Heroic certainty 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time: Mt 15:21-28 21 Then Jesus went from that place and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22 And behold, a Canaanite woman of that district came and called out, “Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David! My daughter is tormented by a demon.” 23 But he did not say a word in answer to her. His disciples came and asked him, “Send her away, for she keeps calling out after us.” 24 He said in reply, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” 25 But the woman came and did him homage, saying, “Lord, help me.” 26 He said in reply, “It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” 27 She said, “Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.” 28 Then Jesus said to her in reply, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed from that hour.
If your daughter were critically ill, what could possibly induce you to leave your child’s side? Nothing would tear us away from that sickbed except the credible hope of a cure. Even then, we would face a daunting risk. The woman takes it.
Today’s text uses the same Greek verb to tell us that Jesus was going forth and the woman coming forth – as if an identical impulse destines them to meet. In the preceding passage, Jesus reprimands hypocritical scribes and Pharisees whose “heart is far from me” (Mt 15:8). But this humble woman’s heart is close to Christ even before being in his presence.
Although the victim in question is the tormented daughter, the woman begs Jesus to “have pity on me!” Like her fellow Gentile – the centurion who approached Jesus to receive a healing word for his sick servant (Mt 8:5-13) – this Canaanite recognises in Jesus an extraordinary power she craves so as to communicate it to her afflicted child.
We may be shocked that, at first, Jesus responds to the woman in total silence, followed by a seeming rebuke. At the episode’s end, Jesus will extol the woman with the words, “Great is your faith!” Faith is recognising an exceptional Presence that changes us, making us want to adhere to it. The Lord’s off-putting tactics – his ruse about food and dogs – aim to quicken and increase the woman’s nascent faith. “The more humble a person is,” says
St Augustine, “the more receptive and full he becomes. Hills repel water; valleys are filled up.”
Even more, Jesus goads the woman to make the most of her faith. For faith graces believers with a special illumination that opens their minds to know the mysteries about the inner life of God. By faith a believer acquires knowledge of divine truth. Faith informs believers about the things of God. Which is why the woman never gives up. She sees beyond what appears on the surface as rejection. She counters, “Even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table.” That is: I may be as measly as a dog, but I am as certain about you as those lost sheep will be when you find them.
She expresses her heroic certainty in actions. At the point of desperation, when the disciples press to send her packing, the woman comes forward and kneels before Jesus like the Magi, and the leper, the two blind men, and the disciples saved from a storm. The woman implores Jesus simply and directly, “Lord, help me.” Who can refuse a sufferer in such straits?
Sometimes we require the experience of similar desolation in order to actualize the real depths of faith we possess. Maybe we need vexing trials to help us tear ourselves away from our negativity and fatalism so as to take a risk on Jesus Christ.
For then Jesus speaks to us words wondrously alike those the Blessed Virgin Mary uttered to the angel: “Let it be done for you as you wish.”
Fr Cameron is editor-in-chief of the English edition of Magnificat. Mgr Anthony Abela’s Lectio Divina returns next week
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