March 7, 1999 |
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Third Sunday in Lent, Jn. 4/5-42 |
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| Background: There is no reason to think that this story does not refer to an event that happened during the life of Jesus, especially since a conversation between Jesus, a Jew, and a Samaritan woman would have been a bit shocking in the early Church. However, in its present form it is a theological reflection in dramatic form, indeed one written by a very skilled dramatist. It is not impossible that in fact this was a one act liturgical play acted out by the very early Christians as part of the baptismal ritual. The Sufi mystic Rumi once wrote apropos of God and humans, "thirst seeks water, but water seeks thirst." That would be a good summary of today's Gospel. Certainly Jesus defies all the politically correct conventions of his time by talking to such a person, thus denouncing implicitly all ethnic and gender prejudices. Certainly also it is a love story, harking back to the love stories at the well of Isaac and Jacob. But above all it is a story about thirst, about St. Agustine's "You have made us for yourself alone, O lord, and our hearts are restless till they rest in thee." |
read the padre |
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Story: Once upon a time there was an inquisitive little girl by the name of Amy. At least that’s the name her parents gave her when she was christened. However, by the time Amy was four years old, most people who knew her referred to her in their conversations as "that why girl." You see, Amy’s very first word was "Why?" And from that day on it was her favorite word. Why do I have to sleep? Why is it snowing? Why do we have to eat three times a day? Why does the beach have sand? Why do I have to eat to stay healthy? Why do we go to doctors? Why do people die? Etc., etc. Everyday, Amy had an unending chorus of whys. Her parents, her grandparents her teachers, the babysitters, the people on the block all noticed her inquisitiveness. Some of them thought it showed a thirst for knowledge. Others found it annoying. One day her Mom asked Amy why she was asking why? Amy’s answered that she wanted to know everything there was to know about everything in the world and so she needed at ask about things. When her mother suggested that she might not need to know everything right now, Amy replied that she did need to know it. That way she would always know what to do if there would be an emergency. Then one day, the questions stopped. Weeks went by and Amy never asked "why" about anything that happened. Eventually her mother commented that she didn’t seem to be asking why anymore. Amy replied, "Well now I know the answer to everything that’s important. My teacher told the class all about how Jesus came to tell us that God would never break God’s promise to love us. In other words, Mom, everything will always be ok in the end even if it might not seem that way right now. So now I know everything that is really important and I don’t have to worry anymore. |
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