This coming Sunday, we will celebrate the conclusion of the current liturgical year. Year after year through the liturgy we focus on the visit to Mary by Gabriel leading to the birth of Jesus. Then we once again ask forgiveness of our sins during Lent as we prepare for Holy Week and the suffering and death of Jesus leading to the Resurrection and Easter Sunday. And we meet again all those saints who inspire us and await us with their feast days throughout the year.

 

On this final Sunday we celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King. That celebration was instituted in 1925 by Pope Pius XI. With great foresight that has been validated even by our present day, the Holy Father placed before us Jesus as King in response to what he discerned a century ago to be the growing secularism and atheism in the world.

 

In essence, the honoring of the Kingship of Jesus is directly related to religious liberty. As the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reminds us, “During the early twentieth century, in Mexico, Russia, and some parts of Europe, militantly secularistic regimes threatened not just the Catholic Church and its faithful but civilization itself.” 

 

In our own time, the religious freedom of Christians and others is especially limited in many Islamic countries. And the repression of the Church in countries such as China and Nicaragua is a growing menace to the spiritual lives of believers. All of this is related to the efforts of earthly rulers and governments to claim rights and powers that belong to God.

 

As we celebrate Jesus as our king, even in a representative democracy like ours, we recognize that a king is a very special figure for a people. He is a point of authority. It is the nature of a king that he is to be obeyed by his subjects. But when that authority is both just and loving, as in the kingship of Christ, authority is not to be feared but embraced.

 

For that reason, a king who is just and loving is also a point of unity for the subjects. They know to whom to turn in a way that brings them into one people. And from that unity comes peace and stability.

 

With the recent passing of Queen Elizabeth II, what was very striking were the comments reported in the news by which the British populace acknowledged the positive and unifying role she had played during her 70 year reign. Many said they came to stand in the viewing line for hours in order to express their gratitude for her service.

 

In our own country, the conclusion of the most recent election cycle should give us further reflections about the kingship of Christ. These recent weeks have given us a yet another reminder of what a divided people we are. The campaign rhetoric has been typically harsh and uncharitable. And our divisions have been laid bare.

 

Above all, our politics have become constantly focused on building what might be called the City of Man, to the exclusion of the Kingdom of God. The power and reach of the state is constantly expanding and the place and role of faith and family in daily life is being diminished as God is excluded from our public discourse. In the past election, three states even went so far as to enshrine state constitutional protections for the taking of human life through abortion.

 

The Solemnity of Christ the King reminds us that in every heart something or someone must reign. That is a consequence of the spiritual nature of the human person. If Christ does not reign within us, someone or something lesser will take His place. Every form of earthly rule will eventually disappoint or even destroy. 

 

That is why this solemnity is so significant. In Christ alone we have eternal hope. That is why He is so rightly our king.