CHRIST THE KING

If I may be allowed, let me share a personal experience of mine. Fifteen years ago when I was
working abroad as a young man, I remember going through a difficult period of my life, as I had to work
without salary for almost 6 months. I had very little savings to hold on to and it became very difficult
for me to survive. My pride didn’t allow me to take help from anyone. So much so that even my
relatives living in the same city did not know what I was going through. Finally the situation became so
bad that for days I had to live on one chapathi a day. I couldn’t take it more and one evening I broke
down and prayed on my knees before the Lord. I cried, I screamed, I shouted, “Lord! Where are you,
why have you brought me to this foreign land and abandoned me?” In all my experience I had never
cried and prayed like this before. It was a prayer of desperation. Few minutes later I heard someone
calling out my name. It was my friend; I went down to meet him. He was a friend alright but I knew that
he himself was going through a lot of crisis in his life. After a brief chat he gave an envelope to me and I
asked “what is this?” and he replied saying, “It’s for you”. On seeing it I realized that it had money in it.
So I refuse to accept it. Then he said something which I will never forget for the rest of my life. He said
“if Jesus is giving you this today, would you refuse him.” I was dumbfounded and with tears in my eyes I
took it and it was enough for my expenses for the next two months.

I prayed to God and God in fact was reaching out to me through my friend. I was so full of
myself and my pride didn’t allow me to see God in my friend. Dear brothers and sisters, we may have a
very majestic image of God – a God full of glory and power. And when we pray we may expect God to
speak to us from the clouds, in the mighty roaring of the wind, in a spectacular and in a supernatural
way. The question is: Do we have the simplicity and the humility to see God in the very simple things
that we encounter in our lives? Our lifestyle has become so sophisticated and independent so much so
that we don’t feel the need for God in our lives, unless and until we are hit by bad times. We are so
much engrossed in our own problems that we don’t see God reaching out to us in small things. Well,
dear brothers and sisters, if we fail to encounter God in all His simplicity and humility then, the feast of
Christ the king will have no meaning for our lives. A week from now, God is going to reach out to you
and me in a special way through this Parish Mission. Are we prepared to come down from the pinnacle
of our pride and allow God to take the center of our lives? God is giving us this wonderful gift of the
Parish Mission to celebrate Christ as the king and the master of our lives. Please do remember this.

As the Church celebrates feast of Christ the King today, probably we are expecting that today’s readings
will speak about the awe, the power, the majesty and the glory of God. But we are wrong for we don’t
come across any of these images in today’s readings. In the first reading, God comes across as a
Shepherd; he speaks through the prophet Ezekiel, saying “I myself will search for my sheep. I will seek
the lost, and bring back the stray, and I will bind up the cripple, and I will strengthen the weak.” And
this prophesy is fulfilled in the person of Jesus. Jesus came seeking the lost bringing the stray - the
sinners, the tax collectors, the prostitutes- back to the society. Besides, He healed the sick, crippled, the

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lepers and gave them the dignity as human beings.
Jesus was a king of a different sort. He was a king who loved His people. But the people
of his time failed to see the true meaning of His kingship i.e., He was the crucified King on the Cross,
that He was a King abandoned by his own people and that His Cross had become the throne of
forgiveness and mercy of God our Father.
That is why we bent our knees before the Cross, and that is why we bow our
heads in adoration before the Cross for what he has accomplished for each one of us is beyond our
imagination. Many an empire had risen and disappeared but this is why, the Kingdom of Jesus would
continue to reign in the heart of all of us.
What of his Kingdom? The Kingdom of Jesus is a Kingdom that is
governed by love- Jesus crucified on the cross becomes the ultimate expression of God’s love for each
one of us. “Love one another as I have loved you” said, Jesus and do we doubt his utterance? The fact
is that this love becomes the measure by which we will be the measured. We may have a tendency
that allows us to think that only Christians may go to heaven. But it is not the case, for today’s Gospel
gives us a different standard - the only standard by which the whole human race would be judged. The
extent to which we as human beings welcome and feed the poor, clothe the naked, take care of the sick
and visit those in prisons will be the extent to which we ourselves would be welcomed by Jesus.

There are three salient points for our reflection.

1. Firstly, we all need to realize that we are all poor before God. In a sense that we are the poor,
hungry, naked and prisoners that the Gospels speak of. The beatitude in Luke’s Gospel says, “Blessed
are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of God”. Poor in the spirit means to rely solely on God
and God alone. We might have a secure Job, a big bank balance, a happy family and good health but we
also know that there is no guarantee that it will remain so tomorrow. So our blessedness as the poor of
Yahweh would be judged by the way we see Jesus in the actual poor people. The Parish Mission is a
grace giving time to realize our own poverty before God, so that we make God our true possession. I
invite all the parishioners of the St. Peter’s Church for the Mission beginning from 30 th November till 6th
of December. From Monday to Saturday, evening 6:30 pm- 7:45 pm. And morning Eucharist and
Instruction at 6:15 am. It is the time to enthrone Jesus in our hearts as our Lord and King. In Mt 6:33
we read, “seek first the kingdom of God, all things shall be added unto you.”

2. Secondly, the extent we encounter God in the Holy Eucharist, will be the extent we see Jesus in
the poor. And the extent we encounter God in the poor, the extent we will see Jesus in the Holy
Eucharist. God in all its simplicity and humility enwrapped himself to be really present in the bread and
wine consecrated in every Eucharist. If we are able to see God hidden in the Holy Eucharist; then we
will be able to see God in the poor also.
3. Thirdly, we belong to the Kingdom of God to the extent we promote and live out the values of
the Kingdom. A long time ago remember visiting, various places of worship to understand the faith of

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the other religions in order to dialogue with them. In one of the shrines the leader of the community
said that “ours is a selfish religion whereas yours is a selfless religion”. That statement had a ring of
truth to it. The love that Christ showed us is a self-emptying love. We necessarily have to allow
ourselves to be moved and shaped by this love just like Sr. Teresa who having left the Loreto convent
went on to become Mother Teresa - the Saint of the gutter.

My dear brothers and sisters, Christ can’t be separated from the kingdom values. To be a
follower of Christ it is necessary therefore to live out the kingdom values of justice, freedom and love.
Let us promote the kingdom of God in our families, neighborhood and in our workplaces. As people of
God let us take our God to the world and the extent you and I do this, God will say welcome to the
kingdom of God.

As we offer the simple bread and humble wine, let us offer our very self as a fragrant offering
acceptable to God. As this bread and wine is transformed into his body and blood, we too may become
the other Eucharist to the world around us. Pray that this Parish mission may truly be a time of great
renewal and grace. May God bless all of us. Amen