My writer friend Nicholas wrote this blog post, and I wanted to share it with all of you. We thought it would be fun to collaborate on each others blogs, writer to writer. You can read more of Nicholas' Blog at Non Nobis Nati . Thanks again Nicholas for your contribution!
I watched a movie a few months ago that recently came to my mind: King Arthur: Legend of the Sword. With it being a familiar tale to many in our childhood, the movie decided to take a more intense and darker approach to the story we may all be familiar with. For most, our protagonist, Arthur, grows up with humble and lowly beginnings. As he grows in age, he becomes familiar with the story of the sword Excalibur being locked in a stone that can only be retrieved by the rightful king of England. As many try and fail to pull the stone from its geological pedestal, Arthur makes an attempt and successfully retrieves and wields the mighty sword; this ushers him to the throne as the rightful King of England. In the movie (major spoiler alert), our mighty hero's parents, the righteous and benevolent King and Queen of England, are murdered by Arthur's uncle, Vortigern. Experiencing and witnessing their deaths as a small child, Arthur is haunted by nightmares of their deaths. After Arthur is forced to attempt to pull the sword from the stone, he and the whole of England discover that he is the rightful heir to the English throne.
During his character development arc, we see him interacting with Excalibur which is imbued with strong magical powers. In order to control it, he has to face the fears and brokenness he has from the death of his parents. He continues to fail because he looks away each time he re-lives the event through visions. The mage guide he has been given eventually confronts him and says that "I look away... we all look away... but that is the difference between a man and a king."
While this tale is full of Christological parallels and themes, it's that one-liner dropped by our mage friend that truly struck me. Christ is our long-awaited and rightful King. Every perfect and benevolent king we see in our stories, novels, legends and myths are pale in comparison to our actual King in our actual life. He isn't scandalized or judgmental by what decisions you have made or things that have happened to you. It's easy to see us fail in this way as we do everything we can to avoid people that share their troubles with us, or we find ourselves rolling through the stop sign as we avoid eye contact with the disheveled homeless man. But... our King doesn't look away.
Through our Baptism, we are called to participate in the roles of Christ: Priest, Prophet and King. Now, we probably aren't going to prophesy like Simeon, offer pleasing offerings like Melchizedek, or rule like King David. We are, however, called to each of those roles in the unique way that God has planned for us. Perhaps we may participate in that by being a spiritual leader within your family, sharing in conversation about God with another, and, like our King, not looking away from Him as we bring our own failings to Him; This may be at the foot of the manger or of the cross. Just as He doesn't look away from us in our muck, let us not look away from His tender and merciful countenance. Shame and fear is what can make us feel like we are falling. Though Jesus might let us fall sometimes so that we may grow, He will never let you hit the ground. He will always catch you, dust you off and then bring you into His kingship.
“Christus vincit! Christus regnat! Christus imperat!” – “Christ conquers, Christ reigns, Christ commands”
Nicholas Zieglmeier
