HRM Charles III King of the United Kingdom

HRM Charles III, King of the United Kingdom, is the eldest son of the late Queen Elizabeth II and the late Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh. He was born at Buckingham Palace on November 14, 1948. His mother became queen on February 6, 1952. The Prince attended a series of elementary and secondary schools in Great Britain and Australia, and then entered Cambridge University in 1967 was awarded a degree in 1970. He was the first heir to the throne ever to take a degree.

The Queen invested her son as Prince of Wales in July, 1969. He took his seat in the House of Lords in February, 1970.

The Prince began a military career in 1971, receiving training as a pilot. He entered the navy, following in the footsteps of his father, grandfather and both his great-grandfathers. He served on a guided missile destroyer and two frigates. In 1974 Prince Charles qualified as a helicopter pilot and then joined a naval air squadron which operated from a carrier. In 1976, he took command of a coastal minehunter for his last nine months in the Navy.

The Prince of Wales was married to Lady Diana Spencer in 1981. The Prince and Princess of Wales had two sons: Prince William (b. 1982), now the first in line to the throne, and Prince Harry (b. 1984), now the second in line to the throne. The Prince and Princess of Wales separated in late 1992, and the marriage was dissolved in 1996. The Princess died in a car crash in 1997. In 2005 The Prince of Wales married Mrs Parker-Bowles, who now has the title HRM The Queen of the United Kingdom.

Charles became King on the death of his mother Queen Elizabeth II on September 8, 2022.

King Charles  III has a wide range of interests which are reflected in ‘The Prince’s Charities’, a group of twenty not-for-profit organizations of which he is President.  Eighteen of the twenty charities were founded personally by The King. This group of organizations is the largest multi-cause charitable enterprise in the United Kingdom, raising over £119 million annually. These charities represent a broad range of areas, such as: opportunity and enterprise, education, health, the built environment, responsible business, and the natural environment. The King has also become Patron or President of hundreds of similar organizations. He has presented many articles and speeches on architecture, the inner cities, rural communities, education, religion, interfaith tolerance, health, farming, and other areas reflecting his broad interests.

Of particular interest to Perennialists and Traditionalists, The King is actively interested in traditional thought and its applications to the problems of the modern world. He is the Patron of the Temenos Academy, which is dedicated to the central ideas of the Perennial Philosophy. The Temenos Academy Review is the journal of the Academy and is the successor to the journal Temenos, first published in 1981 and founded by Keith Critchlow, Brian Keeble, Kathleen Raine and Philip Sherrard. HRM Charles III wrote that the Academy and its review are “committed both to the perennial philosophy and to the notion that Man is, at root, a spiritual creature with spiritual and intellectual needs which have to be nourished if we are to fulfill our potential.”

Because of this interest in the Perennial Philosophy and Tradition, King Charles III, while still The Prince of Wales,  gave an opening videotaped address to the Sacred Web conference on “Tradition in the Modern World.” The Prince of Wales’ videotaped address is given in full on Tradition in the Modern World: Sacred Web 2006 Conference, a  two-disc DVD set.

He also contributed the “Foreword” to Shakespeare’s Sonnets and the Bible: A Spiritual Interpretation with Christian Sources, by Ira B. Zinman.