Solemnity of Christ the King

We come to our final week of Ordinary Time, the end of our liturgical year. Next Sunday begins the season of Advent and the spiritual preparation for Christmas.  The two previous Sundays concentrated on the last chapter of Matthew’s Gospel, using parables to highlight the prerequisite and measure of discipleship. The Feast of Christ the King has more to do with the actualization of discipleship than with recognizing Jesus as the King of the Universe. As the second person of the Trinity, Jesus did not need to be incarnated in human flesh to have the title of King, for the Word was always present in the Trinity and ruled the universe by ordering it from the moment it was created.

By acknowledging Jesus Christ as King of the Universe, the faithful remember Jesus’ birth, his mission, and completion of that mission by destroying death and ascending to heaven seated at the Father’s right hand, where he judges and rules all people as the King of the Universe.

His Kingship, as we know it, depends upon his obedience to becoming a human in all things but sin and his willingness to suffer and die for the world’s salvation. Christianity is filled with many paradoxes, and the subject of Jesus as King of the Universe is no exception.  It is common knowledge that kingship connotes the leader is in a category all his own by being insulated from suffering and pain long before his subjects who do not hold a royal title.  

Jesus turned the common belief on its head, willingly taking on suffering and death long before he asked his disciples to do the same. The Kingship of Christ is predicated upon his acceptance to die for a debt he did not owe. What is confusing to Christians is that if Jesus paid the debt of sin, why would he ask or expect his followers to do the same? Isn’t Christ’s sacrifice enough? These questions are one of the dividing points between Catholicism and Protestantism.

Catholics believe that Jesus’ suffering and death made it possible for his disciples to share in the glory of heaven, but not without their participation in the paschal mystery (suffering, death, and resurrection).  Therefore, suffering and death are a part of a person’s journey with Christ to the joys of heaven.

Jesus desires a person’s salvation through participation.  St. Paul makes this reality clear, “Now  I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh, I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church.” Jesus offers his kingship to his disciples, not through a proxy but through his life connected to ours.

Are the afflictions of Christ lacking? Not!  The paschal mystery of Jesus is perfect and complete in Jesus but not in us, who are members of the Church. No one has explained this better than St. John Eudes.  

St. John contends that Jesus wants us to share in his perfection in various stages of our lives. First, he desires to perfect the mystery of the incarnation and birth by forming himself in us by being reborn in our souls through the sacraments of baptism and the reception of the eucharist, where Jesus is present to us in his body, blood, soul, and divinity.

The mysteries of Christ are perfected in us by the suffering and death and our rising with him and in him. The absurdity of suffering and death takes on a new meaning when it is conjoined with the sufferings of Christ. Jesus’ final wish to share in his kingship is to fulfill in us the state of his glorious, eternal life with him in heaven.

Here, we are at the crux of discipleship.  There is no more time for preparation; there need not be any more discerning or evaluation, but simply a profound moment of acceptance or denial of a specific way of living.  And that life is sometimes strewn with isolation, helplessness, pain, and suffering.  A true disciple accepts Christ the King’s invitation, a strange one, but an invitation to suffer with Him.  And those who have joined their Master on the garbage heap of Calvary could never think of asking the questions, “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you a drink?  When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?  When did we see you ill or in prison and visit you?”

For a disciple, indifference to a brother or sister in need or in pain is inconceivable. A true disciple lives in the depths of all human suffering and pain and identifies with it.  Discipleship is not an intellectual endeavor but one that accepts the great mystery of the Lord’s passion and death and the helplessness that comes with that acceptance.   “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

This is the actualization of discipleship:  to graft ourselves entirely to the vine of life, the woody vine of the cross.   Discipleship and its actualization are not things that we do along with other things in our lives; instead, our new life starts when we are plunged into death by the waters of baptism, sustained by the eucharist, and mounting the wood of our crosses.  First to sin and then death to our selfishness that we are able to conform ourselves to Christ’s sufferings and be ready to leave this world with him.

This is the paradox of the Kingdom: we are connected to Christ’s suffering through our suffering.  In this submission and helplessness, we understand the beauty of the title of Christ the King.  A King who, after having suffered and died for us, has rightfully taken his throne on the right side of the Father and bids his disciples to come and “… inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”  Come, He will call out, my good and faithful servant, for you have been with me always, even when it seemed I was anything but a King. 

Come now and live on in my love.