By RAYMOND DE SOUZA, KM
Part 5
So, Christ is our King. Being the eternal Son of God, He is King by natural right.
As our Redeemer, He is King by acquired right, for He purchased us with His own Blood: “You were bought with a price,” “ransomed . . . with the precious blood of Christ” (1 Cor. 6:20; 1 Peter 1:18-19).
Therefore, as King He holds the threefold power: legislative, executive, and judicial. Through the New Testament Scriptures and the Apostolic Tradition, interpreted by His Catholic Church, He promulgates laws and demands obedience.
Through the Magisterium of His Church, He executes His decrees, imposes sanctions, and judges all men. He will judge the living and the dead at the last day, and no one will be exempt from the Judgment. His sovereignty is unlimited: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me” (Matt. 28:18).
But His Kingdom is spiritual, “not of this world” (John 18:36). His representatives, Popes and bishops, are not political leaders competing with politicians for an office in government. One enters His Kingdom by faith and Baptism, lives in it by obeying the laws of charity and penance, clearly expounded in the Ten Commandments. The Kingdom of Christ spreads in the world by the preaching and the example of missionaries.
In the Roman Missal (Preface of the Feast of Christ the King), His Kingdom is beautifully described as a “Kingdom of truth and of life; a Kingdom of holiness and of grace; a Kingdom of justice, love, and peace.”
And Pope Pius XI added inspiring words to make us know, love, and serve the Kingdom of Christ in his encyclical letter Quas Primas, in 1925, on the Kingship of Christ:
“He is King over our minds, for He is Truth itself and we must subject our thoughts to His doctrine and supreme knowledge. He is King over our wills, for by grace and inspiration, He subjects our free wills to the will of God. He is King in our hearts by reason of His love, kindness, and mercy, which surpass all that we can ever imagine.”
It is really great to be Roman Catholic, is it not?
Let us move on: As King He is also our Mediator with God the Father in Heaven. This is so because by His Incarnation, God the Son is constituted the one Mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5). As Mediator, He holds a threefold office: that of High Priest, Prophet, and King.
Our Divine Redeemer Himself declared His threefold mission: “I am the Way (King), and the Truth (Prophet), and the Life (Priest)” (John 14:6).
How is He our Supreme Prophet? Because Jesus, unlike the prophets who announced the word of God and the Messias who was to come, is the Word of God in Person. He taught by discourses, parables, precept, miracles, and example. The apostles called Him “Master” and “Teacher,” and He declared Himself to be “the light of the world” (John 8:12; cf. 12:46).
He completed the Revelation made by God to the Jews and ordered it to be propagated to all mankind (that is, in practical terms, He wanted the whole world to be Catholic). He announced that certain practices given to the Jews were now over. By the way, that was the “Law” that St. Paul declared without its works we are saved. Not the Ten Commandments, which Jesus told the people to keep. He abolished abuses that had been tolerated (like polygamy and divorce-and-remarriage, which today prominent “Catholic” ecclesiastics want to bring back from the Old Testament), and taught a New Law that perfected the Old.
He revealed the inner life of God the Holy Trinity and the means to become sharers in it — divine grace, which we receive through prayer and the sacraments. He gave a definitive Revelation that can never be superseded, and commanded His apostles to preach it the world over.
As High Priest and Victim, the Lord Jesus offers prayer and sacrifice, atones for sin, reconciles God and man, institutes sacraments, and communicates the divine life of grace. In the New Testament, the Epistle to the Hebrews expounds the excellence of His priesthood.
One remarkable aspect of our King-Prophet-Priest was His power to perform miracles. If you ask about the purpose and the meaning of the miracles of Christ, they are integral to Christ’s mission to reveal the Godhead, to announce the plan of salvation, and to inaugurate the Kingdom of God.
The purposes of the miracles are: to dispose witnesses and hearers to faith (you do pay attention to a messenger who performs a miracle right in front of your eyes); to confirm the truth of the message and Messenger, and to illustrate Christ’s teaching.
What were those miracles? They were signs performed by divine power to indicate many aspects of Christ and His mission, such as:
Signs of God’s Love: The miracles proceed from Christ’s love and compassion toward human suffering and afflictions. Thus, for instance, our Lord cured the man blind from birth and raised the widow’s only son from death (Luke 7:13; John 9).
Signs of the Coming of the Kingdom: The miracles announce that the Kingdom of God has come in the person of the Messiah, thus fulfilling the prophecy of Isaias that the eyes of the blind will be opened, the deaf will hear, the lame and crippled will walk, the dead will be raised to life (Isaiah 35:5-6; 29:18; 26:19; cf. Luke 7:22).
Guarantees of a Divine Mission and Message: A miracle or a prophecy distinguishes a true from a false prophet. “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God,” said Nicodemus, “for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him” (John 3:2; cf. John 5:36-7). This is the apologetic value and purpose of the miracles, because God does not give the power to perform miracles to frauds.
Revelation of the Divinity of Christ: The miracles not only reveal that Jesus is sent by God, but that He is the eternal Son of the Father who can do the same works as the Father, such as forgive sins, and so make divine claims in all truth (John 3:31-5; Luke 8:24-5; Mark 2:6-12).
Symbols of the Sacramental Economy: The miracle is the physical dimension of the spiritual message. It puts flesh on spiritual changes and claims: the forgiveness of sin — a change we cannot see — is symbolized by a visible change: the healing of a paralytic, the removal of leprosy. The raisings from the dead symbolize spiritual resurrection. The miracles of multiplying the loaves of bread prefigure the Eucharist, the Bread of Life which will be given to the believers by the apostles.
The cure of lepers prefigures the Sacrament of Penance. The outward sign signifies the inner cure, as in a sacrament. The miraculous catch of fish is a sign of the future expansion of the Church (Luke 5:4-10; John 21:6-11).
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(Next article: The royal court of the new Kingdom: the saints. Raymond de Souza KM is available to speak at Catholic events anywhere in the free world in English, Spanish, French, and Portuguese. Please email SacredHeartMedia@Outlook.com or visit www.RaymonddeSouza.com or phone 507-450-4196 in the United States.)
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