Homily for November 25

Homily for Solemnity of Christ the King
2 Samuel 5:1-3
1 Corinthians 1:12-20
Luke 23:35-43

Last weekend at the 5:00 Mass on Saturday evening
and at the 7:30, 9:30 and 11:30 Masses on Sunday morning,
I stood right here before the altar for the closing song
which, you may remember, was
Soon and very soon, we are going to see the King…

So four times last weekend I sang those words with you
and looked up at the crucifix hanging over our prayer
and I thought, I prayed, “This is my king…”

That stayed with me during the week
and I remembered a book I read a number of years ago,
titled, simply, Silence and written by Shusaku Endo.
It’s the story of 16th and 17th century Catholic missionaries to Japan
and the persecution they and other Christians suffered for their faith.
Authorities would present those suspected of being Christian
with a fumie, Japanese for step-on picture.



The fumie was an image of Christ crucified, or of his Blessed Mother.
Suspected believers would be asked to trample or spit on the image
and if they refused, as many did, they would be tortured
and some were even put to death.
Silence tells the story of a priest who met and then failed the challenge
and how he lived with the consequences of his choices.

Such practices seem may seem archaic to us – impossible to imagine.
Would anyone suffer physical torment
rather than step on an image?
Would anyone have such faith?

But Christians have suffered and died on account of their faith in a King
who suffered and died for them.
Our faith in Christ is still challenged today
but the terms of the challenge are more subtle
and our avoidance of the challenge is equally discreet.

The challenge today is not an invitation
to desecrate a sacred image – that’s too obvious.
The challenge today is, rather,
an invitation to deny the sacredness of anything except myself,
relativizing faith to the degree that I expect it to serve me, not I it.

Of course, we’re not all just selfish louts!
A spouse might say, “I would die for my beloved”
or a parent might say, “I would lay down my life for my child.”
The soldier says, “I will put my life on the line for my country.”
And such selfless love is sacrifice of a very high order.
But such sacrifice is offered by the lover for the beloved,
for one in whom I am deeply invested.

The question posed by Christ’s kingship is this:
Am I a lover who names God as my beloved?
Is my love for God such that I would suffer, even die
for my faith in Jesus who has already suffered and died for me?

The difficult part here is that Jesus, our King,
has set such a high standard.
Ours is a King who makes himself subject to his subjects:
he whom we should serve - has served us first.

The world we live in, the culture we eat and drink and breathe,
tells us that the faith I speak of here is foolish
and invites us to disdain, dismiss – even trample on it.

The seasonal question, then, is not so much:
“Should a nativity scene be placed on city property?”
That question is only a distraction.
The greater issue at stake is that to a large degree
we continually trample on the birthday of our King,
buying and selling it a thousand times over
under the guise of believing that somehow
conspicuous consumerism could be a decent way
to celebrate the birth, the coming of our King, among us.

Every year, just before Advent and Christmas
we celebrate the kingship of the one who laid down his life for us.
It is good that we remember even ahead of time
that the baby of Bethlehem would trade the wood of a manger
for the wood of the Cross - out of love for us.
His kingship calls us to examine the trades we make in his name
and whether those trades honor or trample on his love and our faith.

A simple holy “trade” is made at this table, too.
At this altar we bring bread and wine and prayer
and in return we receive the life our King gave for us
in the royal feast of the Eucharist.

Our beloved King has offered himself for us.
What will we offer him and each other in return?

-ConcordPastor