scholarly work.

The United Kingdom may have broken with Rome, but it retains aspects of the pre-modern understanding of Catholic Kingship, in which Christ provides the sovereign with a model of humility and pastoral concern for his subjects. The Coronation is a Christian service in which the monarch is consecrated with holy oil and invested with sacerdotal garments, echoing the medieval concept of the divine right of kings. On Maundy Thursday the monarch continues to commemorate the Last Supper by handing out Maundy Money in a tradition that dates back to the 6^th century.

Twenty-six Church of England bishops (Lords Spiritual) continue to sit in the House of Lords, where they review new legislation, reminding us that we do not have an American style separation of powers, but the precise opposite: each part of English society is represented in the Houses of Parliament, albeit with different roles. To this day, the House of Commons and the House of Lords open with morning prayer. These traditions have informed a culture in which Christian beliefs and values have provided the touchstone.

England became a unified kingdom under the Christian monarch King Æthelstan in c.927AD. Can a sentence in an annual accounts report really replace over a millennium of constitutional Christianity? Strictly speaking, no! The place of Christianity is so embedded in centuries of parliamentary legislation, common law, and the monarchy’s role as Supreme Governor of the established Church that an accounting document cannot change that.

Nevertheless, this sleight of hand should not be dismissed. Roger Scruton warned that institutions are frequently altered, not by dramatic legislation, but by gradual changes in language, convention and expectation. Constitutional change often begins silently with subtle changes in vocabulary, before it reaches statute. Words do not merely describe constitutional arrangements; over time they reshape the way those arrangements are understood.

As such, we should take notice and consider what we might lose. In changing the words used to describe what the sovereign receives his grant for, it has effectively changed his job description without any parliamentary debate, public consultation or scrutiny of any kind. It may be presented as reflecting Britain’s changing population. In reality, however, it replaces a precise constitutional settlement with language so elastic that it can mean almost anything.

Charles may sincerely want to be a reconciler and patron of all faiths, but, constitutionally, that is not the role he inherited. Attempting to redefine the office creates competing claims upon the monarch’s loyalty. The public disquiet in response to King Charles’ decision last year to open St George’s Hall in Windsor to an Islamic Iftar meal was arguably a first example of the sort of tension that could become normal. Is this Medieval hall, in the heart of the oldest inhabited royal castle in Christendom and named after our Christian patron saint, now a ‘space’ for Islam or for any faith at all?

Charles has repeatedly expressed a desire to see himself as the protector of all faiths rather than as the constitutional guardian of one Christian settlement. Before the coronation there had long been rumours that Charles might change the traditional Coronation oath from ‘Defender of the Faith’ to ‘Defender of faith’ in general. In the end, he chose to retain the centuries-old wording consistent with his formal role and the Christian anointing ceremony. It is, however, reasonable to question whether, through his new job description, he is trying to have his cake and eat it.

His unusually deep and longstanding engagement with Islam is the clearest public example of Charles’ instinct for religious pluralism, and it therefore throws the constitutional question into sharpest relief. Charles has long expressed a deep admiration for Islamic art and culture and has spoken with ardour about Islam’s contribution to the West. Yet the classical Islamic political tradition developed a markedly different model of sovereign authority.

Medieval European kings, especially in England, were constrained by a complex web of barons, parliaments and the Church. By contrast, many classical Islamic polities concentrated authority more directly in their ruler, placing greater emphasis upon obedience and executive discretion. We can see the differences between these inheritances today in the way that surviving Christian European monarchies have evolved into democracies with a constitutional monarch as a titular Head of State, providing a remarkably stable model of governance you do not find elsewhere.

English kings have long hankered after more power than they have. King Henry II had a bitter power struggle with his dear friend, Lord Chancellor and Archbishop Thomas Becket. He famously cried out “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?” in a fit of exasperation, not knowing that four enthusiastic knights were listening. On the evening of 29^th December 1170, the knights confronted Becket inside Canterbury cathedral as he was preparing to attend Vespers. When Becket refused to agree to the King’s demands, declaring he was prepared to die in defence of the Church, they struck him repeatedly with their swords.

Thomas Becket’s martyrdom led to Henry II undertaking a humiliating public penance. He walked barefoot through the streets of Canterbury and was ritually flogged by bishops at the site of the martyrdom. This established a stark precedent: the spiritual power of Rome outranked the temporal power of the English king. Even the anointed king remained subject to a law higher than his own will. This defining characteristic of the English constitutional tradition has been repeatedly reinforced through history.

The power dynamic established in the 12^th century swung violently in the opposite direction 350 years later. King Henry VIII viewed Becket as the ultimate symbol of papal overreach and treason. In a Royal proclamation in 1538 he stripped St Thomas Becket of his sainthood, decreed him a rebel, and ordered that his shrine at Canterbury Cathedral be dismantled and burnt. Perhaps Becket was a painful reminder to Henry of what he had done to his friend and Chancellor Sir Thomas More. When More stood on the scaffold, put to death not by accident, but by order of the King, he described himself in terms Becket would have recognised: “the King’s good servant, but God’s first.” Both men understood that there are realms of truth and conscience beyond the King’s jurisdiction and that the King they each served had forgotten the nature of the role he had inherited.

The British Crown still derives its authority from this Christian conception of kingship, shaped over centuries by scripture, canon law, Magna Carta, Parliament and the witness of saints, who all insisted that even kings stand beneath God’s judgement, as we all do. Our monarch is not simply someone who protects religions in general. He should embody a specifically Christian understanding of authority, which involves accepting responsibility from God to uphold the Church, see that justice is pursued and the vulnerable are defended.

Charles’ admiration for Islamic aesthetics need not be at odds with Christian kingship. Bishop Suger of Saint-Denis (1081–1151) wrote that the splendour of physical beauty allows our minds to transcend earthly limitations and connect with the spiritual realm of God. As such, Christianity has always admired beauty wherever it finds it. Gothic architecture itself drew upon ideas, techniques and craftsmanship inherited from the classical world, Byzantium and the Islamic world, transforming them into something uniquely Christian. Civilisations flourish by learning from one another, but they do so most fruitfully when they remain rooted in the inheritance that enables them to recognise truth, goodness and beauty.

The title ‘Defender of the Faith’ reminds the sovereign that his first duty is not to admire every tradition equally, but to remain faithful to the one that gave birth to the constitutional order he has inherited. An inheritance is not ours to reinvent, but to receive with gratitude, enrich through faithful stewardship and hand on to those who come after us. Becket reminded Henry II of this truth. Sir Thomas More reminded Henry VIII. Charles III need not abandon his genuine curiosity about other civilisations to rediscover the same. Perhaps, however, after looking so attentively beyond our own inheritance, it is time for King Charles to rediscover the riches that lie within it. A king who remembers his inheritance does not narrow Britain’s horizons. He gives them their surest foundation.