But the rulers scoffed at him saying, "He saved others, let him save himself" ...  the soldiers also mocked him: "If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself" ... one of the criminals railed at him, "save yourself and us." They scoffed at him saying, let him save himself. And they still come by, saying the same thing: save yourself.  Only now, they, the mockers and scoffers, more often than not make a distinction - they say to Christ, demandingly:"Save us!" And then to us, dismissively: "Save yourself!" Some of us have been reminded, scolded: "Get a grip on your life, take charge of your own life. Save yourself. Control your feelings, conduct yourself with more heroism or honor or more consistent fidelity." Sadly, we ourselves may sometimes say, as we seek to encourage and buck up friends and family, who are not doing what they might, what we feel they could, who are not handling their problems well, not dealing with the issues they face as we might hope, we say, or least think: "Well, do something! It is really up to you, I'll help, we all will, but it is up to you." I personally am doing this even now with one of my dearest, oldest friends, a brilliant man, who has slipped into heroin addiction, and calls himself recovered when he moves instead to cocaine. And what I, and we, really mean, and they really hear is: Save Yourself! Well they can't, you can't, I can't, no one can. Let's face it. And we have this magnificent Sunday to remind us - The King of Kings and Lord of Lords would not do it - save himself - and we cannot do it - save ourselves. It's all up to him. We respond, we believe, we pray, and given his grace we try to change, to accept, or to cope - but we do not save - not each other, not ourselves. Only he does this as he did for the sorrowful thief on that cross. He will remember us and we will be with him in Paradise. In the meantime, we have the grace and assurance and insistence of our faith, that it is all all right, even now, all is well between God and us. He intends to save us, because he knows we cannot do it ourselves. The Psalmist realized this a 1,000 years ago, we must never forget or lose his insight. We are powerless in ourselves to save ourselves, as he knew full well, and said for the ages and for us: "What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you seek him out? You remember that we are but dust, yet you have made us little lower than angels, and redeem us with honor and glory and bring us up from the dark places." The most hopeful of us partly believe we can save ourselves, the most intrepid of us really believe we can. Save ourselves. We cannot. And this Sunday above all Sundays reminds of this. Christ the King, the Lord of Glory, the high and mighty ruler of the universes, the beginning, the first-born, the fullness of God, the Pre-eminent: look at him in this Gospel - helpless on a cross between two thugs. And you are going to save yourself? I am? Your friend is, your son or daughter is? Never. And none of us needs to. Just turn your eyes to him as the thief did and pleaded: "Remember me, Lord." Remember me. He does, and always will. and so will save us, guaranteed. Guaranteed. It isn't, of course, the scoffers who do the real and lasting and terrible damage - it is we ourselves. We who agree with them, that we ought to be able to save ourselves, we ought to be able to resist temptation, to get out of bad situations, we ought to be able to control and contain and confine our emotions, we ought to be able to get it all together, we ought to be able to remain utterly faithful to our commitments, to deal with all our inadequacies and shortcomings, and worse. We ought to be able to save ourselves. Well, actually, we ought not. That is for God, not for us. He knows we have no power in ourselves to help ourselves, it is time we admitted it as well. The Last Sunday after Pentecost, this Feast of Christ the King, this final, triumphant acclamation before the quiet and subdued season of Advent begins, is a Sunday to affirm and proclaim and celebrate the glory of our catholic Christian lives: that Jesus Christ is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and reigns in splendor and majesty. But this Sunday is equally something else as well. The Church will have us, each year, on this Sunday, remember that when God Incarnate had reached his lowest point, the religious people scoffed and called out: "Go on, do it, save yourself." And pagan soldiers and hardened felons joined the chorus. That may happen, probably will happen, to you - but don't be convinced by that heartless admonition. And worst of all, you may think it yourself, that you ought to be able to save yourself, that everyone should. You cannot save yourself and neither can they - your family and friends. God can and will. You can't arrange your own Resurrection on your own will power. But God can, and will, at that very moment when you are seen by yourself, and by those you love, and possibly by all, to be at your weakest, as Christ seemed to be on the Cross. It is then, especially then, that our Savior himself is already at work, that Lord of Lords and King of Kings, who has been there. He is this day remembering us, intervening, restoring, saving, leading us and all those we know and love, toward Paradise. This day.