The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

Happy Solemnity of Christ the King! This solemnity was instituted by Our Holy Father and Supreme Pontiff Pope Pius XI on December 11, 1925 with his encyclical, "Quas Primas" in response to growing nationalism and secularism. The following excerpt is reproduced from "The Love of God and the Cross of Jesus" by Father Reginald Marie Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877-1964), translated by Sister Jeanne Marie, O.P. in 1951. 

Christus Vincit. Christus Regnat. Christus Ímperat. ¡Viva Christo Rey!

Chapter XV

The Kingship of Christ

"All power is given to Me in heaven and in earth." Matt. 28:18

The Church's doctrine on our Lord's priesthood receives a happy complement from what the liturgy for the feast of Christ the King teaches us about His universal kingships over minds and hearts.

The present era, with the Bolshevist movement ravaging Russia with satanic fury and now attempting to spread through the Orient and threatening all Europe, drives home to us the fact that, when the spirit of Christ no longer reigns, the deadly spirit of evil takes its place. The League of Nations refused to recognize God's rights over men and therefore, by failing to recognize the principle of order, showed itself radically powerless to re-establish order.

As Cardinal Mercier wrote in his pastoral letter of 1918: "The principle crime which the world is expiating at the present time is the official apostasy of nations." His Eminence added: "That religious indifference which places divine religion and the invented religions of men on the same footing, and surrounds them all with the same skepticism, I do not hesitate to call blasphemy. More than all the sins of individuals and of families, it calls down upon society the chastisement of God."

Secularism denies God's rights over human society and commits the crime of "lèse-divinité," of the high treason against the Author of society, the greatest evil of the modern world. To make reparation for this crime, we must extol Jesus Christ as the universal king of individuals, families, and societies. If Christ's universal kingship is proclaimed and His social reign recognized, one of the chief errors of the modern world will be struck at its very root.

Interior souls especially should live more by this great thought and their worship of Christ's kingship should include both adoration and reparation. It has seemed worthwhile, therefore, to consider our Lord's royal character in relation to the interior life, which should be the soul of all exterior worship, whether individual or social.

With this though in mind, let us see: (1) what Sacred Scripture tells us of Christ's universal kingship; (2) its nature, basis, and excellence; (3) the way Jesus exercises His universal royal power.

Article I

Christ's Universal Kingship in Holy Scripture

The Messianic texts that foretell the future Christ, make increasingly plain His attributes as universal king. Genesis announces that the peoples of the earth shall be blessed in Him and that He shall be the expected of the nations. Numbers says that out of Jacob shall arise the true ruler (Gen. 12:2; 23:17; 26:4; 49:8; Num. 24:17).

Psalm 2 represents the Messiah as a person distinct from the Father, whom the Father calls His real son, who has all peoples as His heritage: "The Lord hath said to Me: Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for Thy possession … And now, O ye kings, understand: receive instruction, you that judge the earth. Serve ye the Lord with fear: and rejoice unto Him with trembling."

Psalm 109 describes Christ's kingship and His priesthood: "The Lord said to my Lord: Sit thou at My right hand; Until I make thy enemies thy footstool. The Lord will send forth the scepter of thy power out of Sion: rule thou in the midst of thy enemies … He shall judge among nations."

Psalm 71, Deus, judicium regi da, announces the justice, peace, and prosperity of the reign of the Messiah: "And He shall rule from sea to sea … And all kings of the earth shall adore Him; all nations shall serve Him. for He shall deliver the poor from the mighty: and the needy that had no helper … Let His name be blessed for evermoreL his name continueth before the sun. And in Him shall all the tribes of the earth be blessed: all nations shall magnify Him."

Isaias likewise proclaims: "The government is upon Hid shoulder: and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of peace … to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with justice, from henceforth and forever" (Isa. 9:6).

Daniel also speaks of this kingdom when he says that a little stone will first overthrow and break into pieces the colossus with clay feet and then become a great mountain filling the whole earth (Dan. 2:34).

Zacharias extols the virtues of his humble and poor but just and saving King: "Behold thy King will come to thee, the just and savior: He is poor" (Zach. 9:9).

If the Old Testament so clearly and frequently declares the Savior's universal kingship, we would expect the New Testament to be even more explicit; and so it is. The archangel Gabriel, announcing to Mary the birth of her Son, said of Him: "The Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of David His father; and He shall reign in the house of Jacob forever" (Luke 1:32). "Cujus regni non erit finis," as we say in the Credo. In the adoration of the Magi, kings revel Him as a universal king, for these men who offered gold, frankincense, and myrrh to Him as a king sent by God were not Jews but Gentiles.

