W2E-002 Ulster editorials 2-0.txt
How the mighty are humbled

Pomp and Circumstance missing. Extravagance spared. No horse-drawn carriages. No expensive wedding gowns nor endless trains. No 21 gun salutes. Just another wedding on a cold December Saturday. Does the marriage of Princess Anne in Crathie Church mark the start of a new era for British Royalty?

Who would have believed that the people in that Scottish church yesterday were also the stars of so many spectacularly dignified State occasions?

For the Royal family, it is indeed a long, long way from the glittering splendour of St Paul's Cathedral or Westminster Abbey, to a cramped kirk in the north of Scotland.

If the mighty have not fallen, they are certainly humbled.

As the Queen watched yesterday's short ceremony, she must surely have mused upon the recent fortunes, or rather misfortunes, of her children.

So, too, must her sons, Andrew and Charles, as they listened to the words of their sister's second betrothal.

Where the Monarchy goes from here depends upon where it choses to take itself. It is not the media's probing nor the public's fault that things have got out of hand.

The actions of the Royals themselves are responsible for the change in the public's perception of them and the very real threat to the future standing of the Monarchy itself.

From Andrew and Sarah Ferguson to Charles and Diana Spencer, too many ordinary frailties and failings have been exposed already.

The Emperors have not quite lost their clothes but they are in need of a good dry-clean.

That the Queen and her family are mere mortals like the rest of us was never so apparent as now. Things royal can never be the same again.
