Royal gun salutes, flowers, and heartfelt tributes were among the commemorations in Britain, and worldwide, mourning the death of Queen Elizabeth II at the age of 96 in her Scottish estate, Balmoral Castle. She ruled for 70 years, longer than any other monarch, and saw 15 Prime Ministers lead Britain during her reign.
A double rainbow appeared as people gathered outside Buckingham Palace in London, Sept. 8, 2022 as Queen Elizabeth II passed away.
Born April 21st, 1926 in London’s Mayfair District, Queen Elizabeth II was born to King George VI and became the Princess of Wales during WWII. And when her father died of cancer while she was traveling in Kenya with Prince Phillip, the 25-year-old Princess became Queen in 1952.
Known for her pageantry as a royal queen, her exemplary leadership, and her public statements of faith in Jesus Christ, Queen Elizabeth even developed a friendship founded in faith with the late American evangelist Billy Graham.
In The Queen’s Christmas Message from 2000, she said, “For me, the teachings of Christ and my own personal accountability before God provide a framework in which I try to lead my life… I, like so many of you, have drawn great comfort in difficult times from Christ’s words and example.”
Nicoletta Gullace, Associate Professor of history at the University of New Hampshire specializing in modern British history, says the monarch in Britain is in some ways the head of the Church of England, and Elizabeth took that role very seriously.
“She never missed a remembrance Sunday, when they remembered the vets and the two world wars,” Gullace said. “She tried hard to make it this year, but mobility and health got in the way. The only other time she missed was when she was pregnant. She attended church services regularly and gave a warming and inspiring address to the nation every Christmas.”
Calvin Robinson, an Anglican deacon at Christ Church in London, highlighted the Queen’s faith stating, “She was a thorough Christian. The Queen wrote her own speeches every Christmas and she always managed to get in there that the person who inspired her was Jesus Christ. And that, I think, is why she led a life of service and duty and obligation—a servant-leader, if you will. She put Him at the heart of everything. And I think that’s important for someone who’s a global leader because they have to be accountable to someone. And for the Queen that was Christ.”
The British people and freedom-loving people around the world were indeed fortunate to have had such a dedicated and beneficent monarch as Queen Elizabeth II for these past 70 years. Seldom has a nation been better or more self-sacrificially served than they were by the second “Elizabeth the Great.” As the new British Prime Minister Elizabeth Truss puts it, the Queen was “the rock upon which modern Britain was built.”