Homily: 3rd Sunday in Lent – Cycle A
Friends,
starting with this third Sunday in Lent, we truly enter into the heart of this
season. Hopefully, our Lenten
disciplines have been freeing us from our disordered attachments and
distracting voices so that we can hear God the Father speaking to us and see him,
face to face, once again. Starting today
and through the next two Sundays, as we reflect on the personal encounters with
Jesus that our Gospel readings recount for us, we are invited to deepen our own
encounters with him.
The
first of the three encounters is with the Samaritan woman at the well. For me, this is the most emotionally moving
story of the three. As we will discover
in the story, this woman, perhaps through her own decisions or through
mistreatment or bad circumstances in her life, is isolated in her
community. She was married and divorced
multiple times, which in the culture of the time always brought shame on the
woman. She’d rather not be seen and so
she comes to the well at midday, when no one else is expected to be there.
There,
however, she encounters Jesus. What we
see in this encounter is the clever way that our Lord takes to help this woman
open her heart to the gift of life he came to give her. First, he catches her attention by asking her
to give him a drink. Since Jews and
Samaritans didn’t intermingle, she is astonished by his request. Thus, even though she probably hoped that she
could get her water and leave without even looking at the man sitting by the
well, she feels compelled now to engage him in dialogue. “How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan
woman, for a drink?” She’s curious and
Jesus uses that to draw her in deeper. “If
you knew the gift of God and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would
have asked him and he would have given you living water.” She is incredulous that Jesus, who doesn’t
even have a bucket, could give her a drink, and she says as much to him. However, Jesus’ reply to her incredulity touches
a chord in her heart: “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but
whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give
will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Although
the woman still misunderstands what Jesus means, her desire to relieve some
burden from her life seeks to grasp onto Jesus’ offer. And so, she says to him, “Sir, give me this
water, so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.” Now, Jesus’ response at this point may seem
like he is ignoring her request and changing the subject of the conversation. In truth, however, Jesus recognized that this
woman had now opened herself to receive what he is offering her and so he
begins to give her what she requested.
In other words, the woman said. “Sir, give me this water…” and Jesus
does exactly that: just not in the way that she was anticipating.
In
his divine nature, Jesus knew this woman completely, including all of the
emotional, spiritual, and physical burdens she had been carrying. He could see that she was burdened most by
the shame she felt over her failed marriages.
Thus, even though she hopes to be relieved of the burden of drawing
water from the well, Jesus knows that she most needs to be relieved of the
burden of her shame.
Therefore,
when she asks to receive what Jesus is offering her, he first makes her face
her most painful reality. He does so
because of what he will share next: “But the hour is coming,” he says, “and is
now here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth; and
indeed the Father seeks such people to worship him.” In other words, Jesus is saying to this
Samaritan woman that she herself will be able to offer God true worship, even
in her brokenness and shame, but only if she is willing to acknowledge the full
truth of who she is and of the reality of her life up to that point. He emphasizes this point to her: “…indeed the
Father seeks such people to worship him.”
Haltingly
now, this woman’s mind and heart were racing at the astonishing things that
Jesus has said to her. “Could this be
the Christ?” she surely thought to herself.
She expresses her faith that the Christ was to come and Jesus removes
all doubt by saying, “I am he, the one speaking with you.” She believes.
She believes and lets go of the burdens of her life that, just moments
before, she was hopeless of ever being relieved. The sign of this is that, when she leaves to
go tell the townspeople the good news that she has encountered, she leaves
behind her water jar: the physical symbol of all that burdened her.
My
friends, this journey through the heart of Lent invites us to be open to
encountering Jesus (and to be encountered by him) so as to allow him to unveil
for us the truths of our lives, and particularly the truths that we are
hesitant (or afraid, or ashamed) to acknowledge. This so that we can allow him to free us from
the burden of the lies we believe about ourselves and about our lives (which
cover up the uncomfortable truths) and be reconciled to the Father once
again. And why is this important? So that we aren’t punished by him? No! So
that we can worship him in Spirit and in truth!
Because, as we heard Jesus say, “…the Father seeks such people to
worship him.”
Therefore,
as we worship God here in this Mass, let us renew our commitment to our Lenten
disciplines of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving in the hope that they will make
us ready to encounter Jesus so that he might help us see the truth about
ourselves and about the realities of our lives.
Then, seeing his merciful gaze, we will be ready to allow him to free us
from our burdens and, thus, to renew us in Spirit and truth. Renewed in this way, we will then be ready to
go, like the Samaritan woman did, unburdened into the world to proclaim the
truths we have discovered and to invite others to encounter the same, thus
renewing God’s Church.
This
is the work of Lent; and it is a joyful work.
May the grace of this Eucharist strengthen us for this holy work.
Given in Spanish at Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish: Carmel,
IN
March 12th, 2023
No comments:
Post a Comment