Queen Elizabeth, a federal 15-week abortion ban, and Americans abandoning democratic norms.

After a writing hiatus, Shane Vander Hart looks at three recent stories in the news.

Photo by Mark de Jong on Unsplash

I apologize for the unannounced writing hiatus, I needed a break from writing, and there never seems to be a convenient time to do that. So to ease back into writing, I want to highlight three stories. 

The Death of Queen Elizabeth II

Last Thursday, Queen Elizabeth II passed away at the Royal Family’s Balmoral estate in Scotland at the age of 96. She is the longest-serving British monarch, reigning 70 years after her coronation in 1952. King Charles III was officially proclaimed King of Great Britain and the Commonwealth on Saturday.

Albert Mohler, in his podcast last week, made some interesting observations: 

"Queen Elizabeth was the constant, but her nation changed remarkably. It changed utterly. It changed religiously, it changed in terms of the secularization of the culture, Britain secularizing far faster than even some other European nations, not to mention, the United States, and you're also looking at moral change..."

..."for virtually the entirety of her very long life, Elizabeth saw herself as fulfilling a tradition and fulfilling a role by divine sovereignty that could be traced back, if not, genetically and by hereditary claim, at least trace back to ancient monarchies and, in particular, to the monarchical tradition of the Old Testament. Elizabeth was also, we should note, Supreme Governor of the Church of England, the very church that suffered such theological and numerical and moral loss during the 20th century. One of the ironies is that by the end of her life, Queen Elizabeth was almost assuredly more orthodox and conservative than most of her bishops. Her theological convictions came out most clearly in her Christmas messages that were a long tradition of the British monarchy, and it was Elizabeth who saw the transition from delivering them on radio to delivering them on television, and in ways that year by year made more clear her theological convictions, Elizabeth II made very clear that she affirmed the great doctrines of the Christian faith. There were those who ministered very close to her and knew her, who said that the faith for Elizabeth was not merely conceptual, it was personal."

I don't think we'll see another British monarch like her.