Pleroma: Contemplating the Glory of Christ the King

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The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

 

 

Sundays of Pleroma
 

 

Pleroma: The fullness of Time, the fullness of Eternity, the fullness of love, the fullness of joy, anticipation of the Beatific Vision, which will satisfy all of our heart's desires forever and ever. Amen.

When God is finished and His work of creation is complete, we will all live happily ever after.


This is the time of fulfillment [Πεπλήρωται ὁ καιρὸς].
The kingdom of God is at hand.
Repent, and believe in the gospel. (Mk 1:15)


Heaven and earth are full [πλήρης] of your glory.
πλήρης πᾶσα ἡ γῆ τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ
John 15:11
“I have told you [these things]
so that my joy may be in you
and your joy may be complete [πληρωθῇ]."

 

A secret season

A celebration of love, justice, and joy.

"Peace, love, and joy!"

Celebrating the Pleroma:

- Has no rules or regulations, except for the rule that there are no rules or regulations.
- Is not mandated by the Church.
- Is not forbidden by the Church.
- Has no special decorations.
- Does not use any special vestments.
- Imposes no fasts or feasts on the community.
- Is entirely inward.
- Is a focus of meditation and prayer.
- Does have mantras:
"Come, Lord Jesus, come!"
"Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done."

Pleroma is the completion of ordinary time, which directs our attention to the completion of time and the new creation in eternity.

It is a time to seek the grace of the contemplatio ad amorem.

The coming of the King and the Kingdom is the fulfillment of God's plan of salvation.

The culmination of all of our deepest desires.
The culmination of creation.
The culmination of the liturgical year.
- The Return of the King in glory.

It is a joyful season.

"The last word is joy!"

"Already but not yet."

- The Kingdom has come.
- The Kingdom is within us.
- The Kingdom is not yet fully realized.

"The End is near!"

Mark 1:15

Luke 10:9.11, 21:31


Passage from preface about what today's feast means: joyful fulfillment

I pray for the joyful fulfillment of your vocation.

I pray for the fullness of God's love for you.

"Joyful fulfillment!"

A greeting for the season.


Beatifying vision.

Anticipating the beatific vision.

Helps to make us happy in this life.

What is easy to see is suffering, death, misery, poverty, natural catastrophes, sin, stupidity, loss, grief, innocent suffering, crimes, wrongdoing.

The reality of God's glory is hidden at the moment behind the veil of creation, but what we see now will not be so forever.

Things are gonna change, and the whole story of the universe will have a happy ending.

Forward-looking

The only season that is primarily future-oriented.

Advent looks forwards and backwards.
Christmas looks back to the birth of Jesus.
Lent considers the history of sin and salvation through the Paschal mysteries.
The Easter season is bi-focal, rooted in the Resurrection of Jesus and the joy of the apostles.
Ordinary time contemplates the difficulties of the disciples in ordinary circumstances.

The second Advent fulfills the first.

The Creed is prophetic:

He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end. [...]
I look forward to the resurrection of the dead
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

In Pleroma, we look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen!

"The one who sat on the throne said, 'Behold, I am making all things new'" (Rev. 21:5).

His wrath is momentary

Psalm 30:6
For his anger lasts but a moment:
his favor a lifetime.
At dusk weeping comes for the night,
but at dawn there is rejoicing.

His love is everlasting.

"All'alba vincerò."

Greetings

¡Viva Cristo Rey! (Bl. Miguel Pro)

"The grace and peace of Christ the King be with you always!"

The peace, love and joy of Christ the King be with you always!

The joy of Christ the King be with you!

The joy of King Jesus be with you!

The joy of Judgment Day be with you!

The joy of Jesus, your spouse, be with you!


St. Mother Teresa
"May you always be joyful in your union with the Lord. It is this union with your Divine bridegroom that is the cause of your joy."


The grace and peace of Pleroma be with you!

Peace be with you!

Peace, love, and joy!

Hail the new creation!

The End is near!

Happy Harvest!

It's harvest time!

Jesus is LORD.

"The kingdom of God is within you" (Lk 17:21).

"The kingdom of God is in your midst"
γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐντὸς ὑμῶν ἐστιν

"The Kingdom of God is at hand!" (Mark 1:15).

