Feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ the King

Feast of Our Lord Jesus Christ the King
Last Sunday of October
Taken from, “Divine Intimacy,” by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D., pp.1161-1163

PRESENSE OF GOD – O Jesus, Prince of Ages, King of Nations, be the sole Ruler of my mind and heart.

MEDITATION

1. The liturgy today is truly a triumphant hymn celebrating the Kingdom of Christ. From the First Vespers of the Feast, the figure of Jesus is majestically portrayed, seated on a royal throne and dominating the entire world; “His Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, and all kings shall serve and obey Him…. He shall sit and rule and shall speak peace unto the nations.”

The Mass opens with the apocalyptic vision of this extraordinary King whose majesty is intimately linked to His immolation for the salvation of souls…. “The Lamb that was slain is worthy to receive power and divinity and wisdom and strength and honor. To Him belong glory and power forever and ever.”(Introit).

In the Epistle (Col. 1, 12-20) St. Paul enumerates the titles which make Christ King of all kings: He is “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature; for in Him were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.” These titles belong to Jesus Christ inasmuch as He is God, perfect image of the Father, exemplary cause of all earthly and heavenly creatures and, at the same time, Creator, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit, of all that exists, for nothing has existence without Him, but “all things were created by Him and in Him…by Him all things consist.”

Then come His titles to Kingship as Man: “He is the Head of the Mystical Body, the Church…. Through Him [God]…reconciled all things unto Himself, making peace through the Blood of His Cross.” He, who is already our King by reason of His divinity, is also King through His Incarnation, which has constituted Him the Head of all humanity, and through His Passion, by which at the price if His Blood He has regained our souls, which already belonged to Him as His creatures.

Jesus is our King in the full sense of the word: He has created us, redeemed us, vivified us by His grace, He nourishes us with His Flesh and Blood, He governs us with love, and by love He draws us to Himself. In the face of such considerations, the cry of St. Paul rises spontaneously from our heart: “Giving thanks to God the Father…who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption…the remission of sins.”

2. In today’s Gospel (Jn. 18, 33-37) we have the most authoritative proclamation of the Kingship of Christ, since it comes from His own lips in that most solemn moment during the trial which preceded His Passion. Pilate explicitly questioned Him on the subject: “Art Thou the King of the Jews?” Jesus did not reply directly to this first question; actually, He is not King of any one determined nation; His Kingdom has nothing to do with the kingdoms of the earth. But to Pilate’s second and more precise question, “Art Thou a King then?” Jesus replied unhesitatingly: “Thou sayest it; I am a King.” He proclaims His Kingship in the most formal manner before the highest civil authority in Palestine; He proclaims it, not in the midst of an enthusiastic crowd, nor in the triumph of His miracles, but bound with chains, before him who is about to condemn Him to death, before being dragged to Calvary where, from the heights of the Cross, above His thorn-crowned head, will appear for the first time the title of His royalty: “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews” (Jn. 19, 19). He had fled when the enthusiastic crowd wished to make Him their King; now He proclaims Himself King in the midst of the unspeakable humiliations of His Passion, thus affirming in the clearest manner that His Kingdom is not of this world, that His Kingdom is so sublime that no dishonor, no insults can eclipse it. But by this act Jesus also tells us that He prefers to manifest his Kingship far more as a conquest of His Blood than as a title belonging to Him in virtue of His divine nature.

We should go to meet this divine King with all the yearning of our soul. He presents Himself to us under an appearance so human, so loving, so welcoming, stretching out His arms on the Cross to invite all to come to Him, showing us the wound in his side as the symbol of His Love. Far from trying to escape His dominion, we should beseech Him to be the sole Ruler of our mind and heart, and the complete master of our will. We should submit ourselves and all that belongs to us to “His most gentle rule” (Collect).

FEAST OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST THE KING

FEAST OF OUR LORD
JESUS CHRIST THE KING

The Last Sunday of October (Sunday between October 25 and 31 inclusive)

Pope Pius XI (whose motto was: Pax Christi in regno Christi) instituted the feast of Christ the King as a solemn affirmation of our Lord’s kingship over every human society; He is King, not only the soul and conscience, intelligence and will of all men, but also of families and cities, peoples and states and the whole universe. In his Encyclical Letter "Quas primas" the Pope showed how laicism or secularism, organizing society without any reference to God, leads to the apostasy of the masses and the ruin of society, because it is a complete denial of Christ’s Kingship. This is one of the great heresies of our time, and the Pope considered that this annual, public, social and official assertion of Christ’s divine right of Kingship over men in the liturgy would be an effective means of combating it.



