What marks today's feast of Christ the King is what exactly is being ridiculed in the Gospel account. This is highlighted in Luke's description of Jesus' death.
"Save yourself", the leaders of the people and the soldiers kept challenging Jesus on the Cross, and we join them whenever we want a Jesus who can come down from the Cross and escape death.
It was also one of the three major temptations that Satan offered to Jesus towards the beginning of the same Gospel, to escape the Way of the Cross and opt for another way of life.
It is immediately striking that in his description of Jesus' death, Luke distinguishes the leaders of the people and the soldiers from the rest of the people, who only stand by watching. The fact that the people stood watching does not mean that they were innocent bystanders.
Many times in life we just watch things happen, probably without understanding. From the Cross Jesus invites us not to stand passively watching life go by. That's what taking up the Cross means for Christian discipleship. Otherwise, so much will still continue to happen in our lives, apparently with no meaning. But this is darkness. And Paul today says in the second reading: "He has taken us out of the power of darkness."
Jesus' kingdom is a kingdom of light and of truth. The Cross is a revelation of the only power potent enough to undo the rule of the "principalities" that controls our existence. But this, we do not always understand. We continue to ridicule the idea that Jesus is the Messiah of God for us, the one who bears the truth that saves. Jesus is the shepherd king, not the king politician. He rules not our lives, but our hearts. His reign is not one of dominion but of protection.
This protection is infinite, because it is forgiveness, love, and mercy to infinity. It embraces all those today represented in the Gospel by a criminal who, without actually doing anything extraordinary, just turns to Jesus and asks one very simple thing: "Remember me". This attitude makes the shadow of the Cross extend to our own lives. It is here that death takes on another meaning and shows the durability and indestructibility of life and justice.
We no longer expect the world at large to acknowledge Jesus as king. The dream of a Christian society of the Constantinian type is shattered. But Christ's kingdom is bigger than the world itself. The world cannot contain it, but our heart can. The heart is the axis of this kingdom.
Christ's kingdom does not lie in a future moment and is outside history. It is not that we are on a journey towards this kingdom. It is the kingdom itself that is coming our way. What is actually very real about today's Gospel is that it depicts beautifully what is still going on daily in the world scenario. Ours is still a world where injustice is perpetuated, where truth is ridiculed, where many are bystanders, where we are made to believe that evil triumphs.
But the words of Jesus answering the criminal's request "Remember me" confirm that Jesus has other ways of building his kingdom and making people be part of it. We may feel discouraged when we look around us. We still continue to count our crosses, which weigh heavily on life. But the Gospel is good news and truth. "Remember me" reminds us that we are all guilty in some way or other. May the wisdom of the Cross make of us lovers of truth. May we opt not to remain people of the lie.