In His public life Jesus exercised His supreme power in different ways. He brought to perfection the divine law given to men through Moses (Matt. 5:17). He showedHimself as Lord of the divinely instituted Sabbath (Matt. 9:15). With a single word He forgave sins and brought souls as well as bodies back to life (Luke 5:17-26). By His miracles He manifested His power over the whole of material and spiritual creation (Cf. St. Thomas, IIIa, q.44). The very angels gladly subjected themselves to Him and served Him (Luke 2:13; Matt. 4:11; 24:53). 

At the end of His public life Jesus entered Jerusalem in triumph to hear the crowd cry out: "Hosanna to the son of David" (Matt. 21:9). … "Blessed be the king who cometh in the name of the Lord, peace in heaven, and glory on high!" (Luke 19:38). As St. Matthew records, it had been declared in the Old Testament: "Tell ye the daughter of Sion: Behold thy king cometh to thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of her that is used to the yoke" (Zach. 9:9). The garb of humility is worthy of Him who came into the world to trample human greatness underfoot; and, as Bossuet says (Sermon on the Kingship of Jesus Christ), we cannot help but be struck by the fact that, although Jesus fled to the mountains when the people wished to make Him a temporal king after the multiplication of the loaves of bread, He accepted the Palm Sunday acclamations of the crowd in public testimony of His spiritual kingship. He entered Jerusalem to consummate the work of our redemption and to win His kingdom. The Pharisees, provoked by the people's acclamations, said to Him, "Master, rebuke Thy disciples." And he answered them, "I say to you, that if these shall hold their peace, the stones will cry out" (Luke 19:39).

Jesus makes His points even more forcefully by refusing all the outward honors of temporal kingship and then confessing during His passion that He is a king. Never was He greater or more dignified than during those hours of humiliation and ignominy. As Bossuet says, He who had never spoken to His disciples of His kingship reveled it to Pilate; He who made no reference to it when He was working miracles proclaimed it while suffering the torments of His passion.

He desires us to understand that He holds His spiritual sovereignty over our souls not only by right of brith but also by His death as our Redeemer. Pilate said to Him, "Art Thou the king of the Jews?" And Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). That is, My kingdom has its origin elsewhere and My rule is exercised otherwise than in the kingdoms of this world. Pilate insists, "Art Thou a king then?" And Jesus answers: "Thou sayest, that I am a king. For this was I born, and for this came I into the world; that I should give testimony to the truth. Everyone that is of the truth, heareth My voice." That is to say, I am king not only of the Jews but of all those who hear My testimony of truth.

Jesus is a king, but a king of poverty and sorrow, winning His right to rule His spiritual realm by His passion. In mockery the Jews gave Him a crown of thorns for a diadem, and a fragile reed for a scepter, not understanding the symbolism of the crown of thorns which they bestowed nor seeing the infinite value of the drops of blood with which Christ jeweled it. Pilate had our Lord's title of kingship written above Him on the cross in the three most widely known languages of the ancient world, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, in order that all might know of it. The Jews protested, but Pilate, until that moment so weak, stubbornly held to what he had written.

Jesus is a king, but a crucified king, a redeemer king because of His suffering. "His cross is His throne, His blood is His royal purple, His torn flesh is His power" (Bossuet). Who understood all this as Jesus hung dying? She who shared His sufferings and His kingship, Mary the co-redemptrix.

God's kingdom is now established. Our King, by His crucifixion, has redeemed us from slavery of sin and Satan; three days after His death His mysterious victory over sin is manifested in a striking way by His victory over death, the consequence and chastisement of sin. The risen Jesus then says to His apostles: "All power is given to Me in heaven and in earth. Going therefore, teach ye all nations … Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world" (Matt. 28:18).

The resurrection restores Christ's glory to Him, and in the Apocalypse (Matt. 19:16) St. John contemplates His triumph in heaven, seeing Him on a throne of splendor, with His name written on His garment Rex regum, Dominus dominorum, King of King and Lord of lords, the supreme Judge rendering to every man according to his works (Cf. Apoc. 1:18; 4:9; 6:10; 22:13; 17:14). 

