Breaking the cycle...by accepting our enemies will work against us.
Wednesday of Holy Week 2026. John 13.21-32
[Again, a huge thank you to Charlotte Lait, LLM, for giving a voice to my words whilst mine was lost.]
It could have all ended very differently.
Jesus knew he was sitting at a table with someone who would betray him, with an enemy. He even made everyone present aware. In that moment, he was in control of the whole situation: he was hosting the meal, and his friends outnumbered his enemies. He could have easily gone for the cancel culture approach of having Judas kicked out of the group, or even had him beaten up before starting an evacuation away from Jerusalem.
But he didn’t.
Instead, he still broke bread and shared with his enemy, knowing exactly what would happen.
This isn’t to say that Jesus was passive. In the culture of the time, to receive hospitality from someone, or even share a meal together, only to later betray or oppose them, was a huge act of betrayal, marking a person out as an enemy. This is why the narrative of the musical Jesus Christ Superstar is really unhelpful: Judas wasn’t simply a disillusioned follower hoping to get a movement ‘back on track’, or suffering from jealousy whilst conflicted with good intentions. When Jesus includes Judas in his hospitality, he forces Judas to make a conscious choice: either own his part in Jesus’ chosen family or reject the light of the world. When the gospel writer notes that it was night after Judas ate his bread and left, this isn’t simply an indication of time: Judas has opted for darkness over the light.
The awful reality is that whilst every human being is made in the image of God, and whilst nothing can separate us from the Love of God, we are all capable of being corrupted, and as we have sadly seen far too often in our newspapers or on our screens, some people actively choose what is evil, corrupting, destructive, and chaotic, over the goodness of God.
In many cultures, the response to this is to cast these people out, to have them removed, locked away, exiled, or even killed. In the 4th century, there was even a Christian sect dedicated to excluding Christian ministers who weren’t considered sufficiently pure. This was ultimately deemed a heresy (one that is, sadly, alive and well across the world, including in the Church of England).
Jesus, however, doesn’t perpetuate cycles of vengeance and suffering. What Jesus says when he overrules the legal precedent of ‘an eye for an eye’ is born out in his actions. He metaphorically ‘turns the other cheek’, acknowledging Judas actions thus far and even challenging him to make a choice, leaving the possibility of being wronged wide open.
As Christian’s, ‘little Christ’s’, our own label is an ownership of the mockery by our enemies in the early centuries of the faith. We own it in following Christ’s example of accepting that others will choose to be our enemies, not simply by being ‘other’, whether through birth, faith, or doubt, but in actively hating and deriding us for who we are. Part of this vocation is accepting it, whilst always leaving the possibility of redemption open. If we are to be faithful to Christ, the pattern of our calling as his baptised people, then we can do little better than to take the advice of Kent Keith and St Theresa of Calcutta:
People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered.
Forgive them anyway.If you are kind,
people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Be kind anyway.If you are successful,
you will win some false friends and some true enemies.
Succeed anyway.If you are honest and frank,
people may cheat you.
Be honest and frank anyway.What you spend years building,
someone could destroy overnight.
Build anyway.If you find serenity and happiness,
they may be jealous.
Be happy anyway.The good you do today,
people will often forget tomorrow.
Do good anyway.Give the world the best you have,
and it may never be enough.
Give the best you’ve got anyway.You see,
in the final analysis it is between you and God ;
it was never between you and them anyway.