Christ the King, A November 26, 2023
Fr. Alexander Albert St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette
You could maybe be excused for thinking that today’s solemn feast is about the end of the world. After all, we’ve been hearing about that subject for a few weeks in our readings and today we hear again about the final judgment. Today also marks the last Sunday of the Liturgical year. Next Sunday begins Advent, which is the start of a new cycle. So, it kind of makes sense that the feast of Jesus Christ, King of the Universe should be about the end of the world. But it isn’t.
Sure, it includes the end of the world because Jesus our King is also our Judge, but it isn’t about the end of the world. Jesus’ kingship isn’t some future event that starts when everything blows up. No, it has already begun. The reason we hear about that final judgment is to make the point that his kingship matters now and that, when we are finally judged, we will be judged on how we treated the king of the universe now. The Church is telling us “Jesus is the king and if you don’t take that seriously, you will answer for it in the end.”
The very reason the Church added this feast to the calendar in 1925 was precisely because governments and nations around the world – Mexico, Germany, Russia and more – seemed to be setting aside the authority and kingship of Jesus Christ. Nations the world over had started to demand the kind of devotion that belongs only to God. The world needed to be reminded that Jesus Christ is king and that any worldly power must remember the one from whom all authority flows.
It’s worth reminding you now that World War II marks the greatest intentional destruction of human life in all of history and that the aggressors in that war were secular, some even directly hostile to all religion. Indeed, there were more martyrs between 1900 and 2000 than in every other century combined. When Christ’s kingship is forgotten, human life becomes expendable.
One of the greatest perpetrators in the making of martyrs was communist Russia. In their atheistic reign of terror, they exposed just how depraved a government can become when it assumes all authority for itself and denies it’s dependence on God the source of all true authority. But it’s too easy to look back at history after the fog of war has cleared and say “see, those were the bad guys!” It’s too easy, when our own nation is still capable of telling it’s own version of the story to forget that we too did terrible things. It’s too easy to blame war and death and corruption on those people or that nation or this political party and conclude that we at least are serving Christ the King. Do not fall into that trap. Take to heart the warning of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.
An officer for Russia in World War II, Aleksandr was a loyal supporter of Communist revolution at first. Then they came for him. When they turned against him for daring to be critical, his eyes were opened. Through his immense suffering at the cruel hands of that godless regime, he gained a measure of wisdom and insight from which we should learn. Commenting on the great cosmic battle between good and evil, he tells us that “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either – but right through every human heart – and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained.”
It is because this battle line goes through human hearts that, on the day we celebrate Jesus Christ as King of the Universe, we are told a story of quiet deeds done to nameless strangers. For all the cosmic scope of St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, the practical implication of his teaching is that we should love our neighbors… and our enemies.
It is common for the Church to speak of Christ’s Kingship and the Kingdom of heaven as a kind of divine conquest. We seek to bring all souls to Christ, to wage war against sin, error, and every form of evil until the light of Christ’s truth and love conquers all. Militaristic language and imagery have been used from the very beginning of our history and rightly so – we must not forget that our fallen world is full of evil and that that evil fights back with great cunning and fury. At the same time, we must never forget who is our king and what kind of empire we serve.
Just as it is true that the world is full of enemies to be overcome, so it is also true that the world is full of people to be loved… and those are the same people. We are engaged in a great and cosmic war against evil, but our weapon is love. Notice that Jesus does not say “I was in prison on false charges,” he simply says “I was in prison and you visited me.” Perhaps that person deserved to be in prison and ought to remain there a long time, but Jesus doesn’t even address that question. The manifestation of God’s kingdom is not seen in how many people go to prison and for how long, but how we love those prisoners.
Strangers, the naked, the hungry, the sick – our loyalty to God’s kingdom is not affected by whether or not these conditions are their own fault. Justice and reason and the sensible ordering of society are important, but they are too much out there to decide your eternal fate. No, do not forget the battle line in your own heart. Never forget that the battle is won not by killing bad guys with weapons of steel, but by conquering sin and hatred in yourself with the weapons of grace and acts of love for the least among us, friend, neighbor, and enemy alike.
We march in the street today despite the cold and the wet holding aloft Christ our king not because we plan to dominate those who live here, but because we love them. As Christ once took flesh to walk among us and, quite frankly, waste huge amounts of time on a relatively small number of people, so our procession today brings Christ to our neighbor… it is a portent of our desire to walk with the people of this community in order to love them: elderly and in need or hungry because of their own folly or justly imprisoned for criminal behavior or lonely through no fault of their own – each is to be wisely loved in varying aways according to their needs, but the are to be loved because in them, we see our King. So do for them as you would do for him, that you may inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
Your homilies are wonderful. They are full of insight and wisdom. Thank you for posting them. Even though I am not in this parish, I can learn from them.