King Constantine's Anglican memorial service

[Jean-Serge]

I am dealing with this topic more in detail on my blog http://orthodoxie-libre.over-blog.com/2 ... pannychida 

The fact is that a memorial service was organized in London for King Constantine for the anniversary of his death. This is quite natural. Also natural and common was the attendance of several members of royal families : Greece, Spain, England, Denmark, Serbia, Jordan etc, since after all they are all friends and sometimes family. The suprising thing is that it took place as an Anglican ceremony in an Anglican church (the Saint George chapel of Windsor). The president was the Anglican clergyman with some participation and the orthodox Constantinople archbishop for England who read some prayers. This was the structure of the service

• Organ music before the service

• Introit: poem of  Mikhail Lermontov to the Mother of God, on music by Sir John Tavener

• Bidding by the The Right Reverend Dr Christopher Cocksworth, Dean of Windsor

• Hymn by Words John Whittier (1807–92)

• First Reading Ithaka by C. P. Cavafy read by Their Royal Highnesses Princess Theodora, Prince Nikolaos, Princess Alexía and Prince Philippos

• Ave Maria of Schubert

• Second Reading Revelation 21. 1–7 that was supposed to be read by His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales (who could not attend the ceremony)

• Other hymn by John Ellerton (1826–93)

• Address : speech by The Right Honourable The Lord Soames of Fletching

• Hymn: “Amazing Grace”

• Kontakion of the Departed

• Prayers : the first two by the Dean of Windsor, the next third by His Eminence Archbishop Nikitas of Thyateira and Great Britain and the final one said together by both

• Prayer : Our Father

• Music

• Hymn : “I vow to thee, my country, all earthly things above…” by Cecil Spring-Rice (1859–1918)

• Blessing

• National anthem : “God save the King”

• Organ music (end of the service)

Do you have any idea why this liturgical option was taken? In the past, many events for the royal Greek family took place in the Greek cathedral in London. It is still open and working normally. Was it the decision of the family, or the will of the late king himself? Was there some protest from orthodox circles fighting from within?

Some pictures and links

Dailymail article [accessed on 03/03/2024]: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/royals ... milla.htmlDailymail article [accessed on 03/03/2024]: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/arti ... rvice.htmlLibertad Digital article [accessed on 03/03/2024]: https://www.libertaddigital.com/chic/co ... a-7101933/Le Figaro article [accessed on on 03/03/2024]: https://madame.lefigaro.fr/celebrites/a ... r-20240228Site of the Greek royal family [accessed on on 03/03/2024]: https://www.greekroyalfamily.gr/announcement-en.htmlThe booklet with the content of the service is available at the following sites:https://www.greekroyalfamily.gr/images/ ... y-2024.pdfhttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/royals ... milla.html

[Barbara]

This is really a good find, Jean-Serge. WOW - how revealing !
I will look at the links at the library later today or tomorrow - thanks for letting us know !

I do know for sure that the British-installed Jordanian royal family is tightly linked with the English royals. All the men went to Sandhurst, they wear British military style berets, etc. The cultural connection is strong--what about the political one ?!
I am mentioning this to at least partially explain what would otherwise be an anomaly : Arabs attending a Greek monarch's pannikhida [I guess that's what the service was SUPPOSED to have been -]

Is this the 1st year that this watered down 'service' was conducted ? Sir John Tavener's music as probably everyone knows, is billed as Orthodox due to some of the names he gave his musical creations. But his work is far from Orthodox.

[Jean-Serge]

Hello Barbara,

Arab royals are used to attending royal weddings in Europe too... So their attendance to the one-year memorial is not a surprise. The service was definitely a pannychida but an Anglican one. They call it "Thanksgiving service for the life of..."

I see 2 possibilities: the royal Greek family is either Anglican or in sort of syncretistic christianism. In both case, even by the very lax world orthodox standards, this is really not acceptable.
 

[Barbara]

Absolutely NOT ! It's actually a betrayal - UNLESS, like you say, the Greek royal family is crypto-Anglican - !
Good point that the Greek Cathedral in London is available, but instead, this distasteful venue was chosen - by SOMEONE, WHO ??

