Quas primas followed Pius's initial encyclical,
Ubi arcano Dei consilio, which he referred to in his opening statement: ...manifold evils in the world were due to the fact that the majority of men had thrust Jesus Christ and his holy law out of their lives; that these had no place either in private affairs or in politics: and we said further, that as long as individuals and states refused to submit to the rule of our Savior, there would be no really hopeful prospect of a lasting peace among nations. In
Ubi arcano, Pius enjoined the faithful to seek "the Peace of Christ in the Kingdom of Christ".
Quas primas established the
Feast of Christ the King, which was
Pope Pius XI's response to the world's increasing secularization and nationalism. It was written in the aftermath of World War I and the
Revolutions of 1917–1923, which saw the fall of the
Hohenzollerns,
Romanovs,
Habsburgs and
Ottomans. In contrast,
Pope Pius XI pointed to a king "of whose kingdom there shall be no end". In 1925 the Pope asked the French
Dominican priest
Édouard Hugon, professor of philosophy and theology at the
Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum, to work on
Quas primas. "[T]he Word of God, as consubstantial with the Father, has all things in common with him, and therefore has necessarily supreme and absolute dominion over all things created". In Matthew 28:18 Jesus himself says, "All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me." In Revelation 19:16 Christ is recognized as "King of kings and Lord of lords." The encyclical summarised both the
Old Testament and the
New Testament teaching on the kingship of
Christ. Invoking an earlier encyclical
Annum sacrum of
Pope Leo XIII, Pius XI suggested that the Kingdom of Christ embraces the whole mankind. Pius explained that by virtue of Christ's claim to kingship as creator and redeemer, societies as well as individuals owe him obligations as king. ==Significance for laity==