Sunday, November 22, 2009

Better Late than Never

So much for a perfect track record of postings! Sunday crept by and I woke up this morning, realizing I hadn't posted anything yesterday. Ah well... can't go back in time, so only way to move forward!

Sunday was the feast of Christ the King, marking the end of the Church year. If you look through Christian art, you'll find all sorts of depictions of Christ as King or Emperor or Ruler, complete with crown, sceptre and throne. Somewhere along the line, we merged Christ's notion of "king" with our notion of "king". The two are diametrically opposed!

Instead of ruling from a throne, Christ rules from the cross. Instead of "ruling" over others, Christ is the servant of all. Instead of wearing a crown of gold, Christ wears a crown of thorns. This notion of "king" is something completely foreign to us, so much so, that over the course of history, we have morphed Christ the King into something that we are more comfortable with.

The thing is... as we have elevated Christ to a throne high above us, we have lost touch with our very roots, our foundation. Popes, cardinals and bishops have taken on the trappings of earthly rulers... losing touch with the foundation of the Church, Christ in the people. We have shoehorned Christ into our own hierarchical system... thereby justifying that same system... Enough!!

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