20th Sunday in Ordinary Time – August 16, 2020 – Gospel: Matthew 19: 3-12
It seems to me there are three important strands that constitute our reflection today, about this healing miracle of Christ. 1. We can’t pretend we didn’t hear Jesus call a non-Jewish woman’s kinsfolk dogs. 2. Her dialogue with Jesus results in JESUS pointing her out to us believers as a faith example. 3. This is no ordinary healing episode: it signals to us Christians how Jesus’ ministry came to include us, the non-Jews, the gentiles. Let’s break open God’s Word, and find some nourishment.
1.Yes: we heard in Matthew’s gospel Jesus calls a non-Jewish pagan’s kinsfolk dogs. Not her. But rather than defend JESUS’ words, or say “JESUS didn’t get a good night’s sleep, or had a bad day the day before,” I understand this event within the context of the first-century culture: that is, how people talked and communicated with others back then. It’s because of the age-old tension between Jews and Canaanites, and because the Jews think the pagans are faithless, JESUS says: “It is not right to take the food of the children, and throw it to the dogs.” And the woman says, “Please, Lord, for even the puppies eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.” Words do shift meaning from one culture, and one context, to another.
Think of our own time. If a man calls a woman or a girl a dog: it’s a putdown. If a man calls another man a dog, it could mean that one man found another to be shifty, underhanded, unreliable, and untrustworthy. But if you listen to pop music and TV dramas, a man can call a man a dog [pronounced “dawg”] and be referring to his friend, his buddy, his comrade, his close companion, especially when they are travelling together. Again, we recall that the meaning and intent of words can and DO shift when spoken in a different context.
2. But second, let’s take a look at this extraordinary woman, begging for her daughter’s healing. This is no run-of-the-mill non-believer. She approaches Jesus and calls him Lord, Son of David. Jews knew what the connection of the promised Messiah was to King David, pagans did not. And how ironic it is: this woman, considered pagan by Jewish standards, is calling Jesus Lord, and Jesus had recently been rejected by the Pharisees and Scribes. In fact, Jesus calls them blind guides and blind fools, because they go through the motions of communicating with God, but their hearts are not connected to God’s heart. Then, this same woman bows or kneels before Jesus in homage: again, not too many people did that.
And then, when Jesus and this woman go head-to-head, she had a ready answer for Jesus: she knew she was perceived as a 2nd -class citizen by Jewish society, but she held her head up! Because when we put her words and actions and gestures before Jesus, even with the odds stacked against her from a long-simmering hatred between her people and the Jews, she still believed she had a place at the feet of a healing Jesus!
So, what shifted in the dialogue from there? Jesus saw and heard her love, courage, and her perseverance,, and when we put those virtues together with her calling Jesus Son of David, Jesus saw faith in her. Of course, we believers remember that Jesus always sees and hears the full intentions in our hearts, even unspoken ones. This woman’s great and unconditional love for her daughter, and her daughter’s well-being, comes shining thru as an example for all.
People with great love are often willing to do whatever is necessary to help a loved one: One 21st century mom who had two children with multiple disabilities had to return to school-board meetings, repeatedly requesting the services that the district actually advertised in their publicity brochures. She went “to the wall,” even while being insulted and mocked, even accused of wanting to “steal” services that the school district said her children did not need. Well, like the Canaanite woman in the Gospel, this 21st century advocate-mom was NOT going to take NO for an answer. She knew what her children needed, and wouldn’t rest without exhausting each resource or appeal.
3. Yes: Jesus teaches us to ask, so that we might receive; so being persistent in prayer is one takeaway lesson. And while earlier today we all heard Jesus say that he’d only come “for the lost sheep of Israel,” the healing of this woman’s daughter signaled a new beginning in Jesus’ public ministry. For us, we see and hear how God was widening and opening up the term “Chosen People” to include people of all races.
This is the start of Jesus proclaiming God’s love to include everyone, including us goys, that is, non-Jews. It signals to US that even when we’re not getting along with people of other nations, God is ALSO calling those people beloved and blessed ones. We need to develop, here and now, the vision that God’s has; for in God’s plan: enemies will begin to speak to each other; those who were estranged will join hands in friendship, and nations will begin to seek the ways of peace together. All this nourishment and yes some challenges also, come from a dialogue from almost 2000 ago, a lesson from our roots that is a sign of heaven’s glory to come. And so we pray to God: Your kingdom come, O God: Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Amen. God bless your week. Father Chris