"The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand! Repent, and believe in the Good News."
Πεπλήρωται ὁ καιρὸς καὶ ἤγγικεν ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ Θεοῦ μετανοεῖτε καὶ πιστεύετε ἐν τῷ εὐαγγελίῳ

Caution

The devil can quote Scripture for his purpose; and the text of Scripture which he now most commonly quotes is, “The Kingdom of heaven is within you.” That text has been the stay and support of more Pharisees and prigs and self-righteous spiritual bullies than all the dogmas in creation; it has served to identify self-satisfaction with the peace that passes all understanding. And the text to be quoted in answer to it is that which declares that no man can receive the kingdom except as a little child. What we are to have inside is a childlike spirit; but the childlike spirit is not entirely concerned about what is inside. It is the first mark of possessing it that one is interested in what is outside. The most childlike thing about a child is his curiosity and his appetite and his power of wonder at the world. We might almost say that the whole advantage of having the kingdom within is that we look for it somewhere else.”
― G.K. Chesterton, What I Saw in America

Mantras

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. — banner for the season

Maranatha!

Advent, Jesus, advent!

Opportunities

All Saints

All Souls

Feast of St. Martin of Tours

Prayers

The luminous mysteries of the Rosary are all about the King and the Kingdom!

Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Hosanna in the highest.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Hosanna in the highest.


Our Father, Who art in Heaven,
hallowed be Thy name.

Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
on earth as it is in Heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us,

and lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.

Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil,
graciously grant peace in our days,
that, by the help of your mercy,
we may be always free from sin
and safe from all distress,
as we await the blessed hope
and the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

For the kingdom,
the power,
and the glory are yours
now and for ever.

Hymns

Joy to the world

Joy to the world, the Lord [will] come!
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And heav’n and nature sing,
And heav’n and nature sing,
And heav’n, and heav’n, and nature sing.

Joy to the earth, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills, and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat, the sounding joy.

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.

He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.


The King of Glory Comes, the Nation Rejoices

Based on Ps 24.

The king of glory comes,
The nation rejoices
Open the gates before him,
Lift up your voices.

Who is the king of glory, How shall we call him?
He is Emmanuel, the promise of ages.

In all of Galilee, in city or village
He goes among his people, curing their illness

He gave his life for us, the pledge of salvation;
He took up on himself the sins of the nation.

He conquered sin and death, he truly has risen.
And he will share with us his heavenly vision.

Decorations

"You know neither the day nor the hour."

"Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done."

Banner?
Icon?

History of the Feast of Christ the King

Wikipedia, "Feast of Christ the King."
In 1925, Pius XI instituted the feast on the last Sunday of October.
In 1969, Paul VI moved it to the last Sunday of Ordinary Time.

