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A minor royal - Peter Phillips (the son of Anne Phillips nee Windsor) - has just married a Canadian management consultant, Autumn Kelly. He is 11th in line to the throne, and, in order not to lose his place in the pecking order, she had to renounce her religion (Roman Catholicism) since the 1701 Act of Settlement prohibits Catholics or those who marry Catholics from "ascending" to the throne "for ever". (Okay, perhaps she has genuinely converted to Anglicanism - after all, people do convert, as Blair has, in the opposite direction - but Politaholic is sceptical). Of course, none of this makes any difference to the price of fish. No one with any sense really cares. But nowadays we think of the UK as a liberal and multi-cultural country and it is an insight into that antiquated artefact("the British Constitution") that an heir to the throne can, in law (if not in practice), marry a Muslim, a Hindu, or indeed a Satanist, but not a Roman Catholic. Then again, having an hereditary head of state in the first place is even more absurd.