Pope: Judas, the "perfect lost sheep" who did not understand the tenderness of God

"May the Lord give us this grace, to wait for Christmas with our wounds, with our sins, sincerely recognized, to wait for the power of this God who comes to console, who comes with power, but his power is tenderness, caresses born from his heart, which was so good that he have his life for us. "

 

Vatican City (AsiaNews) - "The most perfect lost sheep in the Gospel is Judas: a man who always, always had something bitter in his soul" and did not understand the tenderness of God said   Pope Francis at Mass  this morning in Santa Marta, in which he argued that those unfamiliar with the tenderness of God do not know Christian doctrine.

Inspired by the Gospel passage of the lost sheep, Francis said that the lost sheep "did not get lost because he wasn’t carrying a compass.  He knew the way". He got lost because he "had a bad heart," blinded by an "inner dissociation" and he ran away "to get away from the Lord, to satiate the inner darkness that led to his double life": being part of the flock and running away into the darkness. "The Lord knows these things" and "goes out to look for him”.  "He is like a judge, but a judge that caresses, a judge who is full of tenderness: He does everything to save us" He does not "condemn but saves", He looks for all of us, loves us personally, "He does not love the indistinct mass, "but" loves us by name, He loves us as we are. "

"The figure that helps me understand the attitude of the Lord with the lost sheep is the attitude of the Lord with Judas." "The most perfect lost sheep in the Gospel is Judas: a man who always, always had something bitter in his soul, something to criticize of others, who always distanced himself . He did not know the sweetness of gratuity that comes from living with everyone else. And always, since he was not satisfied with this sheep - Judas was not a happy man! - he fled. He ran away because he was a thief. Others are lustful, others ... But they always flee, run away because the darkness in their heart separates them from the herd. That is the double life, the double life of many Christians, even with pain, we can say, of priests, bishops ... And Judas was a bishop, he was one of the first bishops, no? The lost sheep. Poor things! Our poor brother Judas as as Don Mazzolari called him, in that beautiful sermon: 'Brother Judas, what happens in your heart?'. We need to understand the lost sheep. What’s more we all have a little something, little or not so little, of the lost sheep ".

What makes a lost sheep, said the Pope, it is not so much a mistake as a disease that's in the heart and that the devil uses. So, Judas, with his divided, " dissociated heart " is "the icon of the lost sheep," whom the shepherd goes out in search of. But Judas did not understand and "at the end when he saw what his double life did to the community, the evil that it has sown, with its dark interior, which led him to run away forever, looking for the lights that were not the light of the Lord, but lights like Christmas decorations "," artificial light ", that are "desperate. " "There is a word in the Bible - the Lord is good, even for these sheep, He never stops looking for them - there is one word that says that Judas hanged himself, hanged and 'was penitent'. I believe that the Lord will take that word and will it bring with Him, I do not know, perhaps, but that word makes us doubt. But what does that word mean? That until the end of the love of God he was working in that soul, until the moment of despair. And this is the attitude of the Good Shepherd with the lost sheep. This is the message, the good news that Christmas brings us and asks us for this sincere gladness that changes hearts, which leads us to let us take comfort in the Lord, and not the consolations that seek to let off steam, to escape from reality , escape from the inner torture, interior division. "

Jesus, when he finds the lost sheep does not reproach him, although he did so much bad. In the Garden he calls Judas "friend." These are God's caresses. "Those who do not know the Lord’s caress do not know Christian doctrine! Those who refuse to be caressed by the Lord are lost! This is the good news, this is the sincere joy that we want today. This is joy, this is the consolation that we seek: the coming of the Lord by his power, which is his caress, to visit us, to save us,  as with the lost sheep and to bring us into the fold of his Church. May the Lord give us this grace, to wait for Christmas with our wounds, with our sins, sincerely recognized, to wait for the power of this God who comes to console, who comes with power, but his power is tenderness, caresses that were born from His heart, which was so good that he have his life for us".

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