| U.S. News

Writing in the May issue of the monthly archdiocesan newspaper, People of God, Archbishop Sheehan said the National Geographic Society, which sponsored an English translation of the ancient text and put the manuscript on exhibit in early April "did a disservice to Christian people and has exploited this old manuscript for its own purposes."

In the early centuries of Christianity several breakaway sects, mixing Christian beliefs with pagan speculation, claimed that salvation could be obtained only through the knowledge and acceptance of certain arcane, divinely revealed mysteries that they alone possessed. The sects were called gnostic, after the Greek word for knowledge, and were rejected as heretical by the early church.

"In the early church there were many writings such as the Gospel of Judas which were rejected as unworthy to be included in the Bible," Archbishop Sheehan wrote. "We believe that the early church fathers had the guidance of the Holy Spirit in determining which writings were truly authentic and inspired by God and which writings were not. Obviously the Gospel of Judas did not 'make the cut.'"

The Judas manuscript is a third-century Coptic text, uncovered in Egypt in the 1970s. It may be the sole surviving version of a long-lost Greek text of the same name that St. Irenaeus condemned as heretical in A.D. 180.

In conjunction with displaying the manuscript at its headquarters in Washington, the National Geographic Society has published two books about it, made it the cover feature of the May issue of National Geographic magazine, and did a television special that appeared on Palm Sunday on cable's National Geographic Channel.

"The text speaks highly of Judas and says that he was a friend of Jesus and that Jesus wanted Judas to betray him so that God's plan might be fulfilled," Archbishop Sheehan said.

He said the National Geographic Society has done a disservice because it "has presented the Gospel of Judas as, in some way, credible."

This "could cause Christian people to have questions or doubts about the Bible" and authentic Christian teaching, he said.

He noted that the four gospels found in the Bible are about the life, teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus. "The Gospel of Judas is not about Jesus, but rather about Judas himself and seeks to rehabilitate him or put him in a favorable light," he said.

"The Bible clearly contradicts the heretical teaching" of that text, he said.

He noted that Mark's Gospel "clearly describes Judas Iscariot as an unworthy disciple who betrayed Christ."

"The Gospel of John repeats this truth and also points out the Judas was a thief. ... Jesus himself said that it would have been better if Judas had not been born," Archbishop Sheehan wrote.

He quoted Jesuit Father Gerald O'Collins, a noted theology professor in Rome: "The Gospel of Judas was junk in 180 and is junk today."