Our Lord Jesus Christ the King
November 23, 2008
Homily for the Anglican Usage Mass
of the
St. Thomas More Society
celebrated at
St. Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic Church , 1013 Wood Street
Scranton, PA
Matthew 25:31-46
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen
When I was a boy navigating my way through elementary school, I often had conversations with my father about my classmates. As the years went by, I could tell that my dad had a greater affinity for some boys and girls than for others. You see, I was puny, but my dad is a huge man, 6 foot three inches and stoutly built; so all of my classmates showed him respect when we were at school functions, Cub Scouts, Little League, piano recitals and the like. The ones my dad appreciated, however, were not those who showed him respect, but those who showed me respect. Very simply, my classmates did not have to be kind to me, even if they thought they had to be polite to him. Therefore, the way to win my father’s affection was to be kind—all on one’s own—to the least of his children.
My dad thus taught me an important lesson. In order to show respect to the head of the household, it is not enough just to show him respect. One must show respect to all the members of his household to be worthy of his affinity. One cannot abuse the householder’s son and expect that the householder will not notice.
Jesus points this out in today’s Gospel. He notes that those who have not been merciful to the least of His brothers have not been merciful to Him. And also, those who have been merciful to the least of his brethren have shown Jesus the respect He deserves. Paradoxically, therefore, we show true reverence for Christ the King, the ultimate power in all the universe, when we care for the least powerful of all His subjects.
This is the first lesson of Christ the King Sunday. Jesus cannot be separated from His human creation. To abuse His human creation is to abuse Jesus. To serve His human creation is to serve Jesus. If we wish to be obedient subjects of Christ the King, then we cannot neglect to show the utmost respect and reverence for those who are considered the least of this world. To love Jesus is to love His children.
Jesus makes clear in today’s Gospel that He will return to settle accounts with each of us. Hence, the choices that we make here on earth have an eternal consequence. Those who refuse to show respect and reverence for the least of our Lord’s brethren will be condemned. But those who, like Jesus, show mercy to the vulnerable bill be shown mercy. The mercy we show in this life will be the mercy shown to us in the next. The measure we give will be the measure we get back. Therefore, we understand that we acknowledge our Lord’s kingship by showing mercy, and if we fail to acknowledge our Lord in this life, He will not acknowledge us in the next.
Such an acknowledgment is the fruit of our gratitude. That is, as we go out into the world showing reverence and respect for the least of our Lord’s brethren, we do so conscious of His reverence and respect for us—the reverence and respect for us that He demonstrated by dying on the cross on our behalf. Jesus does not ask us to do anything He has not first done Himself. If we are grateful for what Christ the King did for us, we will show our gratitude by showing mercy as He has shown us mercy. The reward of life everlasting is simply what He has also received. Just as His merciful act ended with His resurrection and ascension into heaven, so our mercy to the vulnerable will issue in our life after death and our eternal worship before the throne of grace.
This necessary gratitude is an indication of our foundational humility, the very humility necessary to co-exist with God in heaven. To be grateful is to acknowledge our dependence, and to acknowledge our dependence is to eschew pride, to adopt the humble orientation that is characteristic of all whose eternal abode is heaven. If we hope to be at home in heaven, we must receive as a gift our obligation to serve the needy. After all, they can give us nothing in return for our service to them. We do not help them for what we can get back but because Jesus has shown us that helping the weak is the right thing to do. As servants of Christ the King we serve the Lord’s most vulnerable subjects because we are humble enough to obey an order, humble enough to follow the example that the King has set, humble enough to believe that self-abnegation is indeed the way to heavenly exaltation.
I was fortunate to have in my father someone who appreciated where true affinity lies. True affinity comes not from being able to subjugate others, or even in fooling people into thinking we are genuinely polite. True affinity comes in following Christ’s example of sacrifice, in conforming our wills to the will of our heavenly Father, as we pray should be the case every time we recite the Lord’s Prayer. My father taught me to be genuine, for only in being so can we truly show respect or win the respect of others.
These were valuable lessons for a budding Christian because I soon learned that the One I should most respect and earn the respect of is Jesus Himself. And the genuine respect we offer in both word and deed is a sign finally of our love. Heaven we must understand is the abode of love, and love cannot be coerced. We may be obedient, we may even show mercy to others, because we fear the power of Christ the King, because we fear we may be condemned for all eternity.
For us to be at home in heaven, however, the mercy we show must be a sign of our love for those who do not yet know the mercy of God. Our mercy must be a sign of our love for Jesus Christ. If it is love we have and love we have shown through corporal and spiritual works of mercy, then the Judgment Day foretold in today’s Gospel will be nothing to fear. It will not be an occasion for fear but for release and entry into the fullness of the Kingdom of love we participated in while we yet walked the earth.
It is actually very simple: if we have shown we love Jesus through our love for our neighbors, we can expect the mercy we have been shown will be shown again to us at the Last Day. So is our love a free-will offering? And do we strive for our love for Jesus to be as true as is His love for us?