CSVF Blog

All authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me,
says the Lord.

The Church closes the liturgical year with the celebration of Our Lord Jesus Christ the King.  Today’s feast points the eyes of our hearts forward to the future, to the last of the Christian mysteries—the Second Coming of Christ as King and Judge.  

Customarily, thoughts of death and judgment provoke fear in us, not hope.  But as Pope Benedict has explained in his recent encyclical Spe salvi, Christ’s second coming is good news for us trudging through this “valley of tears.”  This life with its sorrows and injustices will come to a definitive end.  It will pass away, though not into nothingness.  This old and dying creation will make way for the new, where the risen dead will reign with the Risen Christ in the Kingdom of God, in which the communion of saints will enjoy the Communion of the Trinity.  Among the delights of the Kingdom will be this divine consolation: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall their be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:4).  The Christian, therefore, looks forward not in fear but in hope.  In fact, that the Christian even has a future is cause enough for his gratitude and rejoicing.

Still, we live in the present.  From our perspective, the future glory promised the righteous seems far off.  But it is in this situation that hope is born, and not without some experience of the Kingdom already.  Today’s Office of Readings includes this passage from Origen’s On Prayer:

The kingdom of God, in the words of our Lord and Savior, does not come for all to see; nor shall they say: Behold, here it is, or behold, there it is; but the kingdom of God is within us, for the word of God is very near, in our mouth and in our heart.  Thus it is clear that he who prays for the coming of God’s kingdom prays rightly to have it within himself, that there it may grow and bear fruit and become perfect.  For God reigns in each of his holy ones. Anyone who is holy obeys the spiritual laws of God, who dwells in him as in a well-ordered city.  The Father is present in the perfect soul, and with him Christ reigns, according to the word: We shall come to him and make our home with him.

And through our experience of the Kingdom’s first fruits now, we seek to establish its effects in the world around us.  

May the just and holy sovereignty of Christ the King reign in our minds and hearts, now and forever.

Almighty and merciful God,
you break the power of evil
and make all things new
in your Son Jesus Christ, the King of the universe.
May all in heaven and earth proclaim your glory
and never cease to praise you.

We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, forever and ever. Amen.

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