St. Paul tells the Philippians that Jesus hold His universal kingship by the right of inheritance because of His equality with God, and by right of conquest because "He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to the death of the cross. For which cause God also hath exalted Him, and hath given Him a name which is above all names: that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth: and that every tongue should confess that the Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father" (Phil. 2:5 ff. Rom 8:31; Heb. 1:1). For He must reign … And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then the Son also Himself shall be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all in all" (I Cor. 15:25-27). 

Among the Fathers who spoke most distinctly of Christ's universal and kingly sovereignty, we should cite St. Justin (Dialogus cum Tryphone), St. Irenaeus (Adversus Haereses, Book IV, Ch. 12), St. Ephrem (Éphrem ed. Msgr. T.J. Lamy, "Le testament de Saint Ephrem le syrien"), St. Cyril of Alexandria (In divi Joannis Evangelium, Bk. XII), and St. Ambrose, who wrote: "Rightly was the title of king placed on the cross, because from it radiated the kingly majesty of Jesus" (Expositio in Lucam, X).

Article II

The Nature, Basis, and Excellence of Christ's Kingship

When we think of kingship two kinds come to mind: first, temporal kingship, ordered to promote the temporal good of society; and secondly, spiritual kingship, with the direction of all men to the supernatural happiness of a future life as its end. Had Christ a temporal kingship over the world? So far He is a God and Creator, He is most surely the absolute Master of the universe in the temporal as well as in the spiritual order (Cf. Col. 1:16). But so far as He is man, had He royal temporal power? The majority of theologians answer that He had it right but in fact willed not to exercise it.

St. Thomas and St. Antoninus as well teach that, although Christ was constituted king by God Himself, He did not will to have on earth the temporal administration of an earthly realm (IIIa, q. 59, a.4, a. I; q, 58, a.2). This doctrine, well defended by the Carmelites of Salamanca (Salmanticenses, "De incarnatione," disp. xxxii, dub. 2), has become more and more common today and was sanctioned by the encyclical Quas Primas of December 11, 1925. If some theologians (Blessed [Saint] Robert Bellarmine, De Romano Pontifice, Chaps. 4, 5;  Tolet, Sylvius, in Illam, q. 59; Billuart, De justitia, diss. III, a.6) have doubted or denied that Jesus as man possessed royal temporal power, this is owing to the fact that they have considered the question from too narrow a point of view.

Following the Carmelites of Salamanca, Father Hugon justly remarks:

It is not enough to say that Jesus is simply a spiritual king, for that means putting limits to a kingship which Scripture and tradition attribute to Him without reserve. Let us look at the question in a higher and more general way and say: The whole Christ, the Redeemer, our blessed Savior, who subsists in two natures, the divine and the human, is a king in the completest sense of the word, ruling in the temporal as well as in the spiritual order, without restriction … He who said, "All power in given to me in heaven and in earth," (Matt. 28:18) is Christ in His two natures, the visible Christ, speaking to His apostles. Now nothing is excluded from His empire, absolute on earth as well as in heaven … St. Paul states the same truth when he says: "All things are put under Him; undoubtedly, he is excepted, who put all things under Him" (I Cor. 15:27). "All," in the temporal as in the spiritual order, all except the Father, to whom He is subject. What is meant is that Christ reigns not only in His divine nature, because of which He has no need for the Father to subject all creatures to Him, but also in His human nature, because of which He can receive the government of the universe (Revue Thomiste, July 1925, p. 304, "La fête spéciale de Jésus-Christ roi").

As a consequence of the hypostatic union, Jesus has received sovereign dominion over all things, being constituted by God the judge of the living and of the dead (John 5:22, 27), of kings as well as of subjects, and, as St. Peter says, "Lord of all" (Acts 10:36). Therefore the liturgy calls Him the King of nations, "O Rex gentium … veni et salva hominem quem de limo formasti" (Advent antiphon).

In fact, however, Jesus willed not to exercise His temporal power in the world. He freely chose a poor and humble life, and payed the tribute like anyone else, although He had no obligation to do so (Matt. 27:26). Moreover, after the multiplication of loaves when the people were dazzled by the miracle and carried away by dream of material prosperity and wished to make Him a king, Jesus saw that they looked for an entirely earthy magnificence and He left them, fleeing away into the mountains alone (John 6:15).

