Robert Barron: God Enters Into Our Darkness — Palm Sunday

Peace be with you. Friends, we come now to Palm Sunday, also called Passion Sunday. One of the great highlights of the lurggical year. Passion Sunday because on every Palm Sunday, we read in its entirety one of the Passion narratives from the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke. And on Good Friday, we always read John's passion narrative. Something I like to do, we're in the cycle A of readings this year, so we're reading Matthew's version. I like to see now what's distinctive to this one. There there there's a lot of overlap between them, but each one has distinctive uh qualities. Well, what stood out to me as I looked at this Matthew out of all of them puts a stress on Judas and more precisely on the deep regret that Judas felt over what he had done. It it doesn't entirely villainize Judas but in a way enters into the deep remorse that Judas um felt. Let me give you an example. Then Judas his betrayer seeing that Jesus had been condemned deeply regretted what he had done. He returned the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, saying, "I've sinned in betraying innocent blood." Rather extraordinary, isn't it? Uh, you know, we think Judas, the worst possible sinner. Judas the worst person ever, the one that betrayed the Lord. And it's not denied. He's called the betrayer here. But there's not a bit of callous indifference or an ounce of self-justification. That's what most of us sinners do. we, you know, oh, no, no, I'm not a sinner. No, no, no. I I've got plenty of excuses. Or, hey, I I I don't really care. I did something wicked, but, you know, get over it. Well, there's not an ounce of that here in Judas, just the opposite. It seems a pretty clear and honest admission of guilt. And then we're told, um, having flung the money into the temple, that's powerful. He's he gives back the money that he had been rewarded for betraying the Lord. And then it says simply and and rather awfully he went off and hanged himself. So of course familiar from all the all the gospels that Judas uh ends his life in this act of self slaughter. It just seems a terrible end to to a sad uh life. In it seems complete despair, Judas uh kills himself. Now, all this combined, he's a betrayer of the Lord himself and then in his despair, he kills himself. Has convinced, you know, to be fair, most people in the great tradition that Judas is is in hell. If anyone's in hell, Judas would be. Augustine thought so. Thomas Aquinas thought so. Dante in his famous depiction of the very pit of hell. Remember Dante has Satan and he has three faces because he's a weird similocrum of the trinity. And in each of the mouths, each of the three mouths, he choose a sinner. Cases and Brutus, the two people that betrayed Julius Caesar. And then in the central mouth, he chews on Judas, the one who betrayed the Lord himself. And so there it is. The great tradition assumes rather blly that well Judas of course is in hell. Well, I'd like to do is without denying any of that. I mean, these are that's a very strong theological opinion of of the great tradition. I draw your attention to admittedly it's a minority point of view but a u alternative perspective. You can find it in one of the most beautiful churches in Europe uh the Basilica of Vzilelet in France. So not a Gothic church. It's a it's a kind of late Romanesque. Part of it is moving toward Gothic but it's one of the very finest of the romanesque churches in France. Gorgeous architecture. Look it up online. And the interior of Vzolet is is is striking. Well, there is in the nave of Vzle there's a column. At the top of the column is a is a set of carvings, a little relief, right? Well, one of them now is um of the death of Judas. And it shows in kind of a particularly a gruesome way the the hanging of Judas. And his eyes are kind of popped out and his tongue is lolling out of his mouth. And there he is hanging. You say, "Okay, there it is. Judas dying in despair." But then you you turn and the next panel on the same column shows Jesus and he's got draped over his shoulders like the lost sheep the figure of Judas. And Judas is not dead. He's he's alive and he's smiling as Jesus carries him. Well, I say it's an unusual depiction, but a very interesting one. I'll tell you somebody else who found this fascinating was um Pope Francis. In fact, Pope Francis was so taken by this image that he had a photo of it in his papal office or his papal apartment. He was so struck by this image. Yes, Judas killed himself. But then that next panel, is it possible? Is it possible that somehow in the very regret of Judas in in the very sorrow that he felt in this keen sense that he had done something terrible to Jesus that Jesus found enough to save him? Because that's the image, you know, it's the shepherd that goes off in in search of the of the lost sheep and now brings him back. Both Judas and Jesus smiling in the process. Is it possible? Is it possible that even Judas is saved? Now, I know, don't send me letters of complaint. I I get it. I'm not advocating some easy universalism, some indifferentism, you know, everyone's saved. Don't worry about it. Sin doesn't matter. you know, deep down Judas is a great guy. I'm not arguing that universalism is the heresy that we know for sure that all people will be saved. We don't. We don't. God is love. Yes, but we're free. And we can listen now. From the very depths of our freedom, we can say no to God's love. And that no, that resistance raised to the level of an absolute resistance is what we mean by hell. So, is this a a lively possibility? Yes. I'm not denying any of that. Not denying any of it. But may we hope may we hope that that