November

It´s my pleasure to welcome you to this Regnum Christi celebration on the Feast of Christ the King. My name is Michael Devereux. A very special welcome to Bishop Len and also Tammy Grady and Michelle Hill who are consecrated members of the movement visiting us from Rhode Island. We are especially grateful to have you with us on this day.

Some of you won´t know a great deal about Regnum Christi so I´d like to tell you a little about it. Firstly and importantly it is an official movement in the Church. There are many movements of course each with their special charism. The Holy Father speaks with great enthusiasm and admiration for what the movements can do for the Church. At the same time the movements must be always very supportive of the local Church.

Members of the movements must be ready and willing to help. This is something which is often reinforced within Regnum Christi.

The movement was founded in Mexico in 1941 when Marcial Maciel founded the priestly order of the Legion of Christ. Like St Benedict, St Francis and St Ignatius who founded orders over the centuries since the beginning of the Church, Father Marcial was inspired to found the congregation of the Legion of Christ. All were founded at times of particular need in the Church which is I guess exactly what you would expect from the Holy Spirit. Not surprisingly all these founders, and some I haven´t mentioned, were in due course recognised as saints by the church.

As a boy Marcial witnessed the terrible persecution of the Church in Mexico and the awful atrocities that occurred. He came from a privileged and profoundly Catholic background and was acutely aware that so many people lived miserable lives unaware of what God´s love could do for them. I want to read to you a piece in one of Father Marcial´s letters which explains the depth of his feelings. The letter was written from Madrid in 1946. Let me read that to you.

"When I think of the world waning and dying for lack of Christ, when I think of the profound chaos into which this restless and blind humanity is tumbling for lack of Christ, when I contemplate the ruin and lack of fruitfulness in so many good souls for lack of Christ, when I see the mass of workers turn to Communism for lack of Christ, when I meet up with the strength of youth withered and torn apart in the very springtime of life for lack of Christ, I cannot hold back the cries in my heart. I want to multiply myself, divide myself so as to write, preach, and teach Christ. And from the very depths of my being, from the very spirit of my spirit, bursts forth this single resounding cry: My life for Christ! Re-Christianise mankind. This is our mission, this is our goal, this is the reason for our Movement."

Father Marcial goes on to say this:

"If we renew Christian life, virtues will flourish in our century as numerous and heroic as they did in the first centuries of the Church. Christian perfection, no matter how you look at it, is nothing other than to practice the principles of the Gospel, and the Holy Gospel lived out is what I call Christian life."

Marcial was just 20 years old when he founded the Legion of Christ in 1941. He was not yet a priest himself although he had spent some time in a number of seminaries. None suited him and what he wanted to do.

As luck would have it he had a few uncles who were Bishops and one of them gave him the permission he needed. He set up in the basement of a building in Mexico City with a group of I think 12 boys who wanted to become priests. During the day he worked training his charges. In the evening while they slept, he studied, and early in the morning he milked the cow taking the milk into the town to buy food.

Marcial was ordained a priest in Mexico City in 1944. As an aside some of us were in that City in 1994 at the celebration to mark his 50th anniversary. Among them was Garth Lucas, and although we had already started the movement in Dunedin, Garth´s enthusiasm following that visit helped greatly to establish Regnum Christi here and subsequently in Auckland.

Well for Father Marcial 1944 was just the beginning. He took his group to Spain to further their studies, and in 1946 realising he needed to speak to the Holy Father about his ambitions for his congregation, he went to Rome. He knew no one in Rome but he donned a surplice and joined in a procession to get close to the Pope. Close enough to say a brief word to him and get the appointment he sought. The Holy Father encouraged him to persevere in the formation of an army of men and women dedicated to work tirelessly to extend the Kingdom of Christ. His idea was to have highly trained people who would in turn train lay people to do much of the work. It was a new idea in a Church where the laity was used to having everything done for them. The rest is history! Notwithstanding great difficulties there are now thousands of men and women - priests, consecrated men and women and incorporated lay people, 85,000 of them working in countries all around the world.

This then is a brief history of the Regnum Christi movement. As I said two of the consecrated women are here today. Tammy a Canadian and Michelle an Australian. We will hear from them later.

Well what is the movement about for lay people? I suppose different people might describe it differently. For me and Marie it´s been life changing. It has provided a focus for formation and spiritual growth and at the same time providing the opportunity to help the Church in different ways. The formation side comes first as you might expect and in due course each member is expected to be involved in an Apostolate. The Apostolate may be peculiar to the movement like FAMILIA, which helps families to grow spiritually, which some of you know about, or it may be working with a parish youth group or the parish council or organising a Retreat.

Some of you will ask how we got involved with Regnum Christi so I´ll tell you. In 1986 our son Peter felt he had a vocation to the Priesthood. He visited several seminaries here and abroad including the Legionaries of Christ in Cheshire, Connecticut. It seems he was called to the Legion and the following year he commenced his novitiate in Cheshire CT and was ordained in Rome on 1 January 2000. The Legion has the great ability to draw families into it - we were encouraged to become incorporated into the Movement in 1991 and most of our family followed in the intervening years.

Nowadays, the Cleary and Lucas families who are here today also have family members involved with the congregation. Father Peter is now coming to New Zealand and Australia giving Retreats etc on a regular basis so you can see how the Holy Spirit is working.

Finally a word on the Feast of Christ the King.

Father Marcial our founder chose the Feast of Christ the King as a major feast day of the movement to honour Christ the King - in a sense it is our day as Regnum Christi members. It is Christ as a King for the Universe that we honour - our spirituality is Christ-centered. The founder invites us to know love and imitate Christ in all his different virtues especially charity and humility.

Members of the movement all over the world are celebrating as we are today from Madrid to Mexico from Edmonton in Canada to here in New Zealand in both Auckland and Dunedin. No doubt Father Marcial will be celebrating the Feast in Rome with the community there where the Legion of Christ is based.

On behalf of all Regnum Christi me mbers I welcome you to this celebration.

For more information please contact us at infoeng@regnumchristi.org