April 5, 2023 – Wednesday of the Holy Week

Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/040523.cfm)

Judas sold his friend and teacher. The Gospel recounts to us that one of Jesus’ close friends sold him to the chief priests. Why would Judas do that to the person who only showed kindness and generosity to him and to the people?

Judas though, was chosen to be one of the close friends of Jesus and disciples had these two attitudes that motivated him to betray the Lord and to sell him for thirty pieces of silver.

First, Judas never believed that Jesus is the Lord and the Messiah, the Son of God who is sent into the world to redeem the world and save the people from their sins and evil ways. Judas never believed in Jesus but only thought that Jesus was a mere teacher. Thus, Judas never called Jesus as Lord but only Rabbi, which means teacher.

Second, Judas did not have a close, personal and intimate relationship with Jesus. Because Judas never believed in Jesus as Lord, it also followed that Judas had never developed that close relationship with the Lord. Judas actually failed to build true friendship with Jesus and so failed to recognize God in Jesus.

These attitudes of Judas may also be present in us. When we do not believe or refuse to believe in Jesus as our Savior and Lord, who has come to love and forgive us, then, we too shall have the difficulty of not being able to build a personal relationship with God. Failure to recognize God in our life leads us to an estrange relationship with God.

This is also true with our human relationships. Failure to believe in the person, to a friend, to your beloved, to your husband, or wife  or child will lead us to a distanced relationship. This failure in knowing the person and building personal and intimate relationship with the person will lead us to easily discard the person. It will be easy for us to hurt them, to cause them pain, to cheat on them, to betray them, to leave and abandon them – because after all, we are never committed in that relationship.

Thus, we are called rather now to know better the person that we are in relationship with, our friends, our beloved and all those people around us because it is in knowing them that we also come to recognize their importance and believe in them. And again, this shall also move us to commit ourselves in that relationship by developing a close and intimate relationship with others and with God.

May Our Mother of Perpetual Help guide and inspire us in our relationships and to truly believe in Jesus and to build personal and intimate relationship with him. Kabay pa.