Comes now Plaintiff Christus Rex, by and through counsel, pursuant to Quas Primas, promulgated by Pius XI, as amended by motu proprioMysterii Paschalis of St. Paul VI, both of blessed memory and rightful successors to the throne of St. Peter, and for His complaint of insubordination against Defendant the United States of America, avows as follows:
WHEREAS in view of the teaching of Sacred Scripture, as expressed through the Church’s liturgy, Christus Rex is, by His essence and nature, Lord and King over all kings (QP 12, 13); and
WHEREAS men and women are no longer their own property, for Christus Rex has purchased them with a great price such that they are members of His Body; and
WHEREAS it is sufficiently clear from Sacred Scripture that the Lordship of Christus Rex, by virtue of which He exercises universal dominion over persons and nations, is manifest in a threefold power, to wit: (1) “law-giver, to whom obedience is due”; (2) judge, to whom all judgment has been given by the Father, and according to which is the right of reward and punishment; and (3) executive, “for all must obey his commands” (QP 14); and
WHEREAS Christus Rex has authority over all civil affairs, as “all things are in his power” (QP 17), such that the entirety of humankind is subject to His benevolent rule (QP 18); and
WHEREAS there is no distinction in this dominion between the individual or the State (QP 18); and
WHEREASChristus Rex is the true source of happiness and fulfilment for every person and country, and His sovereignty transcends all nations (Id.); and
WHEREAS the duty of public officials of reverence and obeisance to Christus Rex is necessary to promote and increase prosperity in their nations and lands (Id.); and
WHEREAS recognition of Christus Rex is the true cause of well-ordered liberty, peace, and harmony (QP 19); and
WHEREAS Defendant has enacted practices, customs, laws, and regulations that are offensive to the dignity of humankind, repugnant to the sovereignty of Christus Rex, destructive of right order, and ruinous of true peace,
Christus Rex avers and charges as follows:
Count I—Against Dignity
Defendant has placed the laws of the State in opposition to the laws of Christus Rex, and has vowed loyalty to those laws, in violence of the dignity of the unborn, the infirm, the poor, the prisoner, and the aged.
Defendant has violated true worship by enacting laws that are corrosive of, and barriers to, true practice of religious faith, in contradiction to the laws of Christus Rex, including but not limited to, confiscating the treasure of Catholic Christians for the financing of of laws, regulations, policies, and services that offend human dignity and right order.
Count II—Against Solidarity
Defendant has placed earthly political power above heavenly peace and order, and citizens of Defendant have ordered their moral lives toward that political power, to the detriment of true order and civic friendship.
Catholic citizens of Defendant have turned against one another in violation of the faith that unites them and have bowed to the false gods of partisanship that divides them.
Defendant has placed national identity above catholic Christian brotherhood, reducing primary allegiance to the nation state over universal service to mankind.
Count III—Against Subsidiarity
Defendant has enacted laws and policies that undermine the role of the family as the primary social entity, depriving parents of the duty and means to educate their children according to the sovereign order of Christus Rex, including, but not limited to, policies that impose foreign gender or sexual ideology on educational, foster, and adoptive institutions.
Defendant has created onerous regulations and bureaucratic structures that penalize or hinder local charities and other mediating institutions, such as churches, guilds, clubs, and similar subsidiary institutions.
Count IV—Against Common Good
Defendant has enacted laws and policies that are ordered toward the pursuit of autonomous individual goods, to the detriment of common good.
Defendant has made economic goods the highest goods of the nation, to the detriment of service, prayer, worship, and those other goods constitutive of an abundant human life.
Defendant has incentivized the dissolution of familial and other social bonds, rewarding pursuit of individual wealth at the cost of public service and higher human goods and spiritual blessing.
Prayer for Relief
WHEREFORE, Plaintiff Christus Rex calls upon Defendant to institute and observe the Feast of Christ the King, to submit to the sovereign authority of Christ, who came to reconcile all things to Himself, whose blessings know no bounds, whose peace is everlasting, and whose dominion transcends all earthly powers. Such that, in ordering itself according to the laws of God’s kingdom, it “may receive full measure of good fruit, . . . counted by Christ good and faithful servants,” and “rendered partakers of eternal bliss and glory with Him in His heavenly kingdom.”
Kenneth Craycraft is a licensed attorney and the James J. Gardner Family Chair of Moral Theology at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary and School of Theology, the seminary for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. He holds the Ph.D. in theology from Boston College, and the J.D. from Duke University School of Law.
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