FEAST OF
CHRIST THE KING C 2022
The priest
was blessing and congratulating this couple in his parish who had been married
for 50 years. The priest was asking Mary
what was their secret that sustained their marriage relationship in good times
and bad. Mary explained that they agreed
on the day of their marriage that Mary would make all the small decisions and
her husband would make the big decisions.
The priest wondered about this a bit, and then Mary further explained,
with a twinkle in her eye, that they haven’t needed to make any big decisions.
Today on
this the last Sunday of the liturgical year, we celebrate the Feast of Christ
the King. We ask is Jesus the King of
your life – over both the small and big decisions of life? What is the power, the dominion Jesus
exercises over your life as Christ the King?
The
Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, is the crown of the
liturgical year. The Gospel in fact
presents the kingship of Jesus as the culmination of his saving work, and it
does so in a surprising way. “The Christ of God, the Chosen One, the King” (Lk
23:35,37) appears without power or glory: he is on the cross, where he seems
more to be conquered than conqueror. His kingship is paradoxical: his throne is
the cross; his crown is made of thorns; he has no sceptre, but a reed is put
into his hand; he does not have luxurious clothing, but is stripped of his
tunic; he wears no shiny rings on his fingers, but his hands are pierced with
nails; he has no treasure, but is sold for thirty pieces of silver.
Today we
proclaim this singular victory, by which Jesus became the King of every age,
the Lord of history: with the sole power of love, which is the nature of God,
his very life, and which has no end (cf. 1 Cor 13:8). We joyfully share the
splendour of having Jesus as our King: his rule of love transforms sin into
grace, death into resurrection, fear into trust. It would mean very little,
however, if we believed Jesus was King of the universe, but did not make him
Lord of our lives: all this is empty if we do not personally accept Jesus and
if we do not also accept his way of being King.
I would ask
you to be mindful of the image of Christ the King as proclaimed in the Gospel
today. It is the story of how Christ
died on the cross. Recall the scene: his throne was a cross, his crown was made of
thorns, his ushers were his executioners, and the people closest to him were
common criminals. What kind of king is
this? Why do we call him a king at all?
The cross
shows the kind of King Jesus is: he is
one who cares for us right to the end. He cares enough to suffer and die. He cares enough to be misunderstood and
rejected. He cares enough to seem a
failure. He is a King who cares and is
prepared to make any sacrifice for the sake of those he loves.
So here we
see Christ the King, dying on the cross.
And at this moment he is at his most God-like. He is the man who showed us -- fully and
uniquely -- what God is like, because he gives, and doesn’t count the cost.
The power of
Jesus can be seen in his loving forgiveness of the thief on the cross: “This day you will be with me in
paradise.” How often do we exercise this
power? -- the power of forgiveness. Yes,
it is hard to forgive when we are innocent.
Yet none of us is innocent as Jesus was.
The words of
the thief: “Remember me when you come
into your kingdom.” It is amazing
where you find faith. The thief saw in
Jesus what religious leaders, government authorities, soldiers and onlookers
could not.
What about
us? What do we see in Jesus? As we celebrate this feast of power, the
king is revealed to be a broken, dying man.
The sign of this feast -- the cross of Christ -- is traced on our
foreheads in baptism, over our bodies as we gather in worship and on our
coffins in death.
The
temptation before our Church is the temptation that faces our culture: it is so much easier to command than to
persuade; it is so much more efficient
to ignore the weak and the outcast than
to serve them.
Yet, the God
we believe in confuses the proud and lifts up the lowly. Yes, God accomplishes our salvation through
his broken yet baptized people. Here
there is no envy. There is only
mercy.
I go back to
the words of the good thief in the
Gospel: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your
kingdom” (v. 42). This person, simply looking at Jesus, believed in his
kingdom. He was not closed in on himself, but rather – with his errors, his
sins and his troubles – he turned to Jesus. He asked to be remembered, and he
experienced God’s mercy: “Today you will be with me in paradise” (v. 43). As
soon as we give God the chance, he remembers us. He is ready to completely and
forever cancel our sin, because his memory – unlike our own – does not record
evil that has been done or keep score of injustices experienced. God has no
memory of sin, but only of us, of each of us, we who are his beloved children.
And he believes that it is always possible to start anew, to raise ourselves
up.
Let us ask for the grace of
never closing the doors of reconciliation and pardon, but rather of knowing how
to go beyond evil and differences, opening every possible pathway of hope. As
God believes in us, infinitely beyond any merits we have, so too we are called
to instil hope and provide opportunities to others. The true door of mercy
which is the heart of Christ always remains open wide for us. From the
lacerated side of the Risen One until the very end of time flow mercy,
consolation and hope.
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