A Twentieth-Century Feast

"Christ the King: The Feast of Our Age."
In 1925 the celebration of Christ the King was instituted by Pope Pius XI in his encyclical Quas Primas. For many Catholics the feast day approaches with little to no grandeur, and the celebration of the Lord’s Kingship is another ephemeral Sunday before the dawn of Christmas. Still, the Feast of Christ the King is just that, a feast. Though a hackneyed term in the Catholic mind, Catholics must remember that a feast is a call for contemplation and celebration. The Vicar of Christ, our Holy Father, Pope Pius XI asked the Church to establish a feast in honor of Christ’s Kingship. In his words, the feasts of Holy Mother Church “affect both mind and heart, and have a salutary effect upon the whole of man’s nature,” because humanity “needs these external festivities so that the sacred rites, in all their beauty and variety, may stimulate him to drink more deeply of the foundation of God’s teaching.” And among the offerings of the Church, the Christ the King feast has a unique medicinal flavor. The Vicar of Christ then and now offers the Church “an excellent remedy for the plague which now infests society,” the scourge of secularism.
Pius XI, Quas Primas, "On the Feast of Christ the King," 1925.
[7] He is King of hearts, too, by reason of his "charity which exceedeth all knowledge."
That looks a bit like a pun to me. I wonder whether the Pope played cards?
[28] Therefore by Our Apostolic Authority We institute the Feast of the Kingship of Our Lord Jesus Christ to be observed yearly throughout the whole world on the last Sunday of the month of October — the Sunday, that is, which immediately precedes the Feast of All Saints. We further ordain that the dedication of mankind to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which Our predecessor of saintly memory, Pope Pius X, commanded to be renewed yearly, be made annually on that day.
[29] The last Sunday of October seemed the most convenient of all for this purpose, because it is at the end of the liturgical year, and thus the feast of the Kingship of Christ sets the crowning glory upon the mysteries of the life of Christ already commemorated during the year, and, before celebrating the triumph of all the Saints, we proclaim and extol the glory of him who triumphs in all the Saints and in all the Elect. Make it your duty and your task, Venerable Brethren, to see that sermons are preached to the people in every parish to teach them the meaning and the importance of this feast, that they may so order their lives as to be worthy of faithful and obedient subjects of the Divine King.
Another pun! "Crowning glory" isn't exactly a big laugh-getter, but it's cool. I wonder who drafted this encyclical for him.
[31] When we pay honor to the princely dignity of Christ, men will doubtless be reminded that the Church, founded by Christ as a perfect society, has a natural and inalienable right to perfect freedom and immunity from the power of the state; and that in fulfilling the task committed to her by God of teaching, ruling, and guiding to eternal bliss those who belong to the kingdom of Christ, she cannot be subject to any external power. [emphasis added]
[32] Nations will be reminded by the annual celebration of this feast that not only private individuals but also rulers and princes are bound to give public honor and obedience to Christ. It will call to their minds the thought of the last judgment, wherein Christ, who has been cast out of public life, despised, neglected and ignored, will most severely avenge these insults; for his kingly dignity demands that the State should take account of the commandments of God and of Christian principles, both in making laws and in administering justice, and also in providing for the young a sound moral education.
[33] If to Christ our Lord is given all power in heaven and on earth; if all men, purchased by his precious blood, are by a new right subjected to his dominion; if this power embraces all men, it must be clear that not one of our faculties is exempt from his empire. He must reign in our minds, which should assent with perfect submission and firm belief to revealed truths and to the doctrines of Christ. He must reign in our wills, which should obey the laws and precepts of God. He must reign in our hearts, which should spurn natural desires and love God above all things, and cleave to him alone. He must reign in our bodies and in our members, which should serve as instruments for the interior sanctification of our souls, or to use the words of the Apostle Paul, as instruments of justice unto God.[35] If all these truths are presented to the faithful for their consideration, they will prove a powerful incentive to perfection. It is Our fervent desire, Venerable Brethren, that those who are without the fold may seek after and accept the sweet yoke of Christ, and that we, who by the mercy of God are of the household of the faith, may bear that yoke, not as a burden but with joy, with love, with devotion; that having lived our lives in accordance with the laws of God's kingdom, we may receive full measure of good fruit, and counted by Christ good and faithful servants, we may be rendered partakers of eternal bliss and glory with him in his heavenly kingdom.

A derivative prayer

May those who are outside the fold seek after and accept the sweet yoke of Christ.

May we, who, by the mercy of God, are of the household of the faith, bear the yoke of Christ, not as a burden but with joy, with love, and with devotion.

May we live our lives in obedience to the laws of God's kingdom, and so produce a full measure of good fruit.

May we be counted by Christ as good and faithful servants, and partake of eternal bliss and glory with Him in his heavenly Kingdom.

King of Kings and Lord of Lords

Ps 2:10-11

10 And now, kings, give heed;
take warning, rulers of the earth.

11 Serve the LORD with fear;
exult with trembling,
Accept correction
lest he become angry and you perish along the way
when his anger suddenly blazes up.

Reminders in the Liturgy

Jesus, the Pantocrator
Nicene Creed
He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end.
The Lord's Prayer
Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Libera Nos
Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil,
graciously grant peace in our days,
that, by the help of your mercy,
we may be always free from sin
and safe from all distress,
as we await the blessed hope
and the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
For Thine is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory, now and forever. Amen!
Sanctus
Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the LORD.
Memorial acclamation (Anamnesis)
We proclaim your Death, O Lord,
and profess your Resurrection
until you come again.

Or:

When we eat this Bread and drink this Cup,
we proclaim your Death, O Lord,
until you come again.
Communion
Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb.

Links

- The Catholic Lectionary Website, compiled by Felix Just, S.J., Ph.D.
- Pantocrator
- The Christ, the King