Each year on this final Sunday of the Church’s year we celebrate this
wonderful feast of Christ the King, and each year, even as we pull out
all the stops with glorious music, flowers, bells, candles, and clouds
of incense, we get a none-too-gentle reminder not to get too carried
away with all the trappings of royalty. The reminder invariably comes in
the scripture readings. It came in the reading from the Second Book of
Kings where we met the young King David – a king minus any majesty, a
king who was more shepherd of the flock than mighty ruler. The reminder
also came in the reading from Luke’s gospel where the kingship of Jesus
was a matter of mockery – and with good reason. For what kind of
king hangs helplessly dying on a cross between a couple of common
criminals!
Last month when I
attended the canonization of Cardinal Newman in St. Peter’s Square, from
my seat in the huge crowd I could see the various dignitaries who were
in attendance. Prominent among them was Prince Charles who was
representing his mother, the Queen – a very meaningful ecumenical
gesture. Of course, the most prominent dignitary at the Mass that
morning was Pope Francis himself, but thanks to the way he has let go of
the regal trappings of the papal office, there wasn’t a hint of royalty
about him. This got me to thinking how beautifully Pope Francis embodies
the kind of kingship that Jesus stands for: humble, servant kingship. He
never plays the royalty card. He calls that “the leprosy of the papacy.”
With Pope Francis, it’s never about pomp or privilege, it’s about the
poor and those on the periphery. They are his priority – and, of course,
they should be the Church’s priority, as well. Every leader in the
Church (and I include myself) should take a chapter from his book –
never taking ourselves too seriously, finding ways to walk on the same
ground as the people we serve.
This feast of Christ the
King is not very old on the Church’s calendar. The Church got by for
nearly two millennia without such a feast. It wasn’t until the years
between the First and Second World Wars that Pope Pius XI put it on the
Church’s calendar. For good reason. Not unlike today, various
authoritarian and anti-democratic movements were on the rise around the
world: Fascism in Italy, National Socialism in Germany, Communism in the
Soviet Union. As a counterpoint to those nationalistic movements led by
dictators with neither conscience nor constituents – powermongers
accountable only to themselves - the Pope raised up the figure of a most
unlikely kind of leader: Jesus Christ, a king, yes, but a king with no
wealth or weapons other than truth and love, and no territorial
ambitions other than human hearts. It is this servant king, the
suffering, crucified Christ of today’s gospel, whom we honor today and
every day as our King.
But it’s risky, this
business of kingship. At its worst, throughout our long history,
whenever the Church has lost sight of what sort of king Christ is, it
has gotten seduced by the pretensions of power and the trappings of
royalty or, to use Pope Francis’ telling expression, the Church has
become “self-referential” -- inward-looking, self-absorbed - caught up
with itself and its power and prerogatives.
The result? In
turning away from the humble ways of Jesus, the Church has too often
taken on the tactics of the very authoritarian movements that this feast
of Christ the King is meant to counteract – a far cry from Jesus who
demonstrated his authority, not by edicts and pronouncements or power
plays, but by kneeling before his disciples and washing their feet.
My friends, it is
important for us to be clear by what we mean – and what we don’t mean –
when we call Christ our King. Over the Sundays of this past year
we have steadily moved, chapter by chapter, through Luke’s gospel and
have met there a Christ who is quite surprising – not only for what he
said but, more importantly, for what he did. Surprising, too, for
the company he kept. In fact, if we would follow this Christ, this
King, I suggest that a good place to start would be to look at the
company he kept.
Here’s a rundown of some
of his company – taken right from the pages of Luke’s gospel. They
are quite a bunch, I think you will agree: the lowly shepherds at the
manger; the poor, the hungry and the mourning of the Beatitudes; the
unlettered fishermen who were his inner circle; the sinful woman who
crashed a dinner party to wash and anoint his feet; the poor woman with
a lingering hemorrhage who wanted only to touch the hem of his garment;
the lepers who kept calling after him, “Master, have pity on us!”; the
cheating tax collector, Zacchaeus, with whom Jesus insisted on having
dinner; the dying thief of today’s gospel.
These, my friends, are
the company of Christ the King -- his royal retinue, if you will.
We have met them all this past year Sunday after Sunday, and each of
them should be a reminder to us, a powerful reminder, that if Jesus is a
king, he’s a king like no other. For what king worth his salt
would waste his time with that long list of losers?
May our celebration of
this wonderful, but potentially misleading, feast, remind us not only of
what sort of King Christ is, but also of what his kind of kingship means
for us – and for the company we keep!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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