Tag: Christ the King

Cradled in Mercy’s Arms

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, spirituality4 Comments

The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe
November 26, 2023

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/112623.cfm

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, on this feast of Christ the King, we might expect our readings to be filled with triumphal metaphors for God – conquerer, ruler, omnipotent and, yes, distant from us.

Instead, today’s passages offer us images of God as a devoted, simple, and caring shepherd – the tenderest of roles in our natural world.

Thus says the Lord GOD:
I myself will look after and tend my sheep.
As a shepherd tends his flock
when he finds himself among his scattered sheep,
so will I tend my sheep.
I will rescue them from every place where they were scattered
when it was cloudy and dark.

What an unexpected “King” this is! Rather than groveling before his majesty, we are lifted shivering to his warm shoulders. We are rescued from our cloudy shadows and raised into his light.

In Corinthians, Paul instructs us that Christ is King for one reason: he has conquered death. Death is the darkest of shadows from which we long to be rescued – both the small deaths of loss, bereavement, failure, addiction, illness, depression – and the inevitable ending of the life we cherish in ourselves and others. Christ, the kingly shepherd, finds us even when we are lost and confused in fears such as these.

In our Gospel, Jesus says that he will easily find us in our shadows because we are already marked by a certain light – our acts of mercy toward his least ones:

‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you,
or thirsty and give you drink? 
When did we see you a stranger and welcome you,
or naked and clothe you? 
When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’
And the king will say to them in reply,
‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did
for one of the least brothers of mine, you did for me.’

For our prayer today, we might just ask the kingly shepherd to lift us close to the Divine Heart, to hum Mercy over us in a healing lullaby, so that we might return it freely to our wounded world.

Prayer: Our beautiful Responsorial Psalm will be our poetry for today.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
In verdant pastures I rest.
Beside restful waters God leads me;
refreshing my soul.
guiding me in right paths
in the safety of God's Name.
You spread the table before me
in the sight of my foes;
you anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
Only goodness and kindness follow me
all the days of my life;
and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD
for years to come.

Music: Shepherd Me, O God – Marty Haugen

Love’s Crown

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, Jesus, spirituality1 Comment

The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe
Sunday, November 20, 2022

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/112022.cfm

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King. This feast was established in 1925 by Pope Pius XI by his encyclical Quas Primas. The Pope was acutely aware of the secularization of society and culture. He wanted this feast and devotion to bring people a deep awareness that Christ is the center of all Creation.

The images, language and metaphors surrounding the feast are ones that spoke to the people in the early 20th century. They may ring differently to us. Concepts of “king”, “empire”, “dominion”, “subjection” tend to engender negative connotations for many of us. But our readings today can direct us to a deeper understanding of the characteristics Pius sought to highlight, ones that may speak more clearly to us in our time.

Our first reading from Samuel presents the anointing of David as King of Israel. Anointed by those who were “his own bone and flesh”, David prefigured the Incarnate Christ who, by the power of the Holy Spirit, took our flesh to redeem us.

Col1_15 image

The magnificent passage from Colossians offers exultant praise to the Creator for 

…delivering us from the power of darkness
and transferring us to the kingdom of the beloved Son,
in whom we have redemption …

And our Gospel gives us our precious Jesus on the Cross, teaching us the paradoxical truth of what his “Kingdom” really means – not oppressive dominion, but rather a sacrificial love that gives everything for the life of the beloved.

van eyck
Van Eyck’s painting of Christ King and his follower Petrus Christus’s Christ Suffering (15th C.)

Many cannot recognize such “kingship”. They cannot see the holy power within Christ’s sacrifice. They are, as Pius XI recognized for his time, blinded by a secularized culture and a dispirited life.

Let us pray today with the “justly condemned”, but spiritually enlightened, man in our Gospel who asked his Crucified King,

“Lord Jesus,
remember me
when you come into Kingdom!”

Poetry: As Kingfishers Catch Fire – Gerard Manley Hopkins

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame; 
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells 
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's 
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name; 
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: 
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells; 
Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells, 
Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came. 

I say móre: the just man justices; 
Keeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces; 
Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is — 
Chríst — for Christ plays in ten thousand places, 
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his 
To the Father through the features of men's faces. 

Music: Jesus Remember Me

 Renee Yann, RSM

A Heart Beholding

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, Poetry, spiritualityLeave a comment

November 20, 2021
Feast of Christ the King

Today’s Readings

For some, the lofty, politically-tinged title might obscure the rich devotion offered by this feast. The title “king” carries with it suggestions of exaggerated power, wealth and dominance not compatible with our Gospel perception of Jesus.

We may be more comfortable with images of Christ as infant, brother, shepherd, lamb, vine, gate, way, truth, life…

But what all these images point out is that our ability to comprehend the fullness of Christ is severely limited by our humanity. We usually choose a specific image based on our circumstances and spiritual needs.

Pope Pius XI promoted the concept of Christ the King in his 1925 encyclical Quas Primas, in response to growing international secularism and nationalism. His intent was not to compare Christ to the challenged world leaders of the time. It was to raise the perceptions of all people to the lessons of Divine Leadership: mercy, justice, inclusivity, and peace.

Oh, how we could benefit from the same understanding today! 

In this age with its culture of continual war, the human pain it causes, refugee crises, climate devastation, wealth distortion and indifference to the poor, how our hearts long for just, wise and loving leadership!

In his encyclical, Pius XI wrote:

Christ the King reigns “in the human hearts,” both by reason of the keenness of his intellect and the extent of his knowledge, and also because he is very truth, and it is from him that truth must be obediently received by all humanity. He reigns, too, in our wills, for in him the human will was perfectly and entirely obedient to the Holy Will of God, and further by his grace and inspiration he so subjects our free-will as to incite us to the most noble endeavors. He is King of hearts, too, by reason of his “charity which exceedeth all knowledge.”

— Quas primas, §7[4]

Let’s pray for these virtues for all who are charged with any form of power or leadership:

  • keen spiritual intellect
  • deep heart’s knowledge
  • uncompromising truth
  • obedience to grace
  • holy inspiration 
  • noble character
  • and surpassing charity for all Creation

May Christ the King truly live and reign among us. May we behold the “sweet light in His eyes”!

Poetry: A King Inside Who Listens - Rumi

There are many people with their eyes open
whose hearts are shut. What do they see?
Matter.

But someone whose love is alert,
even if the eyes go to sleep,
he or she will be waking up thousands of others.

If you are not one of those light-filled lovers,
restrain your desire-body's intensity.
Put limits on how much you eat
and how long you lie down.

But if you are awake here in the chest,
sleep long and soundly.

Your spirit will be out roaming and working,
even on the seventh level.

The Prophet says, I close my eyes and rest in sleep,
but my love never needs rest.

The guard at the gate drowses.
The king stays awake.

You have a king inside who listens
for what delights the soul.

That king's wakefulness
cannot be described in a poem.

Music: We Shall Behold Him – offered in American Sign Language by Kayla Seymour; sung by Sandi Patty