The human proclivity towards cult behaviour is what I'm talking about. The UK Royals have no real function other than to promote the English personality, as a cultural artifact, to their subjects. In that regard, it functions as a cult, one of the most effective in the world, for promulgating collective reality.

This, after all, is how wars get started.

Edit: the dire circumstances being, of course, WW3 - the subject of the Queens' speech.