Understanding, Love and Mercy are Integral to Justice
Homily of Bishop Barbarito at the Red Mass Sunday October 5, 2025.
Many of you in the legal profession, as well as outside of it, are familiar with Judge Frank Caprio, who passed away from pancreatic cancer this year on Aug. 19, just a little over two months ago. Judge Caprio was most famous for his television series, Caught in Providence, in which the Rhode Island-based judge and lawyer heard many cases of low-level legal citations, which gained a huge population of over 20 million viewers. He was known as the “nicest judge in the world” due to his obvious compassion, understanding and humanity, while applying the law in the lives of everyday people of Providence.
From a poor Italian Catholic immigrant family, he lived the real meaning of faith and family, making a real difference in life, by being the unique person God had created him to be and respecting the dignity of every other person made in the same way.
In February of this year, Judge Caprio published a book, reflecting upon the many years of his life and what influenced him most in his dealing with people in his role as judge. He states, “The cases themselves are not matters for law journals, or the Supreme Court. The circumstances that brought them to court are real-world challenges from which we can all learn. What I hope to demonstrate is that having compassion, respect and understanding for ourselves and for others can yield more positive results in business and in life. I hope this also helps the world become a better place.”
In our nation and world today, torn by such division, hatred and violence, it is truly the wisdom of Judge Caprio and true justice that can make the only difference when politics, rampant instant digital-age communications and rapidly growing, but also misinforming, artificial intelligence continue to fail us, and only deepen the divisions. We need, as Pope Leo XIV is reminding us, to return to the heart. Judge Caprio was fond of saying, “I don’t wear a badge under my robe, I wear a heart.”
Early in September, Pope Leo XIV addressed a video message to the participants of an event, titled Gestures of Welcome, which took place on the Isle of Lampedusa. You may recall that Lampedusa was the first papal visit away from Rome that Pope Francis made in July 2013 after a tragic boat accident involving migrants. Pope Leo expressed how on that visit Pope Francis denounced the “globalization of indifference in the face of migration tragedies.” Gestures of Welcome brought together local residents, volunteers, Church representatives and civic authorities to reflect on the island’s experience as a front line of migration. Pope Leo reflected how the people of Lampedusa can make a difference because history is not written only by the powerful but “is saved by the humble, the just, the martyrs, in whom goodness shines and authentic humanity resists and is renewed.” Pope Leo so well expressed heart-lived wisdom in regard to justice: “There is no justice without compassion, there is no legitimacy without listening to the suffering of others.”
Just two weeks ago, on Sept. 20, the Jubilee of Justice took place in Rome, with a large crowd of pilgrims, many within the legal profession from around the world, to cross the Holy Door of St. Peter’s Basilica and to hear the pope speak to them. Pope Leo’s words were powerful and profound ones in regard to the meaning of justice, emphasizing that justice must be animated by wisdom, love and mercy. His message is one that is so much needed by our world today. Pope Leo spoke of the inherent need for justice among peoples, emphasizing that while justice disposes us to respect the rights of each person and promote the harmony that preserves the common good, the Lord speaks of a higher justice which makes mercy the key of interpretation in relationships, even moving one to forgiveness. He explained, “There are many examples in the Gospel in which human actions are measured by justice that can overcome the evil of abuse. For instance, there is the persistence of the widow who urges the judge to recover his sense of justice (cf. Lk 18:1-8). There is also a higher justice that pays the worker of the last hour as much as the one who works all day (cf. Mt 20:1-16); a justice that makes mercy the key to understanding relationships and leads us to forgiveness, welcoming the son who was lost and has been found
(Lk 5:11-32); and even more a justice that calls us to forgive not seven times, but seventy-seven times (cf. Mt 18:21-35). It is this power of forgiveness, intrinsic to the commandment of love, that emerges as a constitutive element of justice capable of combining the supernatural with the human.”
The Gospel passage that we just listened to for this 27th Sunday of Ordinary Time is a good example of the message of Pope Leo XIV. Jesus tells His disciples that the servants who carried out their daily work in the field were not entitled to any special privileges when they returned to the master, but first had to serve at table before they had their own dinner. That may seem a bit extreme and restrictive, especially in regard to the other examples of justice to which Pope Leo refers. However, the point of Jesus is that, when we carry out what God expects of us, in terms of justice, mercy, compassion, forgiveness, understanding and unity, we are doing the justice of God, which is what God expects of us. This is borne out in the example of Jesus at the Last Supper, who, in the Gospel of St. John, washes the feet of His disciples before the meal. God became one of us in a justice that comprises mercy and compassion as the model as to how we are to live. The master becomes the servant and calls us all friends. This is what our world needs more than anything else today. We need the justice of God which is always in the context of love, mercy and compassion. No one is exempt from this.
Today is also Respect Life Sunday under the theme during this Jubilee Year of Hope, Life: Our Sign of Hope. My letter for this year can be found in the parish bulletin and on our Diocesan website. As we reflect upon justice, it is imperative to reflect upon the gift of life, at all stages, as one to be respected and cherished with only God being the one who gives and calls it back. I thank all of you for your efforts and prayers to foster a respect for the gift of life so much needed today.
The first reading for today from the book of the prophet Habakkuk sums up well justice infused with wisdom, love and mercy: “The rash man has no integrity; but the just man, because of his faith, shall live” (Hb 1:4).
Most Reverend Gerald M. Barbarito
