I’ve told his story before, but I’ll tell it again, of the Roman soldier, Marinus, who was martyred in Palestine in the middle of the third century. He was a good soldier, from a family of soldiers; he was due to be promoted, made a centurion of the Tenth Legion of the Strait, the famous legion founded by Augustus Caesar himself.
Out of envy someone accused him of being a Christian, which he was, although secretly. Which in turn created a crisis, both for Roman authorities and for poor Marinus; because as a Christian, he would not offer sacrifices to the emperor. Some honor Christians could pay the state, you see, others not.
And so Marinus was asked if he was a Christian, to which he said he was. The magistrate, probably wanting common sense and mercy and peace to prevail, gave Marinus three hours to reconsider his answer—whether he wanted to be a Christian and die or instead a centurion and live. Three hours to consider his whole life and eternity; whether he was Christian, or whether it was all just talk.
At this point in the story the local bishop showed up. He grabbed Marinus by the arm and dragged him into the church, right to the front of the altar. Throwing aside Marinus’ cloak, the bishop pointed to the sword on his hip and then to the Gospels resting on the altar.
The bishop told him simply to choose which he preferred—Caesar or Christ. About this both pagan Rome and the Catholic Church agreed; he had to choose. Now was the time; no longer could he comfortably coexist in both kingdoms. He had to choose to sacrifice one or the other.
And there the story abruptly ends. Taking the Gospels in hand, “Marinus presented himself before the judge,” the text says, “and showed even greater loyalty to the faith; and immediately,” it goes on, “just as he was, he was led off to execution, and so found his fulfilment.”[1]
It’s a story I’ve told several times before. One, because it’s short and I like it; but more, because it illustrates well the primordial tension that exists between Christ and the world, between the power of God and all worldly power, in all forms and in all instances and in all history.
This tension has existed, at least, ever since Christ: ever since he rejected the devil in the desert and “all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence.”[2] And ever since John saw what he saw, the collapse of Babylon, the great city that one day will vanish, “and will never be found again.”[3]
As the anonymous second century Letter to Diognetus put it: “Christians inhabit the world, but they are not part of it.”[4] Saint Augustine spoke of two cities, the “earthly city” which “glories in itself” and the “Heavenly city” which “glories in the Lord;” the former ordered by “lust for domination,” while the latter is ordered by love for God and neighbor.[5]
Unabated through the millennia, this tension has rested and riddled the hearts of billions of Christians. From Saint Ignatius of Loyola, meditating on the two standards of Satan and of Christ: one “the chief of all the enemy,” the other the “sovereign and true commander;”[6] from Martin Luther’s theology of two kingdoms to the prophetic preaching of Martin Luther King, Jr., “that although you live in the colony of time, your ultimate allegiance is to the empire of eternity. You have a dual citizenry;”[7] each instance names, as I said, the primordial tension that exists between the Christian and the world.
It names the eternal fact, that if you are a Christian, a subject of the kingdom of God and of his Christ, then you relate to the world differently; you relate to the principalities and powers of this world differently. It’s not that Christians are called to renounce their citizenship and service to the world; it’s that they’re meant to serve differently and to be different sorts of citizens.
Marinus was both a Christian and a soldier, faithful as both. He wasn’t martyred because he suddenly realized that being Christian meant he couldn’t be a soldier (he didn’t think that at all); rather, it’s just that he wouldn’t sacrifice to the emperor; he wouldn’t act as if the state was divine, as if it had absolute authority and power. It’s just that since he was a Christian, there was indeed a line he would not cross, even if it meant death. As a Christian, he understood that there are indeed limits to worldly loyalty.
And this is the plain lesson for us today, on this Solemnity of Christ the King. What was true for Christ in the desert; for Marinus, soldier and martyr; for Saint Ignatius and all Christians since—it remains true today, for you and I. “I am a Christian,” one old martyr said; “I do not offer sacrifice to men,” but instead to “God who is almighty.”[8] If you claim the name Christian and are not a fraud, then what has been true for all Christians for all time is true for you. And so, today’s feast serves simply as a reminder of Christian difference—that there is indeed a difference, and that it matters, and that at some point you will have to choose, and that it may be painful.
But, of course, this means nothing if it doesn’t bear down on you and me practically, if this doesn’t do anything to determine our everyday ethics. This is how all this “Christ the King” business becomes relevant.
To call Christ Lord and King isn’t to claim any sort of status or dignity. It’s not to assert any sort of worldview, to say anything about how our country was or is or should be; it’s not to assert anything about culture or politics or civilization at all. To do that is always a mistake, and, at bottom, a betrayal of the gospel. Rather, to call Christ Lord and King is to live a certain way, to abide by a certain ethics not dictated by culture or government, but by the teachings of Jesus Christ. It’s to live a certain way, the Christian way—even if it makes you culturally apostate, even if it hurts you, especially when it hurts.
Hence the frightening parable of the judgment of the nations, the deliberately frightening parable of the sheep and the goats, an image of the judgment that will come to all of us.[9] As Basil the Great said, this is no fairy tale, but instead the “voice of truth.”[10] It’s judgment that will proceed according not to what we have said, but according to what we have either done or left undone—not words, but deeds.
If Christ is truly your king, then what have you done for the stranger? If Christ is truly your king, then what have you done for the sick and the hungry, the imprisoned and the naked? Christ the King is not impressed by our words, by our sentimental religion; he simply is not impressed. If Christ is truly your king, then what have you done about it?
Think of all those instances and opinions and issues in which you depart from the teachings of Christ; of course, sophisticatedly explaining them all away. Think of all those things which you know Christ wants you to do, but don’t, simply because you worry about what other people think or some other worldly fear. Think about all this, and then think about Christ and the judgment that will come, and about how although we have made our religion sentimental and practically meaningless, Christ has not.
And then tremble a little, but rejoice. Because you’ll have found the true faith then. Frightened, perhaps, a little; but your Christianity will have become real then, and so too your salvation. Which is the ultimate point. Amen.
[1] Acts of the Christian Martyrs, vol. II, The Martyrdom of St. Marinus, 240-243
[2] Matthew 4:8
[3] Revelation 18:21
[4] The Epistle to Diognetus 6
[5] Augustine, City of God 14.28
[6] Ignatius of Loyola, The Spiritual Exercises 140, 143
[7] Martin Luther King, Jr., A Knock at Midnight, 39
[8] Acts of the Christian Martyrs, vol. II, The Martyrdom of Pionius the Presbyter and his Companions 8
[9] Matthew 25:31-46
[10] Basil the Great, Homily 8.328B
© 2020 Rev. Joshua J. Whitfield
