Regnavit a Ligno: Homily for the Feast of Christ the King

Dicite in nationibus quia Dominus regnavit a ligno

These words are to be found below the miraculous weeping Cross in the conventual church of Santa Monica, in Old Goa – if in Goa I encourage you to make a pilgrimage to this Cross. Translated into English the words read: “Go tell among the nations that the Lord hath reigned from a Tree.” These words have all the flavour of the carol “Go tell it on the mountains” that we shall sing once the Christmas season begins. It is an instruction to us, who have been baptized, to go and proclaim the Good News, and make disciples of all the nations.

This king is, however, a strange king. He reigns, not from a cushion, but from the wood of His Cross. In so doing, He offers to us a great model for kingship, an office to which all of us are called, in greater or smaller measure. Before He ascended the wood of the Cross, Our Lord had laid out the model for us (Mt 22: 25-26):

The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves.

Our sacred history, in the book of Samuel (1 Sam 8: 11-17), had already provided for us an example of what the kings of the world are like:

This is what the king who will reign over you will claim as his rights: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves.

The King that we celebrate today, at the end of the liturgical year, i.e. the end of liturgical time, the feast of Christ the King is unlike any worldly king, for as we hear in psalm 130:4:

With the Lord is mercy, with him is plenteous redemption.

And as we hear in the Gospel today, from his wooden throne, from the tree, the Cross of Christ which has become for us the Tree of Life, He dispenses mercy to Dismas, the thief who was crucified to His right.

Amen, I say to you,
today you will be with me in Paradise.

As does Our Lord, so must we, who by virtue of our baptism into Him, are obliged to imitate Him all our lives if we wish to spend eternity with Him. Mercy, then, is the attribute of the Christian kingship to which we are called.

There are other attributes which the lectionary for this feast offers us. In the first reading the tribes of Israel say to David:

Here we are, your bone and your flesh.

These lines should instantly evoke for us the words of Adam as he beheld Eve for the first time (Gen 2: 23):

This at last is bone of my bones
    and flesh of my flesh

In other words, the Christian king is espoused to his people, just as Our Lord is espoused to His bride the Church, of which we are members. Indeed, St. Paul describes the Church as Christ’s mystical body (Col 1:18). And what is the nature of the Christian king who is espoused to His people?

Our Lord teaches us through the prophet Ezekiel:

Ah, you shepherds of Israel who have been feeding yourselves! Should not shepherds feed the sheep? You eat the fat, you clothe yourselves with the wool, you slaughter the fatlings; but you do not feed the sheep. You have not strengthened the weak, you have not healed the sick, you have not bound up the injured, you have not brought back the strayed, you have not sought the lost, but with force and harshness you have ruled them.

As the Lord promises, there will be harsh judgement for these wicked shepherds, for the task for the shepherds is to feed the people, such that, like David, they can “be commander of Israel.” And Israel, that is the Church, is to be commanded, not for petty gain, but so that every nation may be conquered for Him, for, as He has promised – “the gates of Hell shall not prevail” (Mt 16:18) against the forces of Christ. The Christian leader, therefore, is like Christ, not mediocre, but dynamic, ever leading his people, to newer heights and to greatness; so that the nations “may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven” (Mt 5:16).

My dear brothers and sisters, like Our Lord who as St. Paul teaches us today:

delivered us from the power of darkness
and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,
in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

So too the Christian king is required to lead his people against the power of darkness and transfer us to the kingdom of the Beloved Son. If we are not doing this, we are failing gravely in our duty. This heavy duty is not easily accomplished, but it is possible because like David, every Christian who is called to share in the kingly munus (office) of Christ, has also been anointed with the sacred oil – at baptism, and confirmation.

May Christ Our King rule in our hearts and over all the earth, forever and ever, Amen.

(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful at the Cathedral parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, Old Goa on 22 Nov 2025.)

(Image reference: Christ and the Good Thief, Titian, c. 1566, Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna.)

