Homily for the Feast of Christ the King
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There is a scene in the play “A Man For All Seasons” in which Saint Thomas More, faced with execution for treason, utters a line which has become famous: “I am His Majesty’s good servant… but God’s first.” Here he faces the grave encumbrance of balancing his life and his loyalties between two kingdoms: the Kingdom of God, and the kingdom of Man.
Our Lord faces a similar predicament in an uneasy dialogue with Pontius Pilate, as Pilate interrogates Him, attempting to force a treasonous statement from Christ so that Pilate can more easily hand Jesus over to His enemies. However, Jesus doesn’t fall for it, speaking instead of the heavenly nature of His Kingdom. Our Lord then turns the dialogue toward Truth, an entity not well-known to Pilate, who eventually states, with sarcasm, “Truth! What is that?”
Throughout the play “A Man For All Seasons” St. Thomas More seeks and speaks the truth — also not-well-known to his accusers. St. Thomas believes that truth can be found in the Law, so he has interiorized the Truth in his practice of the Law, as well as in the basis of his thought, speech and actions. For Our Lord, however, Truth is found in Himself, as He said to an other Saint Thomas: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”
Our Lord, who is fully human and fully divine, has no difficulty balancing earthly and heavenly kingdoms. St. Thomas More, being only human, but with a grasp of the divine, has little trouble balancing the two, but has profound difficulty convincing those around him that Truth must be the basis for loyalty and for the Law.
So here we are, two thousand years after Our Lord faced His detractors and five hundred years after the martyrdom of St. Thomas More and his friend St. John Fisher, presented frequently with the dilemma of Free Will and challenging choices: to be citizenry’s good servant… but God’s first.
This brings us to the notion of “Christian Patriotism.” To attempt to become a patriotic Christian, or a Christian Patriot, does not create an oxymoron (as some might think), nor would it become a form of dualism, a pretentious non-sequitur. It is, instead, an integrated dichotomy, for one can hardly be a good citizen while rejecting Christian values, virtues and morals, even in a pluralistic society.
As citizens of the Heavenly Kingdom, by virtue of our Baptism and in the practice of our faith, we must engage ourselves in the earthly kingdom. But we can’t be naïve about the Christophobia which has impacted our society. Christophobia involves not merely a fear of theocracy, but a certain revulsion toward religion itself wherein one suffers a fear of loss of personal freedom when laws appear to be too Christian.
This, then, brings forward an overstatement of separation of Church and State as a means of removing religious, moral, or virtuous influence from the public square. However, living our faith, and in doing so, influencing society, makes us better citizens and improves our culture.
The Non-Establishment Clause of our Constitution never envisioned a Godless, irreligious society, but the free exercise of religion. The idea of Separation of Church and State came years later in the writings of Thomas Jefferson. What Jefferson envisioned, through non-establishment and free exercise, was that both Church and State… religion and politics… would be freer, not in an uneasy truce, but in shared strength.
To engage ourselves in the formation of society as people of faith and virtue, is not to sabotage the freedoms of non-believers, but to lift them up to life on a higher plane, reminding everyone of the virtues that framed our nation from the beginning. For Christian patriots, this is not about politics, but about Truth which we hold to be self-evident, by which is meant Truth that is revealed, universal and eternal.
Politics became divisive not because of Virtue clung-to, but because of Virtue-rejected, in a misguided attempt at inclusion, tolerance and acceptance, all of which are the antithesis of virtue. Christian patriotism informs culture of a higher freedom and promotes a vision of better, more solid citizenship. We can do this because, as the motto on our currency proclaims, “In God we trust.”
Our courage is based in the manner in which the Prophet Daniel describes the Kingdom of the Son of Man: “His dominion in an everlasting dominion that shall not be taken away; His kingship shall not be destroyed.” While we, as Catholics, are bound by civil law, we bind ourselves to, and live by, a higher law, a law first revealed by God the Father in His Commandments, that leads us to the Kingdom of God the Son, which is, as we will hear in the Preface for today’s Mass:
“an eternal and universal kingdom,
a kingdom of truth and life.
a kingdom of holiness and grace,
a kingdom of justice, love and peace.”
Jesus endorses and fulfills this prayer in the closing words of today’s Gospel: “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world: to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” When Jesus then says in another place “Render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar, but unto God, what belongs to God,” He encourages us to be good civil servants… but God’s servants first.