Royal wedding blessing on live TV
LONDON, England (CNN) -- The blessing ceremony following the civil marriage of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles will be shown live on television, the prince's spokesman has told CNN.
Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams is to lead the blessing at Windsor Castle following a civil wedding service at Windsor town hall on April 8. The civil service will not be shown on TV, Clarence House said.
Most members of the royal family will be absent from the wedding, which will not be televised.
According to royal sources, the prince's parents, Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh, will be joined at the church blessing in St. George's Chapel by all senior members of the royal family.
More details of guests attending the event will be circulated later on Friday.
The last time Prince Charles walked down the aisle -- in 1981 -- 800 million television viewers around the world watched him marry Lady Diana Spencer at St Paul's Cathedral.
But on April 8, only a few witnesses, including Charles' sons Princes William and Harry as well as Camilla's son and daughter, are expected to be present at the civil wedding.
A spokeswoman for the prince said: "It was never intended that the civil ceremony should be televised as it was always planned to be a relatively small, personal occasion."
Queen Elizabeth, who is reported to have been slow to accept her eldest son's 35-year affair with the now divorced mother of two, will not attend the ceremony in what has been widely interpreted as a snub to the couple.
The wedding has hit several snags since it was originally announced that the couple would marry at Windsor Castle.
But planners discovered that under British law, registering the castle as a wedding venue would mean opening it up to commoners' nuptials as well.
Constitutional experts also question the legality of a civil ceremony.
Earlier this month the registrar general for England and Wales dismissed 11 formal objections to the civil marriage. The objections mainly argued that the law did not allow the prince to marry in a civil ceremony.
