A high-ranking Church of England official has called for Prince Charles to apologize to the ex-husband of his fiancee Camilla Parker Bowles, a newspaper reported Sunday.
Bishop David Stancliffe said church rules dictated Prince Charles must atone for committing adultery and he should apologize to Andrew Parker Bowles for breaking up his marriage, The Sunday Times newspaper said.
Stancliffe, a church authority on rules of worship, said the apology should come before the April 8 wedding and should include “making good of any hurts, the restoration of relationships and serious attention being paid to the relationships fractured or damaged by misconduct.”
He did not say whether he thought the apology should be in person, by letter or by other means.
A spokesman for Charles’ office would not comment on the issue.
Civil ceremony set
Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles will be married in a civil ceremony in the town hall at Windsor, west of London, followed by a service of prayer and dedication at Windsor castle’s chapel.
It is unprecedented for an heir to the throne to marry outside of a church, but the Church of England — of which Charles will be supreme governor when he is king — has qualms about remarriage for divorcees.
The forthcoming marriage has upset some members of the church — which traditionally frowns on church remarriages for divorcees whose spouses are still alive —because Parker Bowles’ ex-husband is living.
Camilla Parker Bowles, who was widely blamed in Britain’s tabloid press for the breakdown of Charles’ marriage to Princess Diana, divorced army officer Andrew Parker Bowles in 1995.
Their divorce came after Charles admitted in a TV documentary in 1994 that he had strayed from his marriage vows, but insisted infidelity happened only after the marriage was “irretrievably broken down, us having both tried.” It was widely assumed, but never confirmed, that Parker Bowles was the other woman.
Prince Charles divorced Princess Diana in 1996, a year before she was killed in a car crash.
