British King Charles has changed the centuries-old title of British monarchs in a report on the work of the royal family and no longer calls himself the defender of the faith, drawing the ire of many traditional Christians.
In the report on the work of the royal household, the phrase "protector of the space for faith in a multiethnic nation" is used for the king instead of the title Defender of the Faith (Defensor fidei), writes the Austrian Catholic news agency Kathpress today.
Anglican dissident Gavin Ashenden, a former chaplain to Charles' mother Queen Elizabeth II, said the change "betrays Charles's duties, his Christian faith and his subjects."
Ashenden left all duties in the Anglican Church in 2017, and converted to Catholicism in 2019.
Charles himself, however, has stressed for many years that he wants to be "defender of the faith" in a broader sense, not just for the Anglican Church of England. At his coronation, he nevertheless used the old, traditional title.
The title Defender of the Faith for British rulers dates back to Henry VIII, who received the title in 1521 from Pope Leo X, after he defended the head of the Roman Catholic Church from Protestant criticism at the time.
When Henry later broke with Rome, the Pope stripped him of his title, but the title of Defender of the Faith was restored to him in 1543 by the English Parliament with the task of protecting the Anglican faith.
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