The Humble King (Reflections on Christ the King, Year A)

 

In my theater days I had the chance to work with a remarkable director named David. David was a senior tutor at Britain’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) and frequently visited the United States. Over the years I worked on four classical stage productions with this quixotic, brilliant, and mercurial man. David had a phenomenal grasp of Shakespeare, a wonderfully creative mind, and a prodigious ability to consume alcohol with no visible effects (Drunk or sober, I think he was just naturally crazy!).

David also possessed a very regal bearing. He would warm-up his actors’ voices by having us repeat soliloquies from Shakespeare’s King Richard II. He’d read a line and we’d repeat after him, trying to match his majestic baritone. David proudly told us that he was something like seventy-sixth in line to the throne of England. My mind boggles at the thought that, should seventy-five royal personages meet an unexpected demise, my Shakespearean friend could be crowned King of England!

I recall that one of my fellow actors once asked David why Britain, in this modern age, still had a Royal Family. He explained that the monarch was the last resort in the justice system. Should a man be convicted of a crime and lose all appeals before the courts, he could still apply to the Queen for pardon. I kind of like that idea: the job of the monarch is to dispense mercy.

Of course, now of days, I look at Britain’s monarchy with a sense of envy. Here’s a country with a class of people whose job it is—regardless of what political party is in power—to represent the nation with pride and dignity (We’re not so lucky in America these days!). The monarch represents all of the people. That’s why, I guess, kings and queens get to refer to themselves in the first person plural, and Brits refer to “Her Majesty’s government,” or “Her Majesty’s army,” or “Her Majesty’s Postal Service.” That which belongs to the monarch actually belongs to the nation the monarch represents. If one serves the monarch, one serves all of the people.

The king in the gospel lesson appointed for Christ the King Sunday in Year A of the Revised Common Lectionary (Matthew 25: 31-46) actually reverses this representation. Here, if one serves the least of the people, one has also served the monarch. Similarly, if one of the least has gone hungry or homeless or threadbare, the monarch has suffered. This monarch shares personally with the hungry, the poor, the forgotten, the persecuted, the sick, and the imprisoned. This king has a radical sense of identification with the lowliest of his subjects. This is the king who is the last recourse for those who need mercy. But this king is also a judge, and he doesn’t easily forget when his majesty, in the guise of one of his suffering subjects, has been slighted.

Christ the King is the newest festival in the liturgical year. It is less than a century old and was established by the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran, and other liturgical denominations after the gruesome slaughter unleashed by World War I. The world which emerged from the senseless carnage of that conflict had little use for royalty who reigned by divine right. The Church, after seeing how pompous Kings, Emperors, Czars, and Kaisers had screwed up civilization, knew she had to teach the world to look toward the King of Kings. The world needed the humble king who rode a donkey rather than a war horse, who came as a homeless baby born in a stable to an unwed mother and laid in an animal’s food trough, who died as a criminal in shame and disgrace. The world needed to look to the King who was and is the final word of mercy. The world needed the king who lives in and for the broken and the forgotten and the discouraged and the oppressed. 

People are still fascinated, of course, by the grandeur and romance of earthly royalty. David said that some in Britain are so besotted by the Royal Family that they have been known to faint dead away in their presence. Just imagine having that same sense of awe for our King of Kings. Martin Luther once said that if a man should tremble before an earthly prince, how much more should he tremble before Almighty God? Could we honor our King by approaching each individual as if we were in the presence of a royal and exalted personage?

Christ the King is the last Sunday of the liturgical calendar. Perhaps it’s a good time to make a sort of “New Year’s Resolution?” Let’s take this festival as the starting point for a renewed sense of the awe and mystery of God. My little church in Northeast Philadelphia is, I’ll admit, rather casual. Lately, however, we seem to have slipped from the “casual” to the “impious,” and are on a downward trajectory to the “disrespectful.” Let’s decide that we’re going to up our game and show a bit more reverence in the King’s presence. Simple things like coming to worship on time, faithfully honoring service commitments, keeping reverent silence during the Eucharist, and generally showing respect for God’s house (You wouldn’t bring your Dunkin Donuts coffee to an audience with the Queen of England would you? Why would you bring it into church?) are really good ways to revive your sense of the sacred. If you can honor the King in his house, you will learn to honor him in your neighbor.

Let me know what you think. Thanks for stopping by.