Why does the Act of Settlement forbid a Catholic monarch?
” The Act of Settlement of 1701 decrees that the monarch cannot be a Roman Catholic, and neither the Monarch nor the heir to the throne can marry a Roman Catholic. This may seem anachronistic, in our multi-religious society today, but there is — whatever one may think of it — a reason. At the Queen’s coronation she is asked, “Will you solemnly promise and swear to govern the Peoples of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of your Possessions and the other Territories to any of them belonging or pertaining, according to their respective laws and customs? Will you to your power cause Law and Justice, in Mercy, to be executed in all your judgements? Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel? Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?” The Protestant doctrine is that the national monarch is supreme governor, next under God, of all
