Meghan Markle will be baptized in the Church of England before she weds Prince Harry.
“I am very, very sure after conversations that this is no tick-box exercise of ‘We ought to get married in church,’ ” says Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, who will officiate both the baptism and the wedding. “There is a profound sense of commitment, of seriousness both about faith and about their lives together, which is quite inspirational.”
Markle was raised Protestant, but will be baptized Anglican to honor Queen Elizabeth II, Harry’s grandmother.
The private ceremony is expected to take place this month in the palace’s 19th-century chapel, The Sunday Times reports. Both her parents are expected to travel across the pond for the occasion.
Markle was previously married to Trevor Engelson, who is Jewish, but did not convert. When her engagement to Prince Harry was announced, many people were concerned about how the divorce would affect a marriage in the Church of England.
“It’s not a problem,” Welby says. “The Church of England has clear rules with dealing with that, and we’ve dealt with that. We went through that as anyone would who will officiate at a wedding where someone has been separated and a partner is still living.”
Markle has served as a global ambassador for World Vision, a very effective evangelical Christian aid organization, traveling to Rwanda in 2016 and India earlier this year. She has also worked with the charity One Young World and is a women’s advocate for the United Nations.
The couple is set to wed on May 19 in St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.
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