麻豆社

From Rev鈥檇 Richard Coles, cleric and broadcaster:

听

When I heard about today鈥檚 Royal Visit to these studios, I recalled the last, when the Queen came to open New Broadcasting House. I was there to see her emerge from the Royal Car, in eye-catching Eau de Nil, to be greeted by the boss. 听Nothing unusual about that, but then I noticed something had changed. She normally arrives to the sound of applause: that day there was none. An outbreak of Republican feeling? No, instead of clapping everyone had one hand in the air capturing on the tiny screens of their smartphones what was happening in reality in front of them. 听I wonder if she notices, or minds? I don鈥檛 suppose we鈥檒l never know. 听

听

She was taken on tour of the building and, visiting Radio One, sat inscrutably, while The Script treated her to a song. Then she was taken to News and there in line waiting to be presented were the 麻豆社鈥檚 fiercest interviewers, not noted for deference, suddenly all bows and smiles. Does that strike her as peculiar, that she should elicit these responses from people, so out of character, so contradictory?

听

It was reported once 鈥� though unconfirmed - that she said she couldn鈥檛 understand the applause that greets her (or used to). 鈥淲hy?鈥� she wondered, 鈥淚 haven鈥檛 done anything. I鈥檓 just there鈥� like Nelson鈥檚 Column鈥�.

听

But maybe that鈥檚 it. In a world of restless change, we need things that hold their place, a centre around which everything else turns. I can鈥檛 think of anyone more qualified to be the unmoving centre of our turning world than the Queen, just there since Britain detonated its first atom bomb, and work on the United Nations building in New York began, and David Hasselhoff was born.

听

Maybe it also answers in us an unsatisfied hunger, for a story bigger than ours, one that predates and will postdate us, and gives us bigger dimensions in which to live more fully than we otherwise would. It points, I think, to the life of faith, once universally shared, now a minority interest like origami. Good riddance, you might think, but I think that without it parts of us wither and fade and we鈥檙e the poorer for it.