(Isaiah 56:1, 6-7; Romans 11:13-15, 29-32; Matthew 15:21-28)
People of God, today’s Gospel reading is provocative in that it can move us to face up to, and appreciate anew, our own Catholic awareness of, and attitude to, God; and to be more aware of the role of religious belief in the context of today’s proudly pagan and indulgent, disbelieving and spiritually indolent, society. Moreover, it offers us an opportunity to learn and appreciate more deeply the Personality of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour, Jesus.
The Gospel told us that Jesus had left Israel and was
walking with His disciples through a Gentile region where, even today we hear, religious
men and women in conservative areas do
not talk to strangers of the opposite
sex; indeed, rabbis do not even talk to female members of their own families in
public. Consequently, there was nothing
strange in Jesus’ ignoring the cries of the Syrophoenician woman.
And yet, here at the very beginning of our consideration of
today’s Gospel reading, the story has already, quite possibly, begun to reveal
some of us to ourselves because, very
many people today would strongly assert that it was not ‘nice’ of Jesus
to ignore that woman thus; after all, they would explain, is not religion
supposed to be about ‘being nice, doing good, to people’?
The woman herself was well aware of the barrier of social
propriety between her – a woman and a Gentile – thus publicly addressing Jesus,
a man and a Jew, for she put on a smattering of Jewishness by calling out to Jesus
as would a Jewish believer:
Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David!
As she became more troublesome, however, His disciples said
to Jesus:
Send her away, for she keeps calling
out after us.
Jesus’
reply shows us just how far the contemporary opinion, that religion is about
being nice and doing ‘good’ to people, is from Jesus’ own Personal attitude:
He said in reply, “I was sent only
to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
Notice,
Jesus was concerned only with doing the will of Him Who had sent Him:
I was sent only to the
lost sheep of the house of Israel.
At this
juncture I want you to recall how Jesus responded to His mother Mary’s surprising
behaviour at the
marriage feast in Cana when she told the servants, ‘Do whatever He tells you.’ Jesus was not thinking about doing anything
at that moment; Mary’s behaviour had been rather unusual and had made things somewhat
awkward for Jesus. The Syrophoenician
women was doing something like that here:
(She) came and did Him homage,
saying, “Lord, help me.”
Thus far, Jesus had adverted to the woman only by rejecting
His disciples’ call for Him to do something about her. However, that request by His disciples seems
to have given the woman herself confidence enough to come forward quickly and
throw herself at Jesus' feet asking for a miraculous cure for her daughter, and
Jesus did then give her His own Personal attention by saying:
It is not right to take the
food of the children and throw it to the dogs.
It is important for us to understand the mind of Jesus
here. St. John tells us (6:38) that
Jesus once explained that He had not just come here on earth, He had been
sent by His Father, and He was
here only to do His Father's will:
I have come down from heaven not
to do My own will but the will of Him Who sent Me.
Notice also, People of God, Jesus did not say He had come
among us to do good; He came to do His Father's will, and that
was His whole purpose of His life on earth, because the Father alone is good,
as Jesus once said:
Why do you call Me good? NO
ONE IS GOOD EXCEPT GOD ALONE. (Mark 10:18)
There we have the key to most of our world's sufferings
today. There are so many people, often
called do-gooders, the ‘woke’ ones who -- in society as a whole, in the
government, in the European Union, at the European Court of Justice, the United
Nations -- say they seek to do good, and probably not a few of them think they
are sincere; but the good they seek is the good that they themselves approve
of, in other words, their own idea of what is good for mankind. Jesus, on the other hand, did not seek to do
good as even He saw it; He sought to do the only real and true good for
men-and-women-made-by-God-in-His- own-likeness, that is, the will of God, His
Father's will for them.
So here, at this stage in our Gospel reading, we can
recognize Jesus seeking to find what qualifications, so to speak, this woman
had from His Father; for His Father had not sent Him to serve the pagan peoples
around but only 'the lost sheep of the house of Israel'. Therefore, He said to the woman:
It is not right to take the
food of the children and throw it to the dogs.