Our Hearts and His Creation: Homily for the second day of the novena to the Sacred Heart of Jesus

The theme for this second day of the novena, Jezuchem Povitr Kalliz, Rochnnechi niga gheunk Ut’tejonn dita (The Sacred Heart of Jesus inspires us to care for Creation), invites us to contemplate the Sacred Heart of Jesus which inspires us to care for His creation. As many of you know, I work through the English language, and when translating, we have the option to consider Rochne as either criação (creation) or natureza (nature). Indeed, I suspect it was nature that was in the mind of those who selected this theme. This evening, in the course of this homily, I would like to reflect on both these words creation, and nature. This choice is based not on some personal predeliction, but also because of the other directions given to me – to make specific reference to the Papal documents Rerum Novarum and Dilexi Te.

In § 19 of Rerum Novarum Pope Leo XIII clearly points out that the Catholic view of the world does not admit of a conflict between classes, as is the case with Marxism, which is predicated upon the clash between the capitalists – the owners of capital, and the proletariat – the owners of labour. Rather recognizing that one cannot live without the other, both have to endeavour to live in harmony.

This call for both the classes to live in harmony, is part of a larger Catholic effort towards reconciliation of the world, of creation, with God, but also a correction against one of the great errors of modernity, and modernism; which is – following the logic of Descartes – to see the world through the prism of binaries, and then – following Hegel – posit a clash between the two. Thus, we have seen the splitting of creation, and the teasing out of a difference between man and nature, suggesting that man is not a part of nature. From the moment we make this distinction, we can see the war between man and creation commence, where man extracts as much as he can, not realizing that he is an integral part of nature.

This understanding of man as an integral part of creation, and not above it, is not antithetical to the biblical understanding of man and his place in nature. It is true, God has placed man above all nature – as the reading from Genesis points out to us.

“Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth” (Gen 1: 28).

But this placing of man above nature is not to be seen through a Cartesian and modernist logic where man is constructed as God. Rather, it should be seen through an authentic Catholic logic, which is hierarchical. Listen to this extract from Rerum Novarum:

It is the soul which is made after the image and likeness of God; it is in the soul that the sovereignty resides in virtue whereof man is commanded to rule the creatures below him and to use all the earth and the ocean for his profit and advantage. "Fill the earth and subdue it; and rule over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth." §40 RN

Man is hierarchically above nature, but not outside of it. Man has to govern nature not in the way of the flesh, but in the way of the spirit. I am echoing here St. Paul’s counsel to the Romans (8: 5-8):

those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed it cannot, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Also, remember that the empowerment of Adam over nature was made before the Fall. Therefore the commandment of God should be clear, have authority over nature, yes, but only in the likeness of the Spirit (CCC 378). As the Catechism (CCC 339) teaches us:

Man must therefore respect the particular goodness of every creature, to avoid any disordered use of things which would be in contempt of the Creator and would bring disastrous consequences for human beings and their environment.

It is no wonder, therefore, that with eyes of flesh, that is a vision that is stripped of the transcendent and spiritual, our conflict with creation has caused such a planetary crisis.

In fact, one can see the problems with the abuse of natural resources as a result not only of the Cartesian, and Hegelian – in a word modernist – logic of binary oppositions, but also because of the – potentially deliberate – misunderstanding of hierarchy. The location of a person higher in the hierarchy does not make them superior in dignity to those lower in the hierarchy, nor does this location give them license to abuse. As Pope Leo XII teaches in § 13 of Rerum Novarum “the limits which are prescribed the very purposes for which it exists be not transgressed” [he is speaking here of the natural authority of the father]. This is to say, that all hierarchical authority exists for a reason, which reason places certain limits on this authority, and these limits may not be transgressed. Following the social teaching of the Catholic church, therefore, subsidiarity, and indeed dignity and respect, are not antithetical to hierarchy, indeed, they are integral to it.

Listen to St. Paul once again, this time in his first letter to the Corinthians (12):

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. (12)

And further in the same chapter:

God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. (24-25)

In other words, each are given different missions, some in leadership, some in service, but all are part of Christ’s body.

