Today, the final Sunday of the liturgical year, is my absolute favorite solemnity, that of Christ the King. I love it both because of the one it proclaims and because it is a celebration of the power and freedom of the human heart over and against any form of totalitarianism: a feast that proclaims, no matter what you do to us, we will not bow to any earthly master. Fr. Cantalamessa explains its provenance.
It was instituted by Pope Pius XI in 1925 in response to the atheist and totalitarian political regimes that denied the rights of God and the Church. The climate in which the feast was born was, for example, that of the Mexican revolution, when many Christians went to their deaths crying out to their last breath, “Long live Christ the King!”But if the feast is recent, its content and its central idea are not; they are quite ancient and we can say that they were born with Christianity. The phrase “Christ reigns” has its equivalent in the profession of faith: “Jesus is Lord,” which occupies a central place in the preaching of the apostles.
A little more:
The onlookers challenged him to manifest his royalty openly and many, even among his friends, expected a spectacular demonstration of his kingship. But he chose only to show his kingship in his solicitousness for one man, who was, in fact, a criminal: “‘Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ He replied to him, ‘Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.'"
From this point of view, the most important question to ask on the feast of Christ the King is not whether he reigns in the world but whether he reigns in me; it is not whether his kingship is recognized by states and governments, but whether it is recognized and lived in me.
At this time of year it always strikes me as providential that the updating of the Roman calendar transferred the feast day to the last Sunday of the year. Now it falls just after Thanksgiving for us Americans --so we celebrate our liberty, and then its Author, in quick succession.
Happy feast day!
