Christ the King: Christ the King: From Bethlehem to Bath Abbey and Beyond
Today, as we celebrate the feast of Christ the King, we
witness strong-man authoritarians who aspire to be kings espousing nationalist,
white-supremacist, anti-immigration, anti-LGBTQ, and anti-democratic policies
rise up across the world and right here in the United States. In 1925, as the
world was being gripped by similar nationalist, secularist, anti-Semitic and
authoritarian-fascist dictators, Pope Pius XI instituted Christ the King Sunday
to refocus us on why we are here – to be icons of God’s love in this world.
Originally set as the last Sunday of October, in 1969, Pope Paul VI moved it to
the Last Sunday before Advent and called it, “The Solemnity of our Lord Jesus
Christ, King of the Universe.”
Christ the King is a title that strikes a peculiar tension
since any and all descriptions of Jesus, whom many of his followers called the
Christ, thankfully bear little or no resemblance to the kinds of earthly
leaders and kings Jeremiah condemns in no uncertain terms: “Woe to the
shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the Lord.
Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who
shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them
away, and you have not attended to them. So, I will attend to you for your evil
doings, says the Lord”[i] Jesus has none of the trappings of these wicked shepherds:
Christ does not destroy, scatter and divide. Rather, our Jesus heals, repairs,
gathers, and unites everyone and everything.
We look at him today, as he hangs on a Roman cross,
condemned by the authoritarian regime of Caesar, still offering God’s love and
compassion to another so condemned. Mocked by the Empire as a so-called king, Jesus
exhibits the characteristics of a true king anointed by God. When asked by
another so condemned, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your
kingdom." He replied, "Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in
Paradise." [ii]
Writing in the aftermath of
World War I, Pius noted that while there had been a cessation of hostilities,
there was no true peace. He deplored the rise of class divisions and unbridled
nationalism, and held that true peace can only be found under the Kingship of
Christ as "Prince of Peace". "For Jesus Christ reigns over
the minds of individuals by his teachings, in their hearts by His love, in each
one's life by living according to His law and the imitating His example." Pius wanted this feast to inspire the laity: “The
faithful, moreover, by meditating upon these truths, will gain much strength
and courage, enabling them to form their lives after the true Christian ideal
... He must reign in our minds…in our wills…in our hearts…in our bodies and in
our members, which should serve as instruments for the sanctification of our
souls, or to use the words of the Apostle Paul, as instruments of justice unto
God.” [iii]
Given the state of the world
today, it still seems like a justifiable feast to observe and to ponder just
what sort of king Jesus is – “is” being the operant word as the Christ was, is
and ever shall be. When one enters the Bath Abbey in Bath, England, one can
find a simple brochure that offers this answer to this central question of
faith – what kind of king is Jesus?
“Jesus was born in an obscure
Middle Eastern town called Bethlehem, over 2000 years ago. During his first 30
years he shared the daily life and work of an ordinary home. For the next three
years he went about teaching people about God and healing sick people by the
shores of Lake Galilee. He called 12 ordinary men to be his helpers.
“He had no money. He wrote no
books. He commanded no army. He wielded no political power. During his life he
never travelled more than 200 miles in any direction. He was executed by being
nailed to a cross at the age of 33.
“Today, nearly 2 billion people
throughout the world worship Jesus as divine - the Son of God. Their experience
has convinced them that in the wonders of nature we see God as our loving
Father; in the person of Jesus, we discover God as Son; and in our daily lives
we encounter this same God as Spirit. Jesus is our way to finding God: we learn
about Jesus by reading the Bible, particularly the New Testament and we meet
him directly in our spiritual experience.
“Jesus taught us to trust in a
loving and merciful Father and to pray to him in faith for all our needs. He
taught that we are all infinitely precious, children of one heavenly Father,
and that we should therefore treat one another with love, respect and
forgiveness. He lived out what he taught by caring for those he met; by healing
the sick - a sign of God's love at work; and by forgiving those who put him to
death.
“Jesus' actions alone would not
have led him to a criminal's death on the cross: but his teaching challenged
the religious and moral beliefs of his day. People believed, and do to this
day, that he can lead us to a full experience of God’s love and compassion.
Above all, he pointed to his death as God's appointed means of bringing
self-centered people back to God. Jesus also foretold that he would be raised
to life again three days after his death. When, three days after he had died on
the cross, his followers did indeed meet him alive again; frightened and
defeated women and men became fearless and joyful messengers.
“Their message of the Good News
about Jesus is the reason Bath Abbey exists. More importantly, it is the reason
why all over the world there are Christians who know what it means to meet the
living Jesus, and believe that He can lead us all to heal and repair a broken
world. May your time in Bath Abbey be a blessing to you, and also to us in the
church.” [iv]
This is why the Church is here at
all: to follow Jesus; to heal, gather, repair, restore, and unite everyone and
everything. To be a blessing to all the earth, and everything therein.
May God for us, whom we call
Father, God alongside us, whom we call Son, and God within us, whom we call
Spirit, hold and enliven us to a full experience of God’s love and
compassion; that in all that is, seen and unseen, we may testify to Your Truth
as a community of Love, Justice and Freedom for all peoples, all creatures, and
all the Earth, which You have given us to tend and preserve as Your Creation.
Amen.
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