On Sunday, November 22, we will celebrate the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. This feast is also known as Christ the King Sunday and it is the last Sunday of the Church Year. Advent is approaching.
In 1925, Pope Pius XI instituted the Feast of Christ the King as a direct Catholic response to the rise of secularism and nationalism. In 1925, the devastation of World War I was in everyone’s minds. Mussolini had seized power in Italy. Stalin had taken control of the Soviet Union. Adolf Hitler published Mein Kempf and launched his political rise. The storm winds were unsettling humanity. No wonder His Holiness wanted to remind the Church and the world exactly who was the true leader of nations—Jesus Christ.
If Christ is our King, then how should we, His subjects, behave? In his encyclical Quas Primas, which officially instituted the Feast of Christ the King, Pope Pius XI tells us:
…His (Christ’s) kingdom is opposed to none other than to that of Satan and to the power of darkness. It demands of its subjects a spirit of detachment from riches and earthly things, and a spirit of gentleness. They must hunger and thirst after justice, and more than this, they must deny themselves and carry the cross. (Quas Primas, #15)
Pretty clearly stated, yet, so hard to actualize in our lives. But, God willing, we have God’s gift of time to move our lives more in alignment to His will.
On the final Sunday of the church year, let us acknowledge Christ as sovereign over all men, women and children. Let us remember what Saint Cyril of Jerusalem says:
We announce not only the first coming of Christ, but also a second which is much more beautiful than the first. The first, in fact, was a manifestation of suffering, the second brings the diadem of divine kingship…..in the first, He was subject to the humiliation of the Cross, in the second He is surrounded and glorified by a host of angels.