November 22, 2009 (Christ the King)

Christ the King Year C 2009

Dn 7:13-14
Ps 93:1, 1-2, 5
Rev 1:5-8

It was just an ordinary day in the life of a priest. It was several years ago, but it is a day hard to forget. It all centered around the font and the table. I began the morning welcoming a young mother and her family, as she brought the body of her four-year old son to the church. When they came by the Baptismal Font, I wondered what was in her mind. Her son had died—drowned when he accidentally fell into a swimming pool. They brought his lifeless body, too young to have made his First Communion, to the table where we all ate the Bread of Life.

It was only two hours later that two young Catholics came into the Student Center with their parents. They changed clothes and then, and then as they proceeded into the Worship Space, they too, came to the Baptismal Font. At the Font, the parents signed them with a little bit of water, reminiscent of having brought their children to another Baptismal Font years ago for Baptism.

Then both sets of parents accompanied their son and daughter down the aisle to the altar. Here, Lisa and Mike stood before the altar and pledged to each other, their unconditional love, a gift from God. After their vows, at the table we all drank from the cup of wine. We could not help but remember the wedding feast at Cana. This Cup of Salvation was the pledge of everlasting love poured out for us.

Then about eight or ten people came to the Reconciliation Chapel. The Reconciliation Chapel at St. Thomas Aquinas is located near the font. It recalls the fact that the early Church referred to this sacrament not as Reconciliation but as second Baptism.

A couple had been away from the Church for years. Others were there because the Spirit had moved them, aware of their sinfulness, to seek the Lord’s forgiveness. Several were there because they were taking another step in the process of initiation into the Catholic Church. Already one with us in Baptism, they had been journeying with their sponsors and the RCIA team and now came to celebrate God’s love and mercy in the Reconciliation Chapel. The next day they stood with us at this table with their hands made into “a throne for the King” (St. Augustine) as they received the Body and Blood of Christ for the first time now in FULL Communion with us in the Catholic Church.

At the 4:45 Mass, five parents came to the door of the church and presented their infant children for Baptism into this parish, into the Body of Christ, into the Church. As they raise their children they wanted to share with them the faith that is so important to us all.

This is the Feast of Christ the King. Jesus is a king very different than worldly kings. His crown was thorns and his throne was the cross. His Kingdom turns our usual world upside-down. The lowly are exhaulted, the rich are left empty-handed. This King came to serve, not to be served. This king-servant, who washes feet, is strangely grand and noble in his quiet vulnerability. He does not muster armies or amass territories. He simply invites, relying on nothing other than our hearts' response.

Jesus says “My kingdom is not of this world.” It is a kingdom not build with warfare. Rather, it testifies to truth. It will not kill for the truth, it will die for it. If Jesus is king, he will be a suffering king. He will not demand ransom. He will be ransom. He will win, not by spilling the blood of others, but by offering up his own.

He tells us that if we are to be part of that Kingdom, then we must serve the imprisoned, the ill, those who have no clothing.

Was it an ordinary day for me—NO WAY! But it was an ordinary day for the Church, for us as a Christian community. We are a people called to enter into and celebrate the mystery of life/death; the mystery of a pledged unconditional love; the mystery of an absolute forgiveness; the mystery of full communion with God. It is those mysteries into which these children have been baptized and others enter into full communion.

It is all very extra ordinary, very awe inspiring. Truly, this day, like every day for a Christian, is a grace-filled moment—a moment in which the mystery of God is being revealed. It is a day in which we consciously celebrate that indeed, Christ is King of our lives, and of all that is.