Meditating, as Catholic thinkers, on a Catholic understanding of hierarchy in the context of this reflection on the word nature, we inevitably arrive at the threshold of natural law. Pope Leo XIII himself points out that natural law recognizes that the person who invests his energy into the soil, is deserving of his labour. And, divine law, or the Ten Commandments, goes on to further elaborate, that one may not covet our neighbours’ property, or the fruits of his labour.

But in Goa, so many contemporary conflicts, and particularly those that result in environmental degradation and a lack of care for what is literally our common home, are the result of the coveting of our neighbours’ property.

Not unrelated to this matter is the way in which the traditional rights of the natural leaders of our society, the natural elite, is envied and coveted by the non-dominant groups. Take, for example, the opposition to the rights of gãocars in the feast of the three kings in Salcette. Too often, the envy of our natural superiors, and the usurping of their rights has been justified as a movement toward equality. But Pope Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum exposes these movements for exactly what they are, the envy and usurpation of the right of others.

One could go so far as to say that it is the coveting and the usurping of our neighbours’ property that has resulted in so much environmental destruction in Goa. The destruction of the comunidade’s rights over village property, i.e. the gãocars collective property, by the Land Reforms and Tenancy laws is the very kind of socialism that Pope Leo castigates in Rerum Novarum. The results of this usurpation are visible for all to see, the bandhs are collapsing, huge acres of fertile land lie fallow, and as a result are eyed by property developers, who come in and change the demography of our land – dechristianising it in slow, but systematic steps. And this state of affairs is not surprising, for listen to what Pope Leo XIII teaches at §15

The door would be thrown open to envy, to mutual invective, and to discord; the sources of wealth themselves would run dry, for no one would have any interest in exerting his talents or his industry

One can lay at the door of the land reforms in Goa, as well as the envy that has been cultivated in our hearts, the reasons for which the environmental integrity of Goa is under threat, and our rich lands, and indeed our very hands, are vacant of any industry.

What then, is to be our response to this crisis in nature and environment that we in Goa face? Pope Leo cautions:

the greed of possession and thirst for pleasure: twin-plagues which too often make a man who is void of self-restraint miserable in the midst of abundance. §28 RN

I have no doubt that these two twin plagues, that animate envy, are at the heart of the ecological crisis in contemporary Goa – and I use ecology in the sense of not just the nature, but also in the sense of the ecology of social relationships – thus I am talking of a crisis in our relationship with all of creation. We come from a land that with right stewardship would overflow with milk and honey, how do we respond?

The response lies in the counsel Our Lord offers us in the Gospel today (Mt 6: 25,32-33), a counsel that springs from His Most Sacred Heart:

Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear.

For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

We seem to be back, therefore, at St. Paul’s command that we think spiritually, and this is precisely what we need to do, restrain our desires, our greed, our gluttony and focus on the virtues that flow unceasingly from the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, font of love and mercy, forgive us our trespasses.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, font of love and mercy, oblige us to recognize our errors.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, font of love and mercy, inspire us to care for all Creation.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful at the Patriarchal Seminary of Rachol, on 7 Nov 2024, the second day of the novena to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus.)

(Image reference: Stained glass window of the sacred Heart of Jesus Christ in the Cathedral of Cordoba, Spain, via Wikiecommons.)

Newman and the Liberal Proposition

On the first of November this year, the day when the Catholic Church celebrates the feast of All the Saints – the reason why we have All Hallow’s Eve – Pope Leo XIV declared St. John Henry Newman a Doctor of the Church.

What does it take to become a Doctor of the Church? Essentially, the Pope, aided by his counselors, does so if he determines that the writings of a particular saint constitute a body of work that speaks to the universal Church, not just to the particular area from which the saint hails, and across various times. In other words, their writings must be timeless.

Who is John Henry Newman? This was the very question I asked myself when I moved to Rome for seminary studies. I had arrived in Rome a weekend before John Henry Newman was to be canonized – recognized as a saint of the Catholic Church. But who is he, I asked myself, as the English run seminary I was in was aflutter with the many visitors who had come in for the canonization.

