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'Church of Judas' or 'Church of Satan'?

The newspaper of the Holy See, L'Osservatore Romano, dedicated the first three pages of its Maundy Thrusday edition to praising Judas Iscariot.

In a first page editorial – titled "Judas & the Scandal of Mercy" – Andrea Monda explains that the Vatican organ decided this year to honor the "most tragic and unsettling" figure of the Gospel.

The editor – probably obeying an order of Pope Francis – chose to post on its front page the reproduction of a picture, above and below first row, that presents a naked Jesus bending over and tenderly ministering to a dead Judas.

Monda explains that the author of this painting is a French Catholic who became impressed by Francis' words praising the Traitor in his book When You Pray, Say Our Father. The artist imagines that after Jesus was crucified, He would have returned to life immediatly, gone to the fig tree and taken down Judas' body and ministered to it. Morsa also reports that Francis loved this painting so much that he has placed it on the wall behind his desk along with another representing Judas.

The inside pages of the Vatican paper feature a sermon by Fr. Primo Mazzolari saying that he believes Judas was forgiven by Our Lord; a brief comment by Card. Carlo Maria Martini on Mazzolari's sermon, saying that each of us can have a Judas inside himself; a text by Giovanni Papini arguing that Judas must have had an ulterior motive to betray Christ because 30 silver coins did not have that great a worth; and a text by Giuseppe Berto impersonating Judas who affirms that Jesus owes His glorification to him.

In the last several decades, this is the first time – as far as we know – that L'Osservatore Romano has promoted Judas Iscariot on its first three pages. It seems the inauguration of a new saint and the official launching of the "Church of Judas" on a Maundy Thursday, the day of his betrayal...

The defense of Judas has been made in the name of the abyss of God's mercy. So we see that now Divine Mercy, against all the Scriptural evidence, also applies to the most infamous criminal in History.

Are we far from the day when the same mercy will be applied to another Great Traitor, Satan? Does it not appear that the Vatican's semi-official launching of the "Church of Judas" is the prelude to the coming "Church of Satan"?

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Photos from L'Osservatore Romano

Posted April 4, 2021

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