November 17, 2022

Friends,

This Sunday at Mass, we’ll be celebrating the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. This feast of “Christ the King,” marks the end of our liturgical year and gets us ready for a new church year with Advent. So let’s take a few moments to reflect on what this feast of Christ the King of the Universe might mean concretely for us and our lives.

What does it mean to say that Jesus is the King of the Universe? 

When Jesus first burst onto the scene in the 1st century, He was going around saying that “the Kingdom of God is at hand.” He was revealing to everyone that something new was happening. God’s Kingdom – a kingdom of peace, justice, mercy, and love which they were waiting for – was now here among them. And when He began preaching and teaching and healing, the Jews who followed Jesus (Himself also a Jew) thought that Jesus would become a great earthly king who would restore the old Kingdom of Israel which their ancestors lived in. That’s why, to mock Jesus, the Roman soldiers put a sign above his cross: Jesus the Nazorean, King of the Jews (INRI).

But Jesus wasn’t the king that everyone thought He would be . . .