Throughout the Church we celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King.  At the end of the journey of our liturgical year we come to recognize, to know and to proclaim that Jesus is the Christ, the King and the Lord.  The purpose each year of our celebration of the mysteries of salvation through the liturgical cycle is to lead us to this final recognition.  Our journey through the scriptures points the way to the knowledge of this truth and helps us to understand that we have been called to be a part of the kingdom of God and that Jesus Christ is the King who has established and defined this kingdom for us through his teachings and that he continues to lead us and guide us as the Eternal King.

    As we celebrate Christ the King we are led into the mystery of the kingship of Jesus.  The scriptures tell us that Jesus resisted every attempt to establish him as king during his earthly ministry.  When talk turned to raising up Jesus as king he would quietly slip away.  We can then ask what sort of king is Jesus if he had no desire to be king while on earth?  Wouldn’t have establishing an earthly kingdom in power have furthered his mission of spreading faith and the gospel of God’s love to all people on earth?

    Jesus today tells Pilate very clearly, “My kingdom does not belong to this world.”  The kingdom that Jesus establishes through his ministry and teaching is not a kingdom of this world.  It does not operate in the same way earthly kingdoms operate.  It is not established on the power of armies and superior forces.  Jesus states simply, “my kingdom is not here.”  The kingdom of God that Jesus rules is of another order than the kingdoms of this world.  It is not a world power, rather it is the truth.  Jesus establishes a kingdom of Truth.  Jesus tells Pilate about his mission, “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.”  Jesus comes to invite us to seek a kingdom of life that is the kingdom of truth.  He is the King of this kingdom of truth because he himself is the Truth.  If we want to be citizens of this kingdom then we must listen to the voice of Jesus, the shepherd king, “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”  Just as the sheep know the voice of the shepherd and follow him so do those of the kingdom of truth listen to the voice of Jesus.

    To know the truth and to follow that truth into life is the deepest desire of the human heart.  Pope John Paul II taking up this theme in Fides et Ratio asserted, “Whether we admit it or not, there comes for everyone the moment when personal existence must be anchored to a truth recognized as final, a truth which confers a certitude no longer open to doubt…Life in fact can never be grounded upon doubt, uncertainty or deceit; such an existence would be threatened constantly by fear and anxiety. One may define the human being, therefore, as the one who seeks the truth…what is sought is the truth of the person—what the person is and what the person reveals from deep within. Human perfection, then, consists not simply in acquiring an abstract knowledge of the truth, but in a dynamic relationship of faithful self-giving with others. It is in this faithful self-giving that a person finds a fullness of certainty and security. At the same time, however, knowledge through belief, grounded as it is on trust between persons, is linked to truth: in the act of believing, men and women entrust themselves to the truth which the other declares to them.”

    Earthly kingdoms are ruled by power, the kingdom of heaven is ruled by truth.  There is a power within this truth to set us free and to allow us to experience the fullness of life.  All who are citizens of the kingdom of heaven listen to the voice of truth that Jesus offers us, they believe in that truth and they commit their lives to that truth.  This kingdom is a priestly kingdom with a royal priesthood that offers worship to God “in Spirit and Truth”.  “What is truth?“  Pilate shows us that the world does not recognize the ultimate power of the truth.  Truth is an instrument to be used to create the illusion of power in the world.  The world’s rulers manipulate the truth.  They don’t serve the truth, it serves them.  They create their own truth that is a distortion and a perversion of the truth that is hidden in our hearts.  Only Christ the King can give us the fullness of truth: the truth of the Father’s love and the truth of his will for salvation, the truth of our dignity as human persons and our eternal inheritance of the kingdom of life in the truth.  We must listen to the voice of truth, believe in that truth and then commit our lives and re-orient them to the way of the kingdom, only then are we truly citizens of the kingdom.