J.M.J. + O.B.T. + M.G.R.*
¡Viva Cristo Rey!
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| The above close-up is taken from the original full image at Goodsalt.com |
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A gift from an Anglican convert
http://mystra.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/christ-the-universal-king/
Today
we celebrated the end of the Church’s year with this great feast.
Sometimes people have a difficulty with the concept of Christ as a
King. It is easy to do “gentle Jesus meek and mild” at Christmas, or
Jesus the kindly rabbi, even for non-Christians. The Risen Christ
presents a greater challenge, of course. But Christ risen and returning
is harder still. And, the most difficult of all to come to terms with
is the Jesus who is risen and returning as the great judge upon the
rainbow, looking upon whom every creature will either enter the new
creation with him or face annihilation. This may be something to do
with Protestantism; Luther was certainly unhappy with the Mediaeval
dooms presented to him during his youth and felt that his life was
blighted by fear of the Great Judge ruling the universe with a rod of
iron. Many Catholics today seem to share this horror at any kind of
fear; as if it is the thing which above all else destroys faith. It may
be that the wrong type of fear – one which paralyses and becomes a
terrible mental burden – does indeed strangle faith. But a healthy
fear, awe in the presence of the Lord who creates all things and by his
will holds them in being, who will return and to whom we must be able to
look without shame, is not an evil.
The image of Monarchy is also one which continues to evoke a sense of
great wonder in us. Although today the idea of the Monarch is so
debased (for many tourists a glimpse of the British Royal Family is a
part of what draws them to the palaces and houses of England, and that
for many British people a tea party a Buckingham Palace is still a
social event of some importance) we can hardly see how it can be said of
Christ that he is a King. Or our historical imaginations have been so
filled with appalling tyrants (Henry VIII) or sparring relatives (Maude
and Stephen) or fops (George IV), that we think of Monarchs as
thoroughly disreputable. We are tempted then to minimise Christ’s
monarchy, or to interpret it only in terms of his words before Pilate, my kingdom is not of this world,
as if that meant no earthly King could or would be like him, or indeed
he like them. Yet, on the contrary, the kings of Europe and Byzantium
understood themselves in terms of Christ’s kingship (at least, this was
the ‘ideal’). They ought not be tyrants on the ancient eastern model,
nor figureheads in the way a modern monarch is. People often trace this
back to Constantine or Charles the Great, and very much imagine that
Jesus did not foresee any such arrangements: these two great Roman and
Frankish emperors simply used the monotheistic principle to back up the
monarchical one, and so used Christianity to their own advantage. But
there was another, civilising, side to the arrangement. If the kings
and queens claimed that their authority and right to govern came from
God, and that they themselves were an image of Christ the King, there
was a consequential obligation upon them to act as if they really
believed it. Like all human beings they did not always live up to their
obligations, and the example of Ambrose and the Emperor Theodosius
shows us that; but it also demonstrates not only (as people like to say)
the “power” of the Catholic Church, but also the weight of moral
obligation felt by monarchs who had accepted Christianity and the
Christian model of kingship. The smaller kings of Mediaeval Europe too
experienced this sense that they were to be royal shepherds and some –
St. Louis, St. Edward the Confessor are but two examples – lived it out
fully.
Today there is no Christian kingship, just as there is no
Christendom. Instead we have technocracies, democracies, dictatorships
and communist republics and the Church must live in such a world,
preserving the truth which she has been given and giving expression to
it. The feast of Christ the King helps us to do this. The Catechism
says:
Christ already reigns through the Church. . .
Jesus Christ is Lord: he possesses all power in heaven and on earth.
He is “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion”, for the
Father “has put all things under his feet.”. Christ
is Lord of the cosmos and of history… Christ dwells on earth in his
Church. the redemption is the source of the authority that Christ, by
virtue of the Holy Spirit, exercises over the Church. “The kingdom of
Christ (is) already present in mystery”, “on earth, the seed and the
beginning of the kingdom”…
We are already at “the last hour”.
“Already the final age of the world is with us, and the renewal of the
world is irrevocably under way; it is even now anticipated in a certain
real way, for the Church on earth is endowed already with a sanctity
that is real but imperfect.” Christ’s kingdom already manifests its presence through the miraculous signs that attend its proclamation by the Church.
. . . until all things are subjected to him
Though already present in his Church, Christ’s reign is nevertheless
yet to be fulfilled “with power and great glory” by the King’s return to
earth. This reign is
still under attack by the evil powers, even though they have been
defeated definitively by Christ’s Passover. Until everything is subject
to him, “until there be realized new heavens and a new earth in which
justice dwells, the pilgrim Church, in her sacraments and institutions,
which belong to this present age, carries the mark of this world which
will pass, and she herself takes her place among the creatures which
groan and travail yet and await the revelation of the sons of God.” That is why Christians pray, above all in the Eucharist, to hasten Christ’s return...
In addition,
today is also the fourth anniversary of my reception into the Catholic
Church. These have been years not without trials but not unhappy ones
either. In fact, I can say with all honesty that I could not now
imagine being still an Anglican; I sometimes long for the old “ways”
(especially at a particularly banal refrain of an awful hymn), but
believe that all the elements which make the Church can only be found
where I now am. This conviction has only increased over the past years
and has become an defining aspect of my conscience which has helped my
very much through some difficult patches. In the Anglican tradition
they have a short season “of the Kingdom” leading up to today’s feast.
It is not really a season in it’s own right, but the propers are all of
a piece with the theme and it means that the feast does not just pop up
from nowhere like a sort of ecclesial new year’s eve. I wonder if this
is something which will be adopted in the Ordinariates? We shall have
to wait and see…
Of your charity, please pray for me on the special anniversary, and for all of you, I will pray too.
Thank you anonymous author
of mystra nova
I am praying for you
Sincerely yours in Jesus through Mary,
Mike Rizzio
Imitate Mary
Become like Jesus
Live for the Triune God
Seek the Light of Our Lord Jesus Christ
See you on the High Ground!
* - J.M.J. + O.B.T. + M.G.R. stands for:
Jesus, Mary and Joseph;
O Beata Trinitas;
St. Michael, St. Gabriel and St. Raphael
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