The British national anthem being sung at a supposedly Church service ? I looked through the list that one or two of your links gave. I didn't fail to note that Prince Michael of Kent, the infamous leader of the Freemasons, was there.
Could this possibly have been a Masonic production, at least behind the scenes ?

It was interesting, though, to read up on the recent history of some of the royals in attendance.
I did some brushing up on the Jordanian family. The Guardian got the age wrong of Queen Noor. The paper said she is 60, but she's 72. I had read her biography of her husband, King Hussein, when it came out.

What's a little surprising is that her grandfather, Najeeb Elias Halaby Sr.,was one of the 1st Syrian immigrants to the United States in 1891 or so. His religion wasn't specified beyond Christian where i was looking. Presumably, the grandfather might have been Syrian Orthodox ? But Queen Noor's father, Najeeb Halaby, Jr., was raised as a Christian Scientist !
That's what it has traditionally taken to become accepted in American higher circles. Some kind of Protestant, preferably Episcopalian [the American version of Anglican, of course]. Halaby, Jr. was head of PanAm Airways for 4 years til 1972.

Just for historical interest, here is a short clip of him speaking on the November 11, 1968 news about Pan Am hijacked aircraft. Notice how different the style of the anchor delivering the news is, compared with today's.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMe0FnavK5M

 
 
 

[Jean-Serge]

 

If I am not mistaken the British National Anthen is sung every time that the monarch is there in Anglican churches. King Charles could not attend due to his illness but queen Camilla was attending. 

As for Michael of Kent and masonry, Michale of Kent, as cousin of the late queen, is used to attending many ceremonies or sometimes even representing the royal family. For instance, he represented the royal family at the wedding of the pretendant to the Albanian thrones some years ago. However, your comment reminded me a Spanish documentary I saw some years ago on Youtube about the wedding of Juan Carlos, prince of Spain (he did not have the title of Prince of Asturias), and Sofia of Greece. The documentary tells that Franco, the then ruler of Spain, refused to attend the wedding because the father of bride belonged to masonry. However, I do not have any proofs about the father of King Constantine being a mason, or about king Constantine himself being a mason.

[Barbara]

Fascinating !! Franco must have had a reason for believing that the father of his daughter-in-law-to-be was a Mason. It would not have been hearsay alone, one can be sure. That says a lot about the ideals of that former era in Spanish history - as well as all the periods leading up to it.

There's a reason that the Spanish aristocracy and the Catholic public supported Franco... it's been made to appear shameful, but rarely does one hear the truth about who his opponents in the Spanish Civil War were : Communists, anarchists, etc.supported by huge amounts of arms and cash by the Soviet Union ! Tellingly, the Western nations were unanimously in favor of the these, termed falsely "Republicans". They should have been called at minimum, the Socialists, but there was much disinformation in the Western press at that time to obscure who these people really were.

Today, almost no one would even have a qualm about someone being a Mason. But it DOES say so much about such an individual, as we all know.

Also, I bet the old documentary you saw would be hard to find now ! All such useful information for inquiring minds surely has been suppressed.

Further to the Jordanian royal family, I looked up Prince Hassan bin Talal, who was present at the service.
Just to refresh our memories about the history of the Hashemite dynasty :

Prince El Hassan['s] male-line ancestors served as Sharifs of Mecca. In the early 1900s, the kingdom of Hejaz was set up in western Arabia by the Western powers in order to torment the Ottoman empire, and Hassan's great-grandfather, already Grand Sharif of Mecca, was made king of this state.
That kingdom did not last long, being soon conquered by Al Saud.
However, one of the sons of the Grand Sharif, Prince El Hassan's grandfather, King Abdullah I, became king of Transjordan in 1946.
In 1949, after annexing the West Bank in Palestine, and "uniting" both banks of the Jordan River, it was constitutionally renamed the "Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan"-commonly referred to nowadays as Kingdom of Jordan.
 
Does anyone who had a stamp collection when young remember the "Transjordan" stamps ?!

To sum up, while the Hashemite family may not be actual Masons themselves, they seem to be along that line.

At the minimum, they have served the British monarchs all this time.