Defending Judas

Judas Iscariot is in Hell, and it is pointless trying to defend any other position, despite the constant fudging and double-speak the Church of Nice keeps serving up over this issue.

How do we know he's damned? Because we have it directly from both the Second and Third Persons of the Holy Trinity in public revelation.

First, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity: Judas is "a devil," the "Son of Perdition," and "better for him had he never been born."

Next, the Third Person, through His inspiring of the writers of Sacred Scripture (including the first Pope):

During those days Peter stood up in the midst of the brothers. "My brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand through the mouth of David, concerning Judas, who was the guide for those who arrested Jesus.

He was numbered among us and was allotted a share in this ministry. For it is written in the Book of Psalms: Let his encampment become desolate, and may no one dwell in it. And: May another take his office." (Acts 1:16–20)

So two candidates are chosen and then the selection made "to take the place of this ministry and apostleship, from which Judas hath by transgression fallen, that he might go to his own place" (Acts 1:24–25).

Notice what is going on here. Judas is being replaced because he has lost his place among the company of Apostles forever.

Judas needs to be replaced because the number of Apostles needs to be brought back up to 12 because of the significance of 12 in relation to the 12 tribes of Israel. Peter knew this and hence tells the rest that Judas needs to be replaced.

It is extremely important to note: Judas was the only apostle who had to have his place filled when he died.

When Herod killed St. James the Apostle, the other apostles did not replace James. There were, of course, successors to the Apostles, but the successors were not viewed as replacing any one of the originals of the apostolic band — only Judas.

Judas had to be re-placed because he had gone to his own place: Hell. And Catholic tradition as expressed by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church understand that "his own place" means Hell.

It is most abundantly clear that Judas lost his apostleship forever, because if he didn’t, if he was still an Apostle — as indeed St. Peter and the others still are — then there would be 13 Apostles now, not 12, since Matthias was brought in not to succeed but to replace him.

Having 13 Apostles would destroy the integrity of the Holy Spirit's inspiration to the Apostle John in his Apocalypse when he writes of the heavenly Jerusalem: "And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them, the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb."

So what do we have here? Confirmation directly from Sacred Scripture that Judas is damned.  

All this week, we are going to be exploring this issue, because it is not just some academic point worthy of theological eggheads debating, but because an entire theology has grown up around the issue of defending Judas.

And that theology has brought forth an entire school of thought that has corrupted and continues to corrupt Catholic minds on questions about judgment, predestination, the supposed necessity of the sin of Judas, as well as the ever-mysterious question of the mercy of Our Lord — especially in this freshly inaugurated Jubilee of Mercy declared by the Holy Father.

The question of Judas and his end is the flashpoint of all this controversy and this controversy is hampering nearly every effort in the Church at self-reform, reform of the liturgy, evangelization, authentic ecumenism, priestly vocations, sexual morality — you name it. There is not a single area of controversy present in the Church these days that does not relate back in some way to the topic of Judas’s eternal damnation.

We will be exploring this vexing problem all this week because there is so much contained in it that needs to be explored in depth.  

The heart of the issue is put simply: If Judas was somehow saved, then the whole of Catholic tradition has been wrong for nearly 2,000 years. That point is precisely why the more theologically progressive in the Church are so anxious to rehabilitate Christ's betrayer.