This world is more in need of Christ the King than it ever has been. Today is the feast of Christ the King! “Christ died for all men, and is king and lord of all. Christ also, as king of the angels, exerts at least accidental influence of grace and glory upon them, inasmuch as they are His ministers in the heavenly kingdom. He also reigns as judge by exercising His justice over demons whom He cast out of creatures during His life on earth. Christ the King, as explained in the encyclical, reigns in the whole of man, in our souls which He deifies, in our intellects so that they may always think of Him, in our wills so that they may be subject to Him, in the affections so that Christ may be loved above all things, in our bodies so that our members may serve "as instruments of justice unto God" for His honor and glory. This kingdom also includes civil society, for as Leo XIII remarks, civil society no less than the individual is dependent on God as its author, for "there is no power but from God," and without Christ's help man cannot observe even the whole natural law, provide for sound morality, pass good laws, for, as St. Thomas says: "In the state of corrupted nature man cannot fulfill all the divine commandments without healing grace," nor the whole natural law. Hence Pope Pius XI declares against laicism, "that by the rejection of Christ's universal kingdom, it gradually comes about that no distinction is made between the true religion and false religions, and then all religion, even natural religion, is abolished, and thus the reign of impiety and immorality is established," so that the words of our Lord are verified: "He that is not with Me is against Me." - Rev. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP