Judas

John 13: 21 – 32

Judas.  A name that sticks in Scripture and in our minds as a symbol of evil.  Evil action, evil intent, evil results.  We see this in the picture St. John gives us of the last supper shared by Jesus and the 12 men who were His travel companions for 3 years.  Men Jesus had called individually and particularly to be His Apostles, including Judas.

Thinking about Judas creates some conflicts for me.  Did he, as some scholars think, believe that Jesus would call down all the forces of heaven and take control of Israel?  Did Judas think that the Jewish leaders would take Jesus’s side and change their actions?  Was Judas indeed controlled by Satan as John states?  What Judas did brought about Jesus’s death, but there would have been no resurrection without His death.  Was Judas’s betrayal a round about way to get God’s will done?

I wish I could answer these questions to my own satisfaction, but I cannot.  Motives and intentions are hard enough to tease out with people I know well, much less someone that I know only through another’s eyes.  I can so easily say that what Judas did is forever unforgivable.  That there is no sin worse than setting up the crucifixion of Jesus, our Lord.  That had I been reclining at that table, I would not have allowed Judas to leave the room without an explanation – especially when Jesus handed Judas that incriminating piece of bread!

Religious pilgrimage has fallen out of style for modern Christians and sometimes I wish that it had not.  We read the stories in our Gospels as isolated incidents without thinking of the time frames or the geography, without considering the sequence of events in real time.  We would learn so much more if we pictured ourselves present to the events that are being described.

I am asking you today to slow down, to sit at table with Jesus and the Apostles.  Share the jokes and conversation.  Listen as Jesus talks about his betrayer, then gives Judas the incriminating piece of bread.  Don’t think you have to do anything,  just be present with our Gospel reading.  Listen for the voice of Jesus saying:

  Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him.  

If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself 

and will glorify him at once.

Allow yourself to be confused by the words as the 11 around the table must have been.  Pray for understanding and peace.  Pray for God’s presence with you.  Wait and listen.