My task today in preaching is a bit like when I put something together for
either Easter or Christmas. On a normal Sunday, the readings are the same,
whether it is the Saturday Vigil Mass or the Sunday morning Mass, but at
Easter you have the Easter Vigil, with many readings, and then the Easter
Sunday Mass having different readings, and at Christmas, there are the two
different Masses for Christmas Eve and two different Masses for Christmas
Day, making up four different sets of readings. This weekend we have the First
Scrutiny taking place at the Vigil Mass, which requires using the Year A
readings, but then for the Sunday Masses we are using the Year C readings, in
part because those are the ones on the Sunday Mass sheet. So I’ve got to try
and say something that fits the readings, whichever Mass you are coming to
this weekend.
One of the overall themes is that we all need to repent, no matter who we are,
from the homeless man in the street, to the Pope in Rome, and everyone else in-
between. There’s always the danger of wanting to relax, to think that we have
made it, and to just freewheel or coast along, without realising that our spiritual
life is slowing down and we are going off the boil and becoming lukewarm.
Another danger with thinking that we have got it all made, is that we then use
our energies to look for faults in others, rather than concentrating on ourselves.
We can become like fig trees that are producing no fruit; we’re otherwise good
and healthy trees, but we’ve not been planted exclusively for locking away
carbon; we’re supposed to be producing figs. God, in His mercy, is giving us
another chance; Lent is here to help us to break through our complacency.
But it’s not a DIY job. It’s not just a matter of trying a bit harder, putting in
more effort, or even finding specialist help. If we are to grow in divine life, we
can’t invent that by ourselves. We need that to come from God. It’s a bit like
when Moses encountered the Lord in the burning bush: it wasn’t a nice magic
trick for him to enjoy and then go home; God had a mission for him – go to my
broken people in slavery in Egypt and tell them God has heard their cry and
now He is going to work miracles and lead them out of their slavery. Think of
the great sense of expectation and hope this must have brought the Israelites
when they first heard it. As we probably know, God worked various miracles
through Moses and Aaron, and Pharaoh was very slow to be convinced. It was
only, finally, with the death of his son, that Pharaoh told them all to leave him,
afraid that he might be dead next. One of the things that can sometimes strike
us about the characters in the Bible is that they are so realistic, and that there is
nothing new under the sun – technology may have changed, politics may have
changed and so on, but people’s humanity remains the same, still full of the
same worries, doubts, fears, expectations, hopes and joys as today.
When Christ encountered the Samaritan woman at the well, there was a lot of
background to this encounter. The Samaritans, yes, didn’t get on with the
Jews, a bit like the situation in the past between Protestants and Catholics in
Northern Ireland. They were both of the same faith origin, but, and I only
discovered this on Friday, the Samaritans didn’t accept all of the Scriptures that
were held holy by the Jews. We’ll come back to that in a few moments.
If we’re looking at the theme of repentance and the call to conversion, the
Samaritan woman was something of an outcast in society. She came to the well
at “about the sixth hour”, which is midday, when only mad dogs and
Englishmen are around because of the blazing sun. She goes to gather water at
a time when she hopes no one else will see her.
The Lord, when He encounters her, is thirsty for the blossoming of her faith,
and He draws her gradually to come to believe in Him. He doesn’t shy away
from addressing the topics that need to be faced. He shows her He is aware of
the failures in her personal life, and that leads her to actually trust in Him as
some sort of prophetic figure from whom she wants advice. On the religious
question between Jews and Samaritans, she asks, should we worship here or in
Jerusalem? He tells her: “You worship what you do not know; we worship
what we know, for salvation is from the Jews” – true ecumenism means we
need to confront the truth and build on a solid foundation, rather than ignoring
important issues and just saying nice things to each other. As I mentioned
earlier, the Samaritans only have the first five books of the Old Testament, so
they are unaware of all the prophecies about the coming of the Messiah. But
what leads to her conversion is not just plain asserting of the truth, but also the
compassion that goes with it, and we can so easily give the one without the
other, supposed love or truth, but we don’t always manage to get the two to fit
together in the way that Our Lord does.
We need conversion, and we are like the Samaritan woman. We need the love
of Christ, and the truth He brings. Then, at last, the Scriptures are brought to
their fulfilment, and our conversion becomes a much easier thing.
Curious about exploring things further? If you would like to ask further questions about the topics raised in these homilies (or maybe think it wasn’t explained too well!), please feel free to e-mail Fr Michael at stjoseph.thame@rcaob.org.uk