We marked the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II with a Solemn High Mass for the repose of the late monarch’s soul on Sunday 11th September. It attracted a full house of parishioners, in addition to visitors from all around the world. A good number were moved to tears when singing “God Save the King” – either for the first time ever, or, for some, the first time in over seventy years. The Provost missed out on this because he was away on the last leg of a summer holiday, but was back in London in good time to watch the obsequies on television. A staunch monarchist, he treasures the memory of his one and only personal encounter with Her late Majesty. It occurred in front of the Oratory Church not long before the dreaded lockdowns of 2020. Exiting from the main doors after listening to a sermon, he descended into an empty forecourt just in time to see a car slowing down on the Brompton Road and, inside, Her Majesty turning to look at the church. The Provost should probably have bowed, but in the excitement of the moment he at least remembered to remove his biretta which he waved enthusiastically, and he was thrilled when his Sovereign reciprocated with an indulgent smile and a rather more elegant wave of her own, before the car continued on its westward progress.
Queen Elizabeth II actually knew a thing or two about the London Oratory. She was once travelling home to Buckingham Palace in a helicopter in the company of a Catholic courtier whom she could not resist teasing. As they flew over South Kensington Her Majesty enquired about a sizeable patch of verdant lawn below. “That is the garden of the fathers of the Brompton Oratory, Ma’am,” explained the courtier. “The Oratory fathers?” asked the Queen, “Don’t they belong to your denomination?” The courtier answered in the affirmative, which elicited the response: “Trust THEM.” Mercifully the Oratory was not yet in existence when King Henry VIII grabbed a nearby patch of vegetation which would become Hyde Park from the possession of the Benedictine monks of Westminster Abbey.
All but the most obstinate sectarians will have recognised the late Queen to be a sincere Christian who gave testimony throughout her long reign to the centrality in her life of her faith, and of the Person of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. As queues of hundreds of thousands passed through the Lying-in-State in Westminster Hall, it was striking to note how many of those who paused to bow or to curtsy also made the sign of the cross, and among the mourners at the catafalque there were groups of religious in their habits. This was all a touching testimony to the loyalty of the Catholic subjects of this realm, and of the profound affection in which we held a monarch who at her Coronation had promised to uphold “the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law”. Various inhabitants of Oratory House made the pilgrimage to Westminster Hall. One of the fathers who had waited for eight and a half hours found himself turfed out of the queue at the doors, when he was found by the security team to be carrying an offensive weapon in the pocket of his cassock. He remains adamant that he did not intend any mischief. The menacing instrument was a miniature Swiss Army penknife on a key ring, which had been engraved by his parents as a gift for the tenth anniversary of his priestly ordination.
A wide spectrum of emotions was visible in the faces of those who filed past the late Queen’s mortal remains. Chief among them, naturally, were sorrow and grief. Some of those interviewed explained that Her Majesty had been a last living link with the generation of their grandparents and others who had lived through the War. A powerful sentiment that many of us experienced will have been a sense of immense gratitude for someone who had given her all without ever seeming to ask for anything in return. We see all too often how privilege and access to wealth can be a temptation to the life of self-indulgence and dissipation, which never brings happiness. The Queen, for whom wry self-effacing humour was a typical public response to trials which she sometimes had to endure in her own life, provided a great example of the dignity and inner serenity that are among the hard-earned fruits of self-sacrifice, restraint and service to the common good.
We Catholics are able to express our affection and thanks for our late Sovereign in a way that is positive and practical. It is a key tenet of our Catholic Faith that the prayers of the living are of great assistance to the souls of the faithful departed. Let us pray for Queen Elizabeth II, that in Heaven she may receive an incorruptible crown, and be merrily reunited with her beloved Prince Philip at the Throne of Grace. Let us pray also for our new King Charles III, who in the autumn of 2019 was the life and soul of the party at the celebrations in Rome for the canonisation of our own Oratorian saint John Henry Newman. May God comfort our earthly King as he mourns his mother, and through the intercession of the Queen of Heaven, of our holy father Saint Philip, and of Saint John Henry, may His Majesty and his reign be always blessed.
Goodbye, Ma’am, and thank you for everything.
God save the King!
Father Julian Large