That Christ if King over all creation is the theme of the whole Mass and Office of the feast. The Mass begins with the magnificent Apocalyptic vision of the Lamb of God, sacrificed but henceforth glorified for ever, acclaimed by the innumerable host of Angels and Saints (Intr.). By its position on the last Sunday of October, towards the end of the Liturgical year and just before All Saints, the feast of Christ the King comes as the climax of our celebration of all Christ’s mysteries and a kind of earthly anticipation of his everlasting reign over the elect in the glory of heaven. It sums up the Christian message that by His Death and Resurrection Christ has conquered sin and death and reigns in the glory of His victory among the elect who are its fruit. Christ is the creative Word; He is the Man-God, seated at the right hand of the Father; He is our Saviour; these are His threes title to kingship.



Prayer to Christ the King



O CHRIST Jesus, I acknowledge You King of the Universe. All that has been created has been made for You. Exercise upon me all Your rights. I renew my baptismal promises, renouncing Satan and all his works and pomps. I promise to live a good Christian life and to do all in my power to procure the triumph of the rights of God and Your Church. Divine Heart of Jesus, I offer You my poor actions in order to obtain that all hearts may acknowledge Your sacred Royalty, and that thus the reign of Your peace may be established throughout the universe. Amen.

CHRIST THE KING By Fr. Yves le Roux, SSPX

CHRIST THE KING
By Fr. Yves le Roux, SSPX ~ http://www.stas.org/publications/letter/2007/November/
November 8, 2007

Dear Friends and Benefactors,

After His Resurrection, Our Lord sent His Apostles on their mission: "Go, teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." There is no ambiguity in these words: religion cannot be restricted to the purely private domain.

Many think that it is good for the government and the laws to remain neutral regarding religion, allowing it to develop without interference or obstacles from the State. Some even dare to say that such official neutrality is the most desirable status for the Church. But as Leo XIII declared in his encyclical "Longinqua oceani," such an opinion is erroneous.

Even more, it is treason against Our Lord and His kingship. To pretend that Christ should not exercise in civil matters His double rights of Creator and Redeemer amounts to nothing other than the denial of His divine nature and His universal kingship.

In spite of all our claims to independence, man is a dependent being. His life in society is not an accident or a free choice. From the moment of his creation, man is by nature a social being. Life in society is not a question of preference, but a vital necessity for us. Thus, at the same time that God created man, He created society. And society, as all of God's creatures must reader to its Creator the homage that is due to Him. In consequence, civil society - that is, the State - has the grave obligation to seek the true religion, in order to let its citizens adore God through Our Lord Jesus Christ, in the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church. The State, as a moral entity, must render worship to God. It cannot be neutral. No creature can assert its independence regarding the Creator, and if we were to allow it for one creature, what would stop us from claiming it for all creatures? The State is also a creature, and such a claim to independence is truly a blasphemy against God.

Let us briefly consider the dramatic consequences of civil society's neutrality towards God.

A country that claims to be neutral, that does not, as a country, render to God the adoration that it should, destroys its Relationship with its Creator. It is like a man who refuses to adore God. That man is objectively in the state of mortal sin, and thus, none of his actions is pleasing to God, none of them merits eternal life.

The same happens with a society that adopts the Liberal principle of the separation between the State and God. That society is in the state of mortal sin and does not receive the blessings of God. It merits to be justly punished. While a man will receive the full, just punishment for his crimes in the afterlife, societies receive it here on earth. Our Lady in Fatima told the little shepherds that many countries would be wiped out from the face of the earth because they were not giving her divine Son the honor legitimately due to Him.

Moreover, a state's policy of neutrality precludes it from aiding the Church. The Catholic Church, Mother and Teacher of Truth, does not receive from the State the assistance that she has the right to expect to spread her divine teachings. She is treated as an association like any other, or even reduced to the level of a sect or false religion.

This neutrality favors the spread of errors. Errors which came into contact with other errors draw from this contact a new strength to fight against the Truth. And Truth must be protected from any error, because Truth is tainted by such contacts.

This necessary protection of Truth is not a weakness, but rather a sign of its authenticity. Gold loses its purity and value when mixed with base metals. If a healthy man wants to remain healthy, he must protect himself against illness, avoiding any contact with the germs that carry disease. In a similar manner, to survive, Truth must be exempt from any contact with error.

Thus, the indifference of the State in regard to religion is an error – it is a formidable weapon to destroy the Catholic faith and to favor Error in its many guises. What do men become in such a situation? They no longer receive the light of Truth, and thus, they err, walk blindly and get lost. Pius XII was right when he said that the salvation or damnation of many frequently depends on the civil constitution of a country.

It is so because if the country itself is Catholic all its laws would lead man to adore and honor God, to praise and serve Him. In a Catholic country, the observance of the Sunday would give everyone the possibility of adoring God without obstacles. The civil laws would oppose abortion, the depravity of morals and fashions - and the same civil laws would forbid divorce arid favor the unity of families.