even Judas given this this remorse that he showed given this keen sense that yes he's a sinner his deep regret was that perhaps enough for the Lord to work with and so as to carry him back into the flock you know let me say a couple things now in support of this um St. Pope John Paul II remarked one time that there's nothing in the church that corresponds to canonization on the dark side. What I mean is when you canonize someone, you say he's in heaven. She's in heaven. The church definitively pronounces that person's in heaven. Well, there isn't a a counter canonization where we say that person's definitely in hell. What about Judas? Well, yeah, even Judas, we've never definitively said, it's not a matter of doctrine that Judas is in hell. Something too from John Paul's successor, the great Benedict the 16th. He fully acknowledging, you know, the the the guilt of Judas, fully acknowledging the terrible thing that he did, fully acknowledging even this movement toward despair at the end of his life, said, "Nevertheless, it's not ours to judge that, but we must leave Judas's fate to the mercy and justice of God." Okay. Okay. Well, you say, "All right. I I guess I understand that. But look, don't we say if you committed suicide, you're you're clearly in a state of desperation. You've despaed. You've given up on God. And so clearly that's a mortal sin that you've never had a chance to to get forgiven. So you're in hell, right? Well, listen to the Catechism of the Catholic Church on this. It's paragraph 2283. We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. So the church prays for persons who have taken their own lives. Pretty clear. It seems to me you can't just say if someone took his own life, he's definitely in hell. No, no, you can't say that. Why? because ways known to him, God can provide the opportunity for solutary repentance. Now, here's what I want you to see everybody on this great day of Passion Sunday. It's it's not so much the the fate of Judas that I'm interested in here. What I'm interested in is the is the radicality of God's mercy. That's what that vessel capital I think is trying to drive at that yes we we can stand to thwart God. We can say no. We can fall into the worst kinds of sin. But there's something relentless about God's pursuit of the sinner. He's after us. He's the good shepherd looking for us and given the slightest opportunity able now to bring us back to the to the path of grace. I I'm insisting here with St. Paul that where sin abounds. Uhhuh. Grace abounds the more. What does the cross mean? So on Passion Sunday, we follow Jesus all the way down into the worst of physical suffering. Yeah. Into the worst of psychological suffering. Mhm. And dare I say it, into the worst of spiritual suffering. Now Jesus never becomes a sinner on the cross. He's the savior. But the Jesus that says, "God, my God, why have you abandoned me?" has moved, if I can put it this way, into the psychological and spiritual state of someone who's lost contact with God. Has he? In fact, no. But does the father allow the son to taste to experience that darkness? you know, um, anyone that follows me knows I love the little flower and, um, at the very end of her life, uh, these weren't published right away, these reflections that she is on her deathbed said she felt the real darkness of unbelief. Did she become an unbeliever? No. But she felt it. She entered into that space. Well, see, that's where Christ goes. That's where the saints go into that place. Why? To find those who have wandered as far away as you can go. I'll tell you a quick story to close. I just got this from Father Dennis McManus who gave us a great retreat to our our priests. There was a French couple 19th century. She's very religious. He's not too religious, but out of love for her, he kind of puts up with it. And at one point she said, "Can I put a picture of the sacred heart over the bed?" And he said, "Okay, you know, you like that sort of thing." So they did. And then he was a depressive and he experienced a lot of setbacks his life and then a failure in his business. And he reaches the point of despair and he throws himself off a building. he would commit suicide and and his wife of course was devastated by this and blamed herself and terrible and and he's in hell and I could have I could have stopped it and well in her anguish she goes to ours this little town where John Vienna is was the cure as the priest famous as a confessor spiritual director and she waits in line this long line to see him and she's just weeping you know at the altar and suddenly Vienna comes out of the confessional where he was and he calls her name. And she said, "Well, this is me." And he comes over and she goes, "How how do you know? How how did you know my name?" And he said, "Don't worry about that." See, he received words of knowledge from the Lord. Don't worry about that. And he said, "I I want you to know something. I want I want you to know the Lord told me that your husband, even as he threw himself off of the building, what came into his mind was that picture of the Sacred Heart that you put over your bed." And in that moment, the Lord offered him the opportunity of salvation and he took it. Beautiful. And it gave her this great peace of heart. Yes. Can God find a way in his providence to reach out even to those who are furthest away from him? The same Dante, by the way, who put Judas in the in the pit of hell said that one tear of repentance is enough to awaken the mercy of God. Is Judas definitively lost? Well, the church has never said so. May we hope everybody because of the extravagance of Christ's mercy that even those who've wandered furthest away can still find hope. And God bless you.