Christ is King: A Truth, Not a Taunt, by Peter Wolfgang

By Peter Wolfgang, Catholic Culture, Nov 22, 2025

Peter Wolfgang is president of Family Institute of Connecticut Action, a Hartford-based advocacy organization whose mission is to encourage and strengthen the family as the foundation of society. His work has appeared in The Hartford Courant, the Waterbury Republican-American, Crisis Magazine, Columbia Magazine, the National Catholic Register, CatholicVote, Catholic World Report, the Stream and Ethika Politika. He lives in Waterbury, Conn., with his wife and their seven children. The views expressed on Catholic Culture are solely his own. See full bio.

The Vigil Mass tonight begins the feast of Christ the King. Or, more precisely, “The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe.” I got a head start on it this year thanks to the two Connecticut parishes (here and here) run by the Institute of Christ the King (ICK), where the feast day is celebrated a month earlier on the Traditional Latin Mass calendar, and where both parishes invited me to their blowout celebrations. I attend a Novus Ordo parish myself. But if you ever want to see Hilaire Belloc’s famous lines (“Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine, There’s always laughter and good red wine…”) come to life, visit one of the ICK’s glorious parishes on their patronal feast day.

The phrase, “Christ is King!” is very close to my heart. Pope Pius XI instituted the feast in the 1920s to remind the world that Christ, not the state, is King. Here in North America, “¡Viva, Cristo Rey!” (“Christ is King!”) was the battle cry of the Cristeros. They were Catholic freedom-fighters who were martyred for their faith while fighting a tyrannical anti-Catholic government in Mexico in the early 20th century. …