Churches not interested in PM’s pieces of silver
Judas. The very name, even among those who will not darken the doors of a church on Good Friday or at Easter, is held in opprobrium. The great betrayer. Dante puts him in the lowest circle of Hell, and the world agrees.
Which is not entirely obvious. There are other characters in the Bible who have betrayed their friends, even betrayed their own family. Treachery did not arrive with Judas. Yet we single him out. Why?
There is of course the close relationship with Jesus. But the other apostles also fled. And Peter, the leader among them, denied that he even knew Jesus at the moment of trial.
It is the selling that so offends. The biblical books are replete with stories of ignoble deeds done out of fear, or cowardice, or confusion, or for ambition, for lust, for power, for apparent honour. But simply for money?
“What will you give me if I hand him over to you?” Judas asks.
And the 30 pieces of silver was paid, and remains in our language forever as the metaphor of betrayal.
If Judas had been promised the heartfelt thanks of grateful allies, or a high position at court, or approbation for doing the right thing — however mistaken, we might be more sympathetic. But for money?
Even those who paid Judas recoiled from it. When he regretted his betrayal and returned the money, they knew it was dirty and refused to keep it.
All of which comes to mind this Holy Week, not only for liturgical reasons. The story of Judas — or the incapacity to understand it — fits so well the federal government’s obstinacy on the Canada Summer Jobs program, an obstinacy that appears to be prompting Canadians to rethink whether their government is truly a champion of fundamental liberties.
Am I saying that Justin Trudeau is like Judas? No. Rather it seems that the prime minister thinks that the churches of Canada just might be. And that is more offensive still.
The government began by insisting that applicants for the Canada Summer Jobs program check off an “attestation” that they support the Liberals’ abortion policy. That was driven both by the party’s abortion extremism and ideological fundamentalism. When churches — to say nothing of Canadians who objected on pure free- speech grounds — objected, the Liberals said that applicants should just check the box, because even if they favoured some restrictions on abortion it was not part of their “core mandate.” The federal cabinet thereby aggregated to itself the determination of the “core mandates” of churches and non-profits.
Should the government determine the core mandate of a church? My own MP for Kingston and the Islands, Liberal Mark Gerretsen, wrote this: “I’m Catholic. The core mandate of my church is not to infringe upon charter rights.”
Did the Catholic Church have a core mandate before 1982? Some Catholics look to the Apostles Creed or the Gospels themselves, which are, astonishingly, even older than the charter. The prospect of people who think like Gerretsen, determining the core mandate of the churches, makes things worse.
“Not surprisingly,” wrote my Post colleague Andrew Coyne, “the churches have been no more receptive to this updated opportunity to exchange their consciences for cash than they were the first.”
The Summer Jobs “attestation” is certainly illegal on multiple constitutional grounds, but even worse, it reflects the government’s view that the churches are like Judas, content to be bought off by some variant of the 30 pieces.
No doubt some will be. One Liberal MP, Peter Fonseca from Mississauga, wrote to me claiming to “personally know many churches and religious organizations that have checked off the attestation.” If such people subscribe to the same core mandate as his colleague Gerretsen does, why wouldn’t they?
Gerretsen tells constituents that the attestation has “nothing to do with their personal beliefs or convictions” but only pertains to “activities.” Judas himself may well have been comforted to know that “activities” have “nothing to do” with beliefs or convictions.
There are ongoing attempts to rehabilitate Judas, to put his actions — including the despair that drove him to suicide — in a more favourable light. All such efforts run up against the clear words of Jesus about Judas: “It would have been better for that one never to have been born.”
Such is the severity of God’s judgment upon Judas. Consequently it is entirely to be expected that churches would not follow his example.
Why then does this Liberal government keep telling us to do just that?