Celebrating 60 years as head of The Church

"THE last 60 years have seen remarkable cultural and social change – no one would argue with that!

"The rhythm of national life during that period has seen 12 British Prime Ministers come and go, responsibility shed, but the Queen continues to shoulder hers without respite. There is in the Dean’s study in the Deanery at Winchester one small record of the Queen’s engagement with one of her Prime Ministers.

"The plaque reads: “On 25th July 1955, HM Queen Elizabeth II gave an audience in this room, to her Prime Minister, Sir Anthony Eden KG MC”

"In our 21st century media-dominated world, public figures can no longer manage to hide their indiscretions committed in emails or through friendships with idols who are toppled.

"There has been plenty of evidence of that recently. In 60 years the Queen has managed to be utterly uncompromised and un-deflected from her duty.

"It is largely due to the Queen that there is still a Commonwealth, which has emerged from the transition of British dominance as a colonial power to the mutual respect of independent nations.

"Her own commitment to the Commonwealth, and respect built up with so many Commonwealth leaders by sheer hard work and encounter, has been on its own a lifetime’s ambition.

"There is no doubt that the Commonwealth has been able to model something in the modern world that clubs of the wealthy nations cannot.

"In a global environment where peace built on justice stretches across education, health, fair trade, opportunity, respect for difference: the Commonwealth models something very important for the 21st century.

"Many of us have a moment when the limelight of destiny has touched our lives by an encounter with the Monarch. My own would be during the celebration of the Golden Jubilee.

"The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh came to a gala luncheon and then toured a series of exhibitions of local industry in the public square outside the Cathedral where I was then working. After a busy morning elsewhere the Queen arrived and was briefly introduced to the 160 or so of us invited to lunch.

"In my short encounter I stammered something about a ‘Union Jack’ having been draped across the scaffolding of the Cathedral tower, then under construction. It was not taken up and the moment passed.

"There was the lunch, a speech, more people to meet and a tour of the exhibits.

"I had gone from the lunch to the Cathedral exhibition and it happened that the Queen toured that area of the exhibits. She arrived, looked at me and said ‘I am still trying to spot the flag’. That quiet remark, picking up a comment that I had thought was unregistered, was an amazing feat of connection in an impossibly busy day and all of us looking for our own moment.

"We take for granted that the Queen will not only commune with her Prime Ministers and visiting Heads of State, but also help to encourage excellence, open significant buildings, commission High "Court Judges personally, affirm scientific projects, invite the nation into her back garden, and be there to acknowledge in person those deserving a national award.

"She is often charged with enabling community healing and reconciliation, not least when she was the first Monarch to visit the Republic of Ireland in 2011, a journey requiring both courage and diplomatic skill.

"Besides all of these things Her Majesty is also the Defender of the Faith and Supreme Governor of the Church of England. It is a role that she has taken with the utmost seriousness and considerable insight and depth.

"Her Christmas broadcasts are amongst the most spiritually sensitive and uplifting messages of the Season.

"She does not mind sharing her faith because that is what has inspired her service, and sustained it for three score years.

"She knows that ‘without a vision the people perish’, and that faith, religion, spirituality – however you want to describe it – is an indispensible engine of that vision.

" Being faithful to Christ for her is not about brow-beating the world into seeing things from her own perspective. It is about seeking to generate an environment in which people thrive because justice and mercy thrive.

"It is because ‘whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure’ makes for abundance of human life. Long may she reign over us!"