Date: Sunday, March 12, 2023

At the end of the Gospel according to St. John, dying on the cross, aware that everything was now finished, Jesus says, “I thirst.” In this extreme condition, Jesus naturally or physically would ask for a sip of water or wine to quench his thirst. We know in the Gospel according to St. John, there are often deeper layers of meaning. Jesus “thirsts” to be one with his Father in heaven and Jesus “thirsts” to accomplish, to finish “the work” of the Father on earth.

In our Gospel today, again from John, Jesus is determined to pass through Samaria on his return to Galilee. He stops “tired” at Jacob’s well. It is a weariness to do God’s work that those who come to believe in him may not perish but experience eternal life. The disciples go into town to buy food. A woman from Samaria comes to draw water. Jesus makes a request, “Give me a drink.” She comes to draw water from the well at noon. Is she being shunned by women in the village who come early in the morning to avoid the hot sun and to socialize? Jesus having a conversation with an unaccompanied woman is culturally awkward even shocking. They engage in a conversation about “living water” and then about her personal life. She has been married before and Jesus seems to know that the man she is with is not her husband. The conversation ends with Jesus and the woman talking about true worship not taking place at the temple in Jerusalem or on the mountain in Samaria but the manner of worshipping the Father in Spirit and truth.

When the disciples return, the woman leaves her “water jar” and goes to tell the town folk that she has met someone who knows everything about her. She realizes that Jesus is offering her “living water” that will quench her deepest thirst for meaning, for belonging, for being loved and respected as a human being. “Living waters” are not stagnant but flow with currents that carry us into community and into the world with the life that we have received in and through our encounter with Christ. Living waters cannot be bottled but bubble up in us -- springs of eternal life.

Buffalo and WNY have experienced a great deal of loss and trauma -- most recently with the tragic death of a fireman who lost his life fighting a blaze on Main Street. The sacrifice of Jason Arno has touched the heart of our community. Delton Arno, his brother, gave the eulogy on Friday in Saint Joseph Cathedral. He said his brother is more “than a hero.” Delton spoke of his brother’s humanity by describing him as, “risky, loving, mischievous, compassionate, altruistic, belligerent, thoughtful, kind. The heart of the family, the glue between crowds, the life of the room, center of gravity, the level head among the chaos.”

Jesus comes to us like he did for the woman at Jacob’s well, like he came to Jason Arno, like he is coming to Dixie Andrews who will be baptized during the Easter Vigil, as he comes to all of us at Eucharist here in this church and at home in “Spirit and truth.” During the homily, Rev. James Van Dyke, spoke of the student he had as a freshman at Canisius High School. “How much that little guy, in the first seat of the first row in room 1B9 at Canisius High School, had grown. Not just in size, stature, and smarts, but how much he had grown in love.”