Sidestepping reservations individual party members must have about being associated with the pomp and ceremony of a very anti-republican spectacle, Sinn Féin hopes to demonstrate diplomatic gravitas and a mature capacity to lead all Ireland.

At his coronation, King Charles will reaffirm his Protestant identity, and while he has included other faiths in the ceremony, Catholics in Britain wish for more inclusion, especially given the country's past conflicts with them.

At one time, the British king and U.S. president had similar roles in their nations. But the British system evolved while the United States still has a president that is too powerful and too difficult to remove.

At King Charles III's coronation, the Cross of Wales will have two small relics of the True Cross incorporated within it, showing the connection between the Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion.

With his new book 'The Critical Revolutionaries,' Terry Eagleton focuses on the scholars who revolutionized literary study and foreshadowed the New Criticism movement that became widespread in mid-century American universities.

Just below those top-line figures on religious affiliation, significant changes in national identity also become clear—29 percent of the Northern Irish population now see themselves exclusively as Irish. This is just three points behind the 32 percent who consider themselves British.