How many women today would have stormed off in an upsurge of
self-righteous indignation after words of that sort!! This woman was not like that, however, and
this is where we must start to learn about ourselves from her example,
because she was deeply aware of the holiness both of Jesus and of the God from
whom she was seeking a miracle; she was in no way preoccupied with any presumed
worth or ‘rights’ of her own. So many of
those who decry or ignore God and the Church today are filled with imaginations
of that sort: their human rights and their own social dignity and
worth, while having little or no awareness of God and certainly no reverence or
awe in their appreciation of His dignity.
The woman in the Gospel, answered Jesus in humility and
truth, and speaking with a wisdom that was not her own she said:
Please, Lord, for even the
dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.
Unknown to herself she had, with those unstudied words, produced
her credentials: for Jesus recognized at once that such wisdom could only
have been given her by His Father. And
so, without further ado, He said:
O woman, great is your faith!
Let it be done for you as you wish.
St. Matthew, recounting that event, was showing his converts,
both Jewish and pagan -- and also telling us -- that in Jesus' estimation a
miraculous cure -- like that of the daughter of the Canaanite woman -- is
nothing more than a few crumbs in comparison with the heavenly banquet prepared
in heaven for His disciples and for all those who will subsequently become
children of God the Father through faith in Jesus. We who are present at Mass, who offer the
Eucharistic Sacrifice and share in the Eucharistic food, must recognize and
appreciate that we are thereby sharing in and partaking of a treasure
incomparably more stupendous and awe-inspiring than any miraculous cure!
We would, indeed, be thrilled if a miracle were to take
place here in our midst. Why, therefore, are we not much more thrilled
by the heavenly realities taking place in our Catholic worship. and at the
beginnings of heavenly transformation being afforded us, as individual disciples
of Jesus and children of God, through our faithful Christian and Catholic devotion
to and love for Jesus, and our commitment to and service of His Church and His
people!
The reason is that we can only come to such an appreciation
by an active faith: not just mere
believing, which accepts words without seeking to be caught up by, or involved
in, their deeper meaning. Dear People of God, an active faith, a burning,
longing, and loving faith is essential for our Catholic growth and
fulfilment; a faith which tries sincerely to appreciate and respond to God’s
teaching and Jesus’ actions, a faith such as that of the Canaanite woman, of whom
Jesus most approvingly said:
O
woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.
By nature we are sensitive, responsive, to physical
blessings and worldly wonders. By faith
we must endeavour, strive, to make ourselves more aware of and responsive to
the immeasurably more wonderful blessings and miracles of grace being offered
to us in the sacramental and prayer life of Mother Church. This, I believe, is the essential work
incumbent upon us as Catholics today: we need to learn to live to the utmost of
our human capabilities and potential, not only on the natural level but also on
the spiritual, supernatural level, under the guidance of Christian teaching and
Catholic faith, and by the power of the Spirit Jesus has given to Mother Church
for our formation. The Canaanite woman
appreciated and loved her daughter by nature.
She had come to appreciate Jesus first of all from what she had heard of
Him. But then she did all she could to
draw closer to Him, approaching Him above all with humility, aware of His
majesty and her own need; she did not approach Him bloated with self-awareness
and self-appreciation. And yet, although
she was so humble, she would not allow herself to be put-off from her desire to
meet and speak personally with Jesus, neither would she allow herself to be drowned
by her own self-pity on hearing words whose real purpose and meaning she could
in no way understand.
People of God, we, each and every one of us, have to try to
develop such a faith within us: a humble seeking, a persevering longing for God;
and an ever more grateful and responsive faith in His Spirit at work in
us who are children of Mother Church. If
not, at the very best, we will only be able to digest scraps from the table of
the Lord; and that would indeed be tragic, because we have been called to the
fullness of faith in Mother Church and are being prepared to participate in a
banquet of heavenly proportions. It is
up to us. We have been invited; Mother
Church will not fail us on the way; and God’s most Holy Spirit guarantees us
strength, comfort, and guidance for the journey; so let us commit ourselves and
try to help each other, for, as St. Paul told us:
The gifts and the call of God are
irrevocable.