The apostles themselves, laboring under the same delusion, believed that He was going to found a temporal kingdom, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee came asking that they might have the first two places in the new realm. Our Lord answered: You know not what you ask. Can you drink the chalice that I shall drink?" Up until the time of the ascension the apostles still held a mistaken view on this subject, and at the very moment when Jesus was about to ascend into heaven they asked Him, "Lord, wilt though at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?"  (Acts 1:6). They had not yet really grasped Jesus' answer to the Pharisees: "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall they say: Behold here, or behold there. For lo, the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:21).

Jesus shows us by these words that His kingship belongs first of all to the spiritual order. He wields His royal power by ascendancy, by attraction, by love, by intellectual, moral, and supernatural authority over minds, wills, and hearts. By it He has founded a spiritual society, the Church, and holds the place of its head by a double title: first, as His birthright; for He is the Word made flesh, the Son of God, and thus inherits from His Father the right to command all men; secondly, as His by right of conquest; for we have been unfaithful, becoming traitors to our king, and He has won us back by wrestling our souls from the slavery of sin and Satan, buying us back with a great price (I Cor. 6:20). And we, by our baptismal vows freely renewed, have recognized His sovereign authority over us.

Christ's spiritual and temporal authority has the excellence of supremacy, leading all souls of good will to eternal happiness. It is an authority with power not only over bodies but over souls, not only over people, but over all kings and heads of states as well, the authority of the Son of God, Himself subject to the Father alone. Christ's authority belongs to the greatest intellect, the most loving heart, the most upright, kindest, and strongest will, and implies also the power of legislate and supreme judge.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus declared Himself the equal of the divine Legislator of Sinai by claiming that He had come to complete the Old Law. He repeated His assertion more than once: "You have head that it was said to them of old; …but I say to you…" (Matt. 6:27-44). Perfecting the Old Law of fear, He made the New Law of grace and love. "A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another." "Love your enemies, … pray for them that persecute and calumniate you" (John 13:34). 

He is also supreme judge, as His words to the apostles show: "And whatsoever thou shalt bing upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: And whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven" (Matt. 16:19; 18:18). He declared that He would one day come to judge the living and the dead (John 5:22, 27). 

His supreme authority is consequently universal, extending to all places, to all times, to all creatures; for Jesus has command even of the angels, the ministers of His kingdom. By right all things are now subject to Him; in fact at His second coming all will be subject to Him on earth as in heaven. In regard to Him no one can remain neutral. "He that is not with Me, is against Me" (Matt. 12:30). We cannot be neutral in regard to the final end of life; if we have no desire for it, we turn away from it.

The universal kingship of Jesus orders all thing toward their ultimate end; He is "the way, the truth, and the life." He leads souls to eternal life, there to enjoy God face to face and to love Him above all things with the absolute certainty of never losing Him by sin. Herein the infinite goodness of our King shows itself strong with nothing of weakness about it. The kings of earth seek to obtain temporal goods for their people by imperfect and often impotent means. Christ leads us effectually to our last supernatural end, to everlasting happiness; He bestows upon us His light, His strength, His life, and His love to bring us there, giving Himself as our food to restore our strength and to communicate His life to us. Only those who obstinately refuse to let Him lead them, to let Him save them, who scorn His divine love and will not be drawn to Him as He wills to draw them, fail to reach their goal.

Yet even the enemies of Jesus glorify Him indirectly. The obstacles they raise up against Him He transforms into means; persecutors serve to bring glory to martyrs, and that greatest of all obstacles, the cross, becomes the marvelous instrument of our salvation. A day will come when all Christ's unrelenting enemies will be finally and fully overcome. Then if He does not reign over them by mercy, He will reign over them by justice, as the Messianic psalm expresses it: "Thou shalt rule them with a rod of iron, and shalt break them in pieaces like a potter's vessel" (Ps. 2:9). Even now hell trembles whenever we call upon His name.

But to men of good will, whose good will itself is evoked by His grace, He will be sweetness and peace, Princeps pacis. As the Apocalypse says: "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more, nor mourning no crying nor sorrow" (Apoc. 21:4). He will have vanquished death after having triumphed over sin, the cause of sorrow and death in the actual plan of Providence. The reign of our King is our happiness and our salvation. He rules us in perfect peace, in the tranquillity of order radiating from Him upon us all.

Article III

The Exercise of Christ's Royal Power

Christ wields His royal power with wisdom unparalleled and goodness compounded of strength and sweetness, neglecting no smallest detail in its universality, whether in matters of Church government or of the intimate direction of souls.

