King Charles would find swearing allegiance ‘abhorrent’, says Jonathan Dimbleby
The King finds the idea of people paying homage to him during his Coronation “abhorrent”, the broadcaster Jonathan Dimbleby believes.
For the first time, the public are being given an active role in the ceremony as they are invited to swear allegiance to the King.
But Dimbleby. a close friend of the King, said he has “never wanted to be revered”.
The Archbishop of Canterbury has reiterated that the oath is voluntary.
Justin Welby said earlier this week there was “no drama” about whether the public swear allegiance to the monarch, clarifying that this was “an invitation; it’s not a command”.
The “homage of the people”, revealed last weekend by Lambeth Palace, is a new addition to the ancient ceremony which is being led by the archbishop.
Lambeth Palace said it hoped people would say the homage out loud and there would be a “sense of a great cry around the nation and around the world of support for the King”.
Campaign group Republic called the idea “nonsense” and “offensive”.
Dimbleby, who is attending the Coronation, said he feels there may have been a miscommunication because it is “so different from the king that I know”.
Asked what the King thinks of the idea, he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he did not know “for certain”, but added: “I can think of nothing that he would find more abhorrent.
“He’s never wanted to be revered. He’s never wanted, so far as I know, to have anyone pay homage to him except in mock terms as a joke.
“He wants, I think, to feel that people will share in the event.”
Read the latest from our royal correspondent Sean Coughlan – read more here.
Dimbleby said it seemed to him to be an initiative by the archbishop “who thought it would be a good thing to give everyone a chance to pay that homage”.
He said: “I think it was well intentioned and rather ill-advised, because its effect, of course, is to allow everyone to say, well, I’m not going to pay homage.”
He added that it is “so different from the King that I know to ask for homage or to expect homage”.
It is unclear who came up with the idea, but it is “pretty inconceivable” that Buckingham Palace was not aware of the homage element or the entire order of service before it was announced, the BBC’s Religion Editor Aleem Maqbool told the Today programme.
Earlier this week, the archbishop said it was fine if people did not want to join in the voluntary oath.
Asked about some newspaper reports suggesting he had gone “rogue”, he insisted the service had been a “huge, collaborative [with Buckingham Palace and the Cabinet Office] and very lovely process”.
“There’s no individual who can claim the credit for this service,” he added.
While reading out the oath, the archbishop will call upon “all persons of goodwill in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and of the other realms and the territories to make their homage, in heart and voice, to their undoubted King, defender of all”.
The order of service will read: “All who so desire, in the abbey, and elsewhere, say together:
“I swear that I will pay true allegiance to Your Majesty, and to your heirs and successors, according to law. So help me God.”
