Today’s Gospel tells the story of a woman who goes to a well for a jug of water and has a life altering encounter with Jesus and is promised a special kind of water with properties far beyond her wildest imaginings.
In the socio-religious context of today’s Gospel story, according to the cultural mores and religious laws, this woman is perhaps the last person to whom “living water” should be given. At least that is what we are supposed to think. After all, she is a woman who, in a male-preferred society, is undeserving of any special privileges. Furthermore, she is a Samaritan, a member of the group that observant Jews considered fallen away from the true religion of Israel, and therefore apostates, and no longer people of the covenant.
On top of that, she is a woman of questionable virtue, even within her own community.
Many scholars believe that is the reason she came all alone to the well, and in the heat of the day, to draw water, rather than in the company of the other women, in the cool of the morning. Because of this, many scholars surmise that she may well have been an outsider in her own village.
In the first reading along with the Israelites, we are told that God will quench our thirst. In the Gospel we discover that Jesus is the source of “living water.” Thus, we may conclude that God’s promise to quench our thirst, is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It is interesting to note that in all of this, there is no talk of our meriting this life-giving water. The Israelites were undeserving, the Samaritan woman was undeserving, and we too, in our human sinfulness, are undeserving. This life-giving water is not earned or deserved but freely given by the grace and mercy of God.
It is from God’s lavish love that this water flows and our thirst is slaked. What matters is whether we recognize that we are thirsty and know to seek Jesus Christ to have our thirst quenched through him.
I think it is very important to note that this woman at the center of today’s Gospel encounter could easily, particularly through the lens of misogyny, be written off as a sinful person. But that would completely miss the point and the trajectory of her encounter with Jesus. A hugely significant point of the story is not just that she is sinful but that she is a Samaritan woman! And Jesus is a Jewish man and he should know better than to have anything to do with her! So we have a man approaching a woman in an area where they are alone and they are unrelated to each other -- this is very problematic according to 1st Century Middle Eastern social codes of appropriate and acceptable behavior between women and men. Jesus should know better, but he has a plan and his plan is to offer her salvation, regardless of her “outsider religious status,” regardless of her sin. Jesus is the Living Mercy of God.
The trajectory of this encounter that is so important, is that Jesus manifests that God’s plan of salvation is not just for the House of Israel, it is for all people. It is even open to Samaritans, and this reality, while it may be lost on most Christians today, it was surely not lost on the early hearers of this Gospel encounter.
How does this Gospel’s message of the universal mercy of God for all people regardless of their social, political or religious status, inform my review of the political agenda and policies of this administration in Washington D.C., being carried out throughout the nation and around the world?
And what is my response? Will I continue to write to and call members of Congress (both Republican and Democrat) expressing my outrage, shared by Pope Leo and the US Bishop’s Conference, at the brutal and inhumane treatment of immigrants, refugees and people of color by ICE and other Government officials? Because every letter, every call, every protest, every act of resisting unchristian and immoral policies that dehumanize, marginalize and harm human beings, is an
informed statement of Gospel values, and a de facto act of living out our discipleship of Jesus Christ.
May the peace and light of the Risen Christ be upon you all!
Fr. Tim
In the socio-religious context of today’s Gospel story, according to the cultural mores and religious laws, this woman is perhaps the last person to whom “living water” should be given. At least that is what we are supposed to think. After all, she is a woman who, in a male-preferred society, is undeserving of any special privileges. Furthermore, she is a Samaritan, a member of the group that observant Jews considered fallen away from the true religion of Israel, and therefore apostates, and no longer people of the covenant.
On top of that, she is a woman of questionable virtue, even within her own community.
Many scholars believe that is the reason she came all alone to the well, and in the heat of the day, to draw water, rather than in the company of the other women, in the cool of the morning. Because of this, many scholars surmise that she may well have been an outsider in her own village.
In the first reading along with the Israelites, we are told that God will quench our thirst. In the Gospel we discover that Jesus is the source of “living water.” Thus, we may conclude that God’s promise to quench our thirst, is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It is interesting to note that in all of this, there is no talk of our meriting this life-giving water. The Israelites were undeserving, the Samaritan woman was undeserving, and we too, in our human sinfulness, are undeserving. This life-giving water is not earned or deserved but freely given by the grace and mercy of God.
It is from God’s lavish love that this water flows and our thirst is slaked. What matters is whether we recognize that we are thirsty and know to seek Jesus Christ to have our thirst quenched through him.
I think it is very important to note that this woman at the center of today’s Gospel encounter could easily, particularly through the lens of misogyny, be written off as a sinful person. But that would completely miss the point and the trajectory of her encounter with Jesus. A hugely significant point of the story is not just that she is sinful but that she is a Samaritan woman! And Jesus is a Jewish man and he should know better than to have anything to do with her! So we have a man approaching a woman in an area where they are alone and they are unrelated to each other -- this is very problematic according to 1st Century Middle Eastern social codes of appropriate and acceptable behavior between women and men. Jesus should know better, but he has a plan and his plan is to offer her salvation, regardless of her “outsider religious status,” regardless of her sin. Jesus is the Living Mercy of God.
The trajectory of this encounter that is so important, is that Jesus manifests that God’s plan of salvation is not just for the House of Israel, it is for all people. It is even open to Samaritans, and this reality, while it may be lost on most Christians today, it was surely not lost on the early hearers of this Gospel encounter.
How does this Gospel’s message of the universal mercy of God for all people regardless of their social, political or religious status, inform my review of the political agenda and policies of this administration in Washington D.C., being carried out throughout the nation and around the world?
And what is my response? Will I continue to write to and call members of Congress (both Republican and Democrat) expressing my outrage, shared by Pope Leo and the US Bishop’s Conference, at the brutal and inhumane treatment of immigrants, refugees and people of color by ICE and other Government officials? Because every letter, every call, every protest, every act of resisting unchristian and immoral policies that dehumanize, marginalize and harm human beings, is an
informed statement of Gospel values, and a de facto act of living out our discipleship of Jesus Christ.
May the peace and light of the Risen Christ be upon you all!
Fr. Tim
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