Royals don’t have surnames. The Queen and her brood are of the House of Windsor; because her husband, Prince Phillip, who also never had a surname, was a Battenberg of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (styled Mountbatten in England), the Queen’s descendants are supposedly Mountbatten-Windsors, and nearly all of them have used the name at one time or another. However, in the military, they have usually gone by Windsor; William and Harry went by Wales in school. Kate will probably have no reason whatsoever to use a surname after she marries William, but if she does, she could no doubt use the name Windsor without raising any eyebrows.
I thought that when Diana and Charles divorced they were listed as Charles Windsor and Diana Windsor in the court papers.
William is know as Flight Lieutenant William Wales in the Royal Air Force.
Not according to this – http://articles.cnn.com/1996-08-28/world/9608_28_royal.divorce_decree_1_prince-charles-matrimonial-family-division?_s=PM:WORLD
Here’s an actual image of the divorce decree: http://www.princess-diana.com/diana/images/scheidung10.jpg
What if one were to CONVERT from Catholicism first? Then would it be kosher? (Well, not kosher, of course)
No she’s not – the laws were changed in Hanover sometime after Sophia. Because when Victoria ascended the throne, it was severed from that of Britain, because only a male could rule there. Thus, it passed to her uncle, the Duke of Cumberland. In fact, some of his descendents are still around. This guy would be the heir. Hanover ceased to exist as a sovereign state after the Austro-Prussian War, and was consumed into the German Empire.
(Strangely enough, the grandson of the last Hanover monarch married the Kaiser’s daughter, Viktoria Luise. Since HER grandfather had kicked HIS grandfather off of the throne, it was seen as sort of a Romeo and Juliet type of thing. Their wedding was the last big royal gathering before WWI began.)
No Catholic nor a person married to a Catholic can be the British monarch. Does that answer your question?
Elizabeth is Sophia’s heir with respect to the British monarchy. The Hanover title isn’t relevant to that.
I’m sorry – I thought you meant the heir to Hanover.
And read what I wrote: CONVERTED to Protestantism.
Indeed, it seems that according to Wiki, Princess Anne’s son, Peter Phillips is 16th in the line of succession. Yet, his wife, Autumn Kelly, was a Catholic, who converted before they were married.
So obviously, it seems as long as said person converts to Anglicanism before the marriage takes place, it doesn’t matter what religion you were before.
The act, so far as I know, says nothing about having to be Protestant, or Anglican, or Christian even. It just says “not Catholic.” Any resolution of convoluted hypotheticals would have to be conducted by the parliament. It really makes no sense for us to speculate.
The current Queen’s consort, Prince Phillip of Greece, was a Greek Orthodox Catholic, but he converted to the Anglican church before they were married. Otherwise Elizabeth would have taken herself out of the line for the throne by marrying him (and we would have had Queen Margaret).
There could have been questions about whether ‘Greek Orthodox Catholic’ is ‘Catholic’ within the meaning of the Act of Settlement, but the Roman Catholic Church officially says the Greek Orthodox church is “in communion” with the Roman church, so that would probably count. It would have certainly caused a fuss.
Are you sure of that? As far as I can tell, he was Greek Orthodox. There are some Eastern churches that are described as “Catholic”, but the Greek Orthodox Church is just Orthodox.
Parliament can name anyone it likes as monarch, and in the absence of an appropriate existing monarch can do so on its own initiative, apparently. Obviously that’s now complicated by the Statute of Westminster, but it seems that was the convention established by the Glorious Revolution.
And once he’s married the Queen will grant him the customary dukedom and he’ll likely use his title as a placeholder surname. For example let’s say he’s made Duke of Sussex; he’d then go by Flight Lieutenant Sussex. So would Kate; for example her credit cards would likely say something like “Catherine Sussex”. Their passports would use their titles though and not have a surname listed.
In fact, it is lawful for the monarch to be married to a Catholic, if the spouse converted following the marriage. They just can’t marry a Catholic, i.e. someone who’s a Catholic at the time of the marriage.
No, the Orthodox Church is not Catholic – the Eastern Orthodox Church split with the Roman Catholic Church in 1054. Phillip is not, and has never been Catholic.
Now, there ARE Eastern RITE Catholics, but it’s not the same thing.
The official name of the Greek Orthodox Church is “the Holy Orthodox Greek Catholic Church” – but that no more means ‘Catholic’ in the affiliated-with-the-Pope sense than a titmouse is a rodent with a large bosom. And while the Roman church admits Orthodox to communion, the Orthodox Church forbids its faithful to commune in Catholic churches.
Bottom line is that the Act of Settlement forbids the monarch or his spouse to be part of that church which is in communion with the Pope, not anything that uses the name ‘Catholic’ for any reason.
The actual applicable text being:
and
Parliament wouldn’t need to involve itself at all, unless it wanted to change the current law. Unless and until that happens, any resolution of “convoluted hypotheticals” can be done simply by reading the Act of Settlement. Under that Act, it is not a problem at all for someone in the line of succession to marry anyone who is not a Catholic. Thus marriage to an Orthodox Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, a Buddhist or a person of no religion at all does not affect the line of succession. The crown will always pass to the heir of Sophia, provided that person (a) is a Protestant, and (b) doesn’t marry a Catholic.
“Hmmm…execute you say…gentlemen I think I have a solution to our problem.”