In working with CoE clergy and staff, I've heard nothing but praise for her in that role. I will bend to their judgement on this issue as it's not really for me to judge. They're all very aware of the decline, I was discussing it with a Dean earlier this month - none have blamed the royal family for it. Many of them are more introspective on how the church has lost its place in the community by not having a place for many in the community, by playing defensively in their role rather than out looking in how they connect better.
We have all inherited our sense of justice from centuries of faith based ideas such as the 10 commandments. It’s hard to say we act without influence from those faith ideas because we don’t.
During her reign, we learned many things about the Bible and other old texts through amazing finds. We can point at older texts for most of the Ten Commandements that we might link with justice, and many of the others like not working on the Sabbath and not putting any other gods before that particular one, well, are they really justice? I'd say no, those are cultural concepts we see to varying degrees throughout southwest Asia at the time, not justice ones.
The fact that the Catholic Church felt the need for the title “Defender of the Faith” indicates that the faith does need defending
Or they just really liked titles back then, in part because it was part of how people built alliances.
Have we forgotten the value of faith because we’ve normalised and accepted the meaningless of the title and a title holder who does nothing meaningful to defend the faith?
The value of faith and the value 'the faith' are two separate things.
All institutions lean towards corruption, and within her reign, there were historic and contemporary issues that weren't really handled well. Just this year, we're finding mass graves from church residential schools, hundreds dead that weren't acknowledged before by any of the multiple church and state institutions involved. The value of the faith/church as an institution is only in the value it gives the community -- some it may do very well, but many including those of the faith have seen many horrendous failures.
Faith, believing in others, in community, in values - yes that can have value. We're so limited when we can't build that trust and support in each other.
faith can move mountains (that’s an idiom for a reason, btw).
It's an idiom because it comes from a quote from Jesus in the Bible. That's the only reason. There is no evidence it actually does that - that's why it's faith and not evidence-based practice.
But I wondered if the word Corona, which means crown, was a clue (and I’m not alone, I know many others with faith who have asked the same).
Corona is because of the shape of the virus. The idea it foreshadowed Prince Phillip and QE2's death more than their age is a bit silly.
Revelations is about Rome and its persecution of Christians during that time - it was written from jail with codes like 666 for Nero. Using it as a prophecy causes issues because it lists things in a very specific order - the plagues from bowls come after the seven trumpets, and last I checked the first trumpet - hail and fire being thrown at the Earth mixed with blood hasn't happened - and those happen after the seven seals...
When you pull out one thing without what comes before it happening, it makes it look like people don't really believe in it as prophecy, they just use pieces of it as a tool to try to convince others who don't know the texts that you're right and ends times are coming. People have done that for centuries and I do not think it defends anything but bad use of the texts.