The Solemnity of Christ the King

Today's Scripture

Today is the Solemnity of Christ the King, and so ends the liturgical year. Last year is about to end, and the new year with the season of Advent is about to begin. The readings for today show us what the feast is about: Christ the King. Jesus shall reign as king forever.

In Judaism, many prayers begin with, “Blessed are you, oh Lord our God, King of the universe….” Today’s solemnity, today’s feast, exists to teach us that Christ is the King of the universe. He rules the world, and all that exists. As we end the liturgical year, we are reminded of the final end of everything: Christ. We pray in the Liturgy: “…Christ will come again.” The readings from today highlight the truth of this prayer.
In the first reading from the Book of Daniel, we find an apocalyptic text which envisions the “one like a Son of man coming, on the clouds of heaven” (7:13). Jesus links Himself with this vision throughout the Gospels. The cloud imagery is often associated with God’s glory, and the angels, as well as the saints (think of our “great cloud of witnesses” in Hebrews 12:1). Our responsorial Psalm reminds us of the royal nature of Jesus’ ministry on earth and in heaven, “The Lord is king, in splendor robed” (93:1).

In the second reading from the Book of Revelation we hear again of Jesus’ universal rule, but we see that the liberation He has brought us---which is how we entered into His kingdom----was through His blood (1:5). Jesus is not simply a king, the King, but he is also our High Priest. His kingdom, like all kingdoms, is royal, but it is also priestly, hence we too share in his royal priestly vocation (Revelation 1:6).
Throughout the Gospels, Jesus may be said to have many thrones: Mary’s womb; the manger in which He was placed after His birth; the donkey on which he rode into Jerusalem; but especially the Cross. Jesus’ exultation on the cross, which we celebrate later in the year at Good Friday, is the place in the Gospels where Jesus most clearly reigns. We catch a hint, just a glimpse, of this in today’s Gospel reading from St. John’s Gospel, in Jesus’ trial before Pontius Pilate. The entire question Pilate poses to Jesus has to do with Jesus’ reign as King. In the next chapter of St. John’s Gospel we find Jesus reigning from the cross as our true High Priest.

But Jesus’ eternal reign is from His heavenly throne where He serves as the heavenly temple. We must keep this in mind. At the very end of time, stands Jesus, coming on the clouds. We share in His eternal reign, as children of the King, and also as brothers and sisters of Christ the King. We too have a royal priestly vocation, and so we must offer up our own sacrifices, uniting them to Jesus’, offering our very lives to God, so that we might transform the world, even as our own ordained clergy transform the bread and wine at the Eucharist. And we have this hope, that Jesus is the eternal King. He shall never die again, and as He has been raised, we too shall raise in glory with Him, at the end of our own lives. The ending of this liturgical year, as with every liturgical year, is one of hope. Hope for the future, and hope for the present.

- Jeff Morrow