Born in 1801, Newman comes across as something of a polymath - theologian, academic, philosopher, historian, writer, poet, an amateur musician even. But this was to come later. The first fact of a telling of his life must be that he was not born Catholic. After initial encounters with Evangelical Christianity, he was ordained an Anglican minister in 1824, while still an academic at Oxford, before throwing it all away to become a Catholic in 1845. Those unfamiliar with the history of England will not know that ever since the reign of Elizabeth I, being Catholic was not easy. Indeed, it was not until The Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, which removed the civil and political restrictions that were placed on Catholics in Great Britain and Ireland, that things began to get better. When Newman embraced Catholicism, things were still not easy, and Newman could not continue in Oxford as a Catholic.

Life as a Catholic was not easy for Newman, because being a convert, and particularly because of the debates he generated, he encountered much suspicion, and it was only when he was made Cardinal in 1879 that he came to be unproblematically accepted by the Catholic church in England.

I did not know who Newman was when he was canonized, but I should have, because he has been a great influence in the intellectual life of Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, whose works I poured over, and has greatly influenced my own intellectual and other ecclesial positions. In fact, I heartily recommend Ratzinger/ Benedict XVI to all Catholics; and the Catholic curious. In the mind of this man, you will find the answers to the philosophical crises of our times. And much of this edifice is constructed on Newman’s own work.

One of the great contributions of Newman is the opposition to liberalism, or liberality, in religion. As outlined by Newman, liberalism in religion is marked by idea that the Truth (truth with a capital T) is not available via religion, and that consequently no creed can be recognized as true. As a result, we also arrive at the conclusion that one creed, or faith, is as good as another, since they are all merely matters of opinion.

The astute reader will recognize these tenets as the basis of the secularism established in India since independence. This reader will also recognize that there is much in the Church in India that has accommodated itself to this liberal understanding. This accommodation can be said to be the result of two beliefs, the first being the belief that the insistence on the truth – in this case the Catholic faith – will result in a certain fundamentalism and an inability to cooperate with persons of other creeds and thus lead to social conflict. Any well-read person will clarify, however, that history is replete with the cases of plural societies, even those marked by groups that see their own creed as true, being able to live with persons of other creeds. The fear of Catholics, or other Christians, or Muslims, for that matter, that they risk compromising the peace of the republic if they assert the truth value of their creed, is without basis. It is when one disrespects the rights of the other that one lays the foundation for social unrest.

The second reason for the accommodation to the liberal understanding is fear. Fear that if one does not toe the line, and dares to stand up and be different, one will make the ruling dispensation cross. This is, however, no good reason to accept the liberal proposition. No one respects a pushover, as is in fact abundantly clear with the way in which Christians in our country are being increasingly mistreated, despite their accommodation to the liberal proposition. Shorn of their distinctiveness, as the clerics and hierarchs push accommodative practices, they are still bullied and pushed to the corner. And this abuse takes place not just in some distant parts of the country, but even in the urbanized spaces. Part of the accommodation to the liberal proposition has meant that the Catholic church has by and large accepted that it will seek to survive in India by offering services as its contribution to the nation. In many ways, this is the reason that has spurred the Catholic Church in India into an NGO-isation. And yet, as the nation-state enters into areas that were hitherto ignored by all and catered to solely by Christian charity – education, health care – one sees how even venerable institutions are now being viewed as dispensable.

We would gain much by turning to the works of St. John Henry Newman to investigate how it is we may respond to the challenge of liberalism in religion. One thing we can already glean from St. Newman’s life. Once one finds the Truth, it is worth following it to its logical conclusion, no matter the consequences. This was the mark of Newman’s life, perhaps it should be ours too.

(A version of this text was first published in the O Heraldo on 18 November 2025.)

(Image reference: John Henry Newman, Sir John Everett Millais, 1881, National Portrait Gallery, London.)