Message of Abbot Paul - Wednesday 3rd August

Message from Fr Paul for Wednesday, 3rd August 2022

 Today I hope to visit my mother to have lunch together and a good chat. I would rather take her out, so as to give her no work, but since the consultant signed her off with the good news that she can do anything she wants, I have no say in the matter and she insists on preparing a full-blown meal. No doubt it will be delicious, but I worry that she is doing too much too soon. I hope she will allow me to do a few odd jobs for her, but I can see her refusing, as her opinion of my practical abilities is minimal. Not to worry, at least I’ll enjoy a short siesta before driving back to Belmont!

 Our Gospel reading today finds Jesus in the region of Tyre and Sidon, some distance from Gennesaret, and here he meets a Canaanite woman. We are in Matthew, (Mt 15: 21-28). “Out came a Canaanite woman from that district and started shouting, ‘Sir, Son of David, take pity on me. My daughter is tormented by a devil.’ But he answered her not a word. And his disciples went and pleaded with him. ‘Give her what she wants,’ they said ‘because she is shouting after us.’ He said in reply, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.’ But the woman had come up and was kneeling at his feet. ‘Lord,’ she said ‘help me.’ He replied, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house-dogs.’ She retorted, ‘Ah yes, sir; but even house-dogs can eat the scraps that fall from their master’s table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, you have great faith. Let your wish be granted.’ And from that moment her daughter was well again.” It’s a moving story. The poor woman is so worried for her daughter that she screams and shouts, embarrassing the disciples, while Jesus just ignores her. Yet she calls him, “Lord, Son of David,” and asks for mercy and compassion, even though she is not a Jew. Here Jesus will extend his ministry to non-Jews, to both pagans and Samaritans, due in no small part to this woman’s intervention. She kneels at his feet, thereby recognising his lordship and manifesting her need. When Jesus compares her to a house-dog, she replies by saying that even these can eat from the scraps that fall from the table of their masters. Jesus is moved by her faith. “You have great faith,” he says, an important statement both for his disciples and for us today. Her daughter is healed at that very moment. Icons in particular present a graphic visual account of the healing.

 Why is that final statement of Jesus so important? It recognises that even non-Christians or Christians whom we regard as having a defective or incomplete faith might well have that “great faith” that Jesus speaks of here. We should be careful of prejudging people and leave it to the Lord to decide who has faith and who has not and how deep that faith is. Lord, forgive us if we have judged others wrongly. Amen.