I wondered why Lepanto had specifically chosen Judas Iscariot for their mockery of social justice, instead of any other odious Biblical figure– not Herod or Goliath, or Satan falling like lightning from the sky. I suppose the joke is based on his line in John, ““Why wasn’t this perfume sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?” However, the very next line explains “He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.” So, not very just. And that’s not the line that Lepanto used in their meme; they used the passage from Luke, which has nothing to do with social justice.
Maybe the folks at the Lepanto institute watched Jesus Christ Superstar and decided that it was part of the actual gospel that Judas wanted to give the thirty pieces of silver to a charity. Maybe this is a living example of why teachers tell their students never to watch a movie instead of reading a book.
In any case, what does the Lepanto Institute have against social justice?
Based upon the comments, I take it that The Lepanto Institute thinks social justice is a heresy that only groovy modernists fall under. Nice stodgy traditional people ignore social justice concerns. Unfortunately, the actual teaching of the Catholic church sides with the groovy modernists on this issue. There’s a whole article in the Catechism about the definition and importance of social justice. And trust me, there’s something for everybody to hate in the Catholic Church’s teaching on the matter. Stodgy conservative types will hate how it spells out directly that respect for the human person is prior to society and that authorities which do not respect the human person delegitimize themselves– not to mention all the talk about reducing social and economic inequalities. As for groovy modernists– well, wait til we get to the part of the Church’s teaching on respect for the human person which is to do with sex.
In Christ, there is no East or West. In the Catholic Church, there is no Left or Right either, no “traditional” or “modern” and certainly no “groovy.” These are dividing lines human beings set up for themselves, in order to hurl dead rabbits by the big hind feet and declare themselves the winners. In Christ, there’s only Christ. Christ is Love and the demands of Love are irreducible. You can’t break it down to “basically what an annoying xenophobic sort of conservative person would believe, only with Rosaries” and shout “Remember Lepanto” at people; nor can you say it’s basically being a hippie but with Mass. It’s different than all that. It’s Christ. It demands that every single one of us leave our father and mother, the culture we were trained to think was good and normal, and journey into the unfamiliar. It demands that we lay down our arms and rabbits and take a good look at the person on the opposite side of the line we’ve drawn. It demands genuine reverence for everything good about that person, and that we be wise as serpents but innocent as doves when we confront the bad.
In Christ, the sins which look like virtue to the Left are not more severe than the sins which look like virtue to the Right. In Christ, the real virtues which the Left values are not silly or superficial, and the real virtues that the Right values are not somehow more important. Nor is the reverse true. There is only virtue to be cultivated, and sin to be avoided.
The sin of Judas was to sell Christ for silver. We can commit the same sin when we sell Christ– the real, whole Christ– in exchange for a handful of coins whose stamp we recognize. Whether the coin we sell Him for is liberal or conservative or anything else matters very little– what matters is that you took Christ, whom you couldn’t possibly comprehend, and traded Him in for something smaller than you are, something that can fit in a purse.
If you are in Christ, you will view everyone as a little Christ. You will play Judas to none of these Christs; you will not be guilty of the false kiss, or of selling your Lord for a profit. But you’ll probably look like a Judas to any number of worldly institutions, because they’ll demand to be your Christ. None of them is Christ. No institution– left, right, Republican, Democrat, Traditionalism, Modernism, American-ism, Lepanto or a rabbit farm– can ever be your Christ.
It’s time we all gave up our rabbits, and stopped selling Christ for any kind of profit.
Oh, and in case anyone wanted to know, the actual, Catholic Patron Saint of social justice is Martin De Porres.
(image via Pixabay)
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