The neutrality of the State, that is, the indifference of a nation regarding God and His Christ, is an extremely grave fault, the most serious of all because it is the root of all the others The doctrine that divinizes human liberty, turning man into a kind of god, is called Liberalism. Demanding and imposing the religious neutrality of States, Liberalism leads souls to Hell. The surest way to lead a soul to its damnation is to let it live in a society without God.

There is no more pernicious error than Liberalism. We must reject and hate it, with all our forces, because it leads us and our children on the path to Hell. Let us wake up! We are at war! We do not have the right to let ourselves be corrupted, intellectually and practically, by these frightful liberal errors whose effects we daily see around us. Why do you think that so many souls cannot find the way to the Truth today? Why are there so many crimes? Why so much vulgarity? Why are so many souls damned in spite of their good intentions? Why? Why? Why?

Because Our Lord does not reign. Because man has become as a god. Because we have inherited this monstrous liberal culture that pretends that the State should not kneel before its God.

It is an ignoble crime, an unspeakable sin. We must not accept it, we must not resign ourselves to see God so badly treated by His creatures, we must not remain silent. We must proclaim, loudly and clearly, the kingship o£ Christ over the nations of the earth.

It is exactly because we proclaim this kingship that we meet with so many difficulties. That is the true reason for the sanctions against the SSPX. It was not because he continued saying the Mass in Latin that Archbishop Lefebvre had to struggle against so much opposition and was condemned. No. The hatred against him arose from his strong affirmation of the inalienable rights of Christ to reign over families and countries, as well as over individuals. Archbishop Lefebvre was condemned because he vigorously opposed the Conciliar declaration on religious liberty, by which modernist Rome accepted that Our Lord no longer reigned over societies. He was condemned by those who should have defended and congratulated him! - a sad proof that Roman authorities do the work of the enemies of Our Lord...

What we have said is sadly proven also by the present Roman policy regarding the faithful who want to have the Tridentine Mass. Rome accepts them on condition of their consent not to publicly proclaim the Kingship of Christ. What a misery! Rome, the indefectible custodian of Truth, beacon of intelligences and mistress of hearts, cradle of Christendom, is today eaten away by the terrible evil of Liberalism. Pius IX saw this clearly when he declared to a group of pilgrims that Catholic Liberalism was the most dangerous evil, "a true plague" in his own words. We live in a time of plague.

What should we do?

We must proclaim loudly and clearly the kingship of Christ. We must, as St. Paul teaches, "bring all minds into the service of Christ," beginning with our own. We must learn the doctrine of the Social Kingship of Christ from our priests, in order to be able to oppose its Liberal detractors. Let us not deceive ourselves: we ourselves are also tainted by this Liberal virus, if not in doctrine, then at least on a practical level. The proof is that we usually judge the realities around us from a naturalistic viewpoint - that is, according to criteria of natural goodness - but not according to supernatural Truth. Our first and most pressing duty is to enroll in this crusade, to engage ourselves personally in this battle for the social reign of Our Lord, so that our countries learn to recognize in Our Lord the God to whom they owe homage. Otherwise, vain is our claim to be Catholics. Today Our Lord is disowned, His kingship insulted. Today we hear again the ignoble cry repeated for two millennia: "We do not want Him to reign over us. Crucify Him. "

We want Him to reign over us. We want Him to reign over our institutions. We want Him to reign over our country, because we know, as the great anti-liberal Popes knew, that he who does not hate error is not a faithful servant of Christ and he is unworthy of being called a Christian.

Allow me to quote you a passage from Cardinal Pie, the Doctor of the Social Kingship of Christ: "You think that your conscience is in peace, you think that you are still orthodox because you firmly believe in the divinity and humanity of Jesus Christ, and that that alone suffices to constitute Christianity... Do not fool yourselves, you are not above reproach in your faith if you are of those who, while offering incense to Jesus, refuse to add gold to their offering, that is, if you refuse to acknowledge and proclaim His social Kingship."

May Our Lady, Queen of our hearts, of our families and countries, grant us the grace of always being faithful witnesses of the Social Kingship of Our Lord, remaining loyally at His side in spite of the misery of the times in which we live. We will be despised and persecuted because of this fidelity. Standing at the foot of the Cross, at the side of Our Good Mother of Heaven, we will not be intimidated by these attacks, because we know that Christ reigns from the Cross and that it is an honor for us to share in His abandonment.

May Our Lady keep us unwaveringly firm in this hope, confident that Our Lord shall reign in spite of His enemies, as He promised to St. Margaret-Mary.

Let us hasten this blessed hour of His reign by our filial devotion to Mary, our Queen, particularly by the daily recitation of the family Rosary.

In Christo sacerdote et Maria,

Fr. Yves le Roux