Homily | April 1, 2026 | Betrayal Starts Long Before The Kiss (Episode 74)

Well, we arrive at Wednesday of Holy Week, and today traditionally it's called Spy Wednesday.

It's where everything comes to a head.

The lines are drawn, the decision is made.

There's no more drifting, there's no more ambiguity.

Something has settled in the heart.

The first reading from Isaiah gives us one of the most powerful interior portraits of Christ.

The Lord has given me a well-trained tongue that I might know how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them.

That's who Jesus is.

He speaks into exhaustion, he speaks into discouragement, into the places where people are barely holding on.

And he lifts them up.

But that same servant says something else, morning after morning, he opens my ear, and I have not rebelled.

That's the key.

Before he speaks, before he listens, before he acts, before he receives, his strength comes from total obedience to the Father.

And that obedience is not abstract.

It leads somewhere very concrete and very brutal.

I gave my back to those who beat me, and my face I did not shield.

This is not weakness.

This is chosen surrender.

He sets his face like flint.

He knows exactly what's coming.

He walks into it.

Now hold that image because if we go to the gospel, it shows us the exact same opposite is going on.

Judas goes to the chief priest and asks one of the most chilling questions of all scripture.

What are you willing to give me?

That question reveals everything.

It reduces Jesus to a transaction.

It turns a relationship into a negotiation.

30 pieces of silver, that's the price.

That's what sin does when it takes root.

Starts to look for openings.

It becomes strategic.

It waits for the right moment to act.

It waits for the moment to sin, to engage in that certain behavior.

That's where we're back at the table again.

Same setting as yesterday, but now it's even heavier.

Jesus says, one of you will betray me.

And what's striking is the reaction of the disciples, well, uh, surely not me, Lord.

That's actually the right question.

Not who is it?

Not it can't be me, but Lord, is it me?

There's humility.

That's self-awareness.

They know themselves enough to know that they are capable of falling.

But then Jesus, Judas, but then Judas speaks, and this is where the gospel becomes almost unbearable.

He says, Surely it is not I, Rabbi, not Lord, but Rabbi.

Not Lord, but teacher.

You see how he's already distancing himself?

And Jesus responds, You have said so.

Here's the hard truth.

Judas is not surprised by his betrayal.

He has already decided, he's already justified it.

He is sitting at the table, but his heart is somewhere else.

And that's the danger of spy Wednesday.

It's not the dramatic fall, it's the quiet decision that precedes it.

It's when you already know what you're going to do.

It's precalculated.

And you go through the motions anyway.

It's when you still show up, but your heart has checked out.

You're not there.

It's when you call him Rabbi, but you no longer call him Lord.

For honest, that's where the gospel hits hard.

Because betrayal rarely happens all at once.

It happens slowly.

A compromise here, a justification there, a small lie turns into a big lie, a small closing of the heart, until one day the decision is already made.

Meanwhile, Jesus is moving in the opposite direction.

Total openness to the Father, total gift of himself, no calculation, no negotiation, two movements, two hearts.

One says, What can I get?

The other says, I will give everything.

And today, right before we enter the trudum, the church puts the question in front of us, almost surgical.

Where is your heart?

Not what do you say, not what do you intend, not what do you hope to be.

But right now, here, as you listen to me, where's your heart leaning?

Because Holy Week is not a performance, it is a decisive intentional act.

And the difference between Judas and the Saints is not that one was weak and the other are strong, it is that one closed in on himself and the other surrendered.

So, my brothers and sisters, today, right before we enter the triduum, don't look at Judas from a distance.

That's too easy.

Ask the harder question Lord, is it me?

And then, before night falls, choose him again and again and again, even when it's hard.

Amen.