March 19, 2017
Third Sunday of Lent
Have we judged the woman at Jacob’s well in Samaria too harshly? She comes to the well to draw water at noon. Is she being shunned by women in the village who come early in the morning? Jesus seems to know her past: “You have had five husbands and the one you have now is not your husband.†Do we assume she is immoral -- a fallen or loose woman?
The strictness of ancient marital customs prompts us to pause and to reconsider her circumstance. As a young girl her father made the choice with whom she would marry. A decision to divorce was made by the husband. A financially desperate family could arrange a marriage to help the family survive. If her own father remained too poor to “redeem†her, her husband could sell her to another man. You may say farfetched. One of the projects in our new “Service Club†is to cut and sew dresses for young girls to wear in parts of the world to lessen the chance that the girl will be taken into trafficking.
At first the unnamed woman is defensive when Jesus asks her for a drink. It is an awkward moment breaking convention. But Jesus goes on to explain that he is offering her “living water.†Jesus does not condemn her but enters into a conversation about true worship. Her appreciation for “this man†who treats her with respect deepens. You can tell the change in how she speaks to Jesus – referring to him first as “a Jew†then “Sir†then “a prophet†then wondering: “I know the Messiah is coming, the one called the Christ.†The woman leaves the water jar and goes to tell people in town: “Come see a man who told me everything I have done. Could he possibly be the Christ?†The woman becomes an apostle!
During the season of Lent, like the woman at the well, we are invited to examine our own lives without judgment or condemnation. Jesus knows our past and offers us life giving water of God’s Word and the gift of Divine Mercy.
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Second Sunday of Lent
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Fourth Sunday of Lent
