Lord Nicholas Charles Edward Jonathan Windsor is a member of the British royal family, youngest child of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent. As a Catholic convert, he has forfeited his right of succession. Lord Nicholas has voiced strong views on the issue of abortion, and actively promotes the protection of the unborn child.
In a private ceremony in 2001 he was received into the Catholic Church, and therefore forfeited his right of succession to the British throne. His mother had converted seven years earlier. Roman Catholics are barred from the succession by the Act of Settlement 1701. On 14 July 2011, he became an Honorary Vice-President of the Friends of the Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, an Anglican Ordinariate within the Catholic Church. He has voiced strong views on the issue of abortion, which he has stated is, as a societal threat, "worse than al-Qaeda".
Marriage and family
Windsor met his future wife, Paola Doimi de Lupis Frankopan Šubić Zrinski, at a party in New York City in 1999 to mark the Millennium. He became engaged to her in July 2006. They married on 4 November 2006 in the Church of St Stephen of the Abyssinians in the Vatican following a civil ceremony on 19 October 2006 in a London register office and she became Lady Nicholas Windsor. He became the first member of the English royal family to be married there since the Reformation. As required by the Royal Marriages Act 1772, the Queen of the United Kingdom consented to the marriage. A House of Commons Early Day Motion welcomed "the first overt marriage within the rites of the Catholic Church of a member of the Royal Family since the reign of Queen Mary I, and the first marriage of a member of the Royal Family to take place within the Vatican City State". Lord and Lady Nicholas Windsor had their first child, a son, Albert Louis Philip Edward Windsor, on 22 September 2007 at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, London. Albert is the eighth grandchild for the Duke and Duchess of Kent. The child is the first Windsor to carry the name Albert since King George VI. An Early Day Motion in the House of Commons welcomed the baptism of Albert as the first royal child to be baptised a Catholic since 1688. Albert was baptised on 20 February 2007 in a Catholic ceremony held in the Queen's Chapel adjoining St James's Palace in London. Lady Nicholas gave birth to the couple's second child, Leopold Ernest Augustus Guelph Windsor, on 8 September 2009 at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. Leopold was baptised by Angelo Cardinal Comastri in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican on 29 May 2010. A third son, Louis Arthur Nicholas Felix Windsor, was born 27 May 2014. Lord Nicholas and his sons are still in the line of succession to the Dukedom of Kent, the descent of which is not regulated by the Act of Settlement. He and his sons are 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th in line of succession to the Dukedom of Kent respectively.
Charity
In 2011, Windsor was appointed to the Pontifical Academy for Life. He is co-signatory of the San José Articles which promote the protection of the unborn child. In 2007, Windsor accepted the invitation to become Patron of Bromley Mind. The position is a public statement of his support for its work, and he makes a practical contribution from time to time by supporting special events and fundraising campaigns. Windsor has worked for the Refugee Council in London, the DePaul Trust for the homeless and in a school for autistic children. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Centre in Washington DC. He is a Trustee of the Catholic National Library UK and , an educational body whose goal is the full protection of the unborn child. Windsor is the Royal Patron, along with his wife Paola of the Christian Heritage Centre at Stonyhurst. A Charitable endeavour to make the historic collections of Stonyhurst College and the story they tell more widely accessible particularly to young people in the surrounding areas. He wrote for the American journal First Things on the subject of abortion, an article which was entered into the United States Congressional Record by Congressman Chris Smith. He has written in the Telegraph and The Catholic Herald on pro-life issues.
