We read the Passion of Christ from St. John’s Gospel on Good Friday (even though, as we learned from Fr. Cassidy, this is the most “exalted” image of Jesus, as if he were not really suffering). St. John is full of symbols. One of these recurring symbols is that the Word of God is like a light piercing the darkness. So John makes a point to tell us that the guards came to arrest Jesus in the Garden armed with “torches, lamps and weapons” — as if a news reporter would think it important to note that a midnight raid by the ATF would have included several flashlights. But this is important to John. The people arresting Jesus are living in darkness, so they have to make some provisional lights for themselves. I am reminded of a painting of this scene by the renaissance artist Caravaggio, which is quite dark and the only faces that are illuminated are Jesus (of course) and Judas, and the guy holding the light. The guy holding the light is Caravaggio himself (self-portrait) feeling remorseful (over killing a guy in a barroom brawl). St. John is asking us to meet Christ in the Garden — not to try to arrest Christ, but to bask in his Light, to ask for forgiveness, and for the guidance of his light to find our way in this confused and overshadowed world.

Fr. Clore

Bill,

What a unique experience! Fr. Marshke’s name lives on as the name of the auxiliary classroom building attached to the school, which was the “Little King” church building that was built by the parishioners (including Fr. Marshke) with their own hands. We still have the chalice that the school children gave him for his anniversary about a year or two before he died.

Fr. Clore

The last six months have been stimulating, since our Parish Encounter in January. After a good deal of filtering and processing, we arrived at seven goals for the next five years. Since Christ the King has been at this for more than 80 years, some of these goals do not sound brand new. Other ideas are quite familiar to some of us, but now we are raising their level of awareness among all the parishioners.

The Goals are posted in Koelzer Hall, and each Sunday during the summer we will address each one of them. This past Sunday, we found Jesus at prayer. In St. Luke’s Gospel, when Jesus is at prayer, we can be pretty sure something important is on his mind, and we can also be sure that he is thinking about what his prayer will have to do with us! In this case, he teaches us to pray five simple things:

Father, may your name be held holy.

Your kingdom come.

Give us each day our daily bread.

Forgive us our sins as we forgive others.

Do not abandon us in the time of trial.

Goal 3 of our Five Year Plan calls for deeper spirituality — more dynamic as we gather on Sunday, and more reflective as we grow in our heart-felt relationship with God.

The Avett Brothers sing a song about three words that are hard to say: I and love and you. These three words are the watermark of humanity. They also sum up Jesus’ relationship with his Father. And we noticed in Paul’s letter to the Colossians, Ch 2, that the fullness of divinity is found bodily in Jesus, and therefore we, too find our fulfillment in our relationship with Christ. Goal 3 may be hard to say, but we can never get enough of it!

Fr. Clore