Jesus exercises His royal power over civil society with prudence. He has the right to require not only that society should not be ruled by the atheistic principles of secularism, destructive of family and country alike, but also that it should be governed according to the principles of Christian law. He has the right to demand not only that national leaders should refrain from denying divine authority, the basis of their own, but also that they should recognize it publicly and submit to it themselves. Christ Jesus, the incarnation of truth, goodness, and justice, has a right to be taught in schools, to be carried to the sick in hospitals, to be represented in courts of justice when oaths are taken. He has a right to public worship in our cities, and the heads of nations will be judged if they have violated the imprescriptible law of Christ the King or if they have tried to stay neutral toward him (Cf. Pope Leo XIII, Immortale Dei and Libertas). 

Our Lord comes to the aid of all who beg His help, inspiring their leaders to conform themselves and their institutions to the spirit of the gospel; to respect, for example, the divine law concerning the unity and indissolubility of marriage, to govern for the security of all, to procure a temporal peace subordinate to peace of soul and eternal life.

In the Church, Christ exercises His spiritual kingship by governing it through His vicar and the ecclesiastical hierarchy: that is, the bishops, pastors, and superiors of religious orders. Heresy and schism have often sought to divide Christ's realm, but the Church will remain one and indefectible until the end of time despite the efforts of hell against it. Christ is in His Church as once He was in Peter's boat; now as then a word from Him suffices to calm to the tempest.

Our Lord is not only absolute Master but the living head of His kingdom, directing all, bestowing life through the sacraments, giving regeneration to souls through baptism, later confirming them, sanctifying marriages, restoring grace by absolution, increasing it through Communion, sustaining those in their last agony, and leading all to eternal life. He inspires His ministers, enlightens His doctors, strengthens His missioners, protects His virgins, upholds Christian families, and fructifies vocations. Whatever human imperfections we find in His Church, He allows in view of a greater good until the time comes when evil will be definitively vanquished.

In the interior direction of souls Jesus exerts His kingly power in a profound and hidden way. Only He and His Father know what marvels take place within souls, although the lives of the saints from time to time reveal to us something of what will be fully known only on the last day. Jesus enlightens our souls interiorly with illuminations of faith, with gifts of wisdom, or understanding, or knowledge, and of counsel. He attracts and consoles us, inspiring us with filial piety for His Father, for Himself, and for His Blessed Mother. He prompts us to make good resolutions and strengthens us to keep them.

Jesus as God has sent us the Holy Ghost; as man He has received the fullness of the Spirit's gifts and He desires to share them with us. If we abandon ourselves completely to Him, He will fill us with His graces, and we shall receive more and more life from Him, growing in experimental knowledge of the Te Deum, "Tu Rex gloriae, Christe, and those words of the Credo which lifted St. Teresa into an ecstasy of joy, "Cujus regni non erit finis." [See Monsignor Sinibaldi's beautiful book on the subject Il Regno del SS. Cuore (Milan, 1924), in which the author, using St. Thomas' principles, considers the great theses in the treatises on the Incarnation and the Church from the point of view of Christ's kingship, which is especially a kingship of supernatural love, since Jesus reigns especially through charity.]

It is fitting, therefore, that we pay Christ's royal sovereignty special worship, particularly now when atheistic secularism is making greater and greater efforts to destroy it. The official apostasy of nations constitutes a crime calling for reparation by exterior as well as interior worship and by public as well as private acknowledgement of Christ's sovereignty. Such reparation can find no better expression than in the solemn, sincere, deep, and effective recognition of Christ's kingship over minds, wills, and heart, over nations and over heads of nations. "For He must reign … And when all things shall be subdued unto Him then the Son also Himself shall be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be all in all" (I Cor. 15:25, 27).

The purifications of the senses and of the soul discussed earlier in this work assure the complete reign of Jesus in our souls, for they lead us to that pure love of the Savior which finds all things in Him and seeks nought else besides. Realizing this, St. John of the Cross tells us: "To possess all, desire nothing. When thou thinkest upon anything, thou ceasest to cast thyself upon the All … Thou must possess without desiring; for, if thou wilt have anything, thou hast not thy treasure purely in God" (Ascent of Mt. Carmel, Bk. I, chap. 13). And the liturgy speaks to us of God as the greatness of the humble, lifting up the lowly to His own exalted heights.