Third Sunday of Lent
Dear Friends,
In our Gospel today, we meet the Samaritan Woman. The Church gives us this reading while we are still at the front end of Lent. The rush of Ash Wednesday and a new liturgical season are over, and we have now fully entered the desert. And in the desert, we are reminded of our desire. Perhaps you have already slipped once or twice in your Lenten fasts. The truth about humanity is that we are made with infinite desire. The Lord alone can satisfy these caverns within us, and it will be our life’s work to understand that truth and live it. So, on the way there, we fill ourselves with things, both good and bad, in order for this sting of endless desire to be satisfied. Perhaps what you have left behind before entering the desert of Lent are examples of things you grasp for. Lent has the power to teach us what we have decided will satisfy us.
The woman in today’s Gospel was convinced she knew what would satisfy her. When encountered at the well and promised living water, she said, “Sir, give me this water, so I may not be thirsty, or have to keep coming here to draw water.” She wanted her desire to be fulfilled, and she wanted to escape shame. Her solitude at the well was not an accident- women of her time would have drawn water in the cool of the morning, not at noon. Jesus then goes for the jugular when he tells her to go get her husband, and come back. He has spoken to the most tender part of her heart, the place where her shame lives, and she would much rather hide than be seen here. In her heart, this is a place of great shame, yes, but also, great desire. This woman has been longing for a love that satisfies, for a love that heals. She has known rejection and humiliation, and now she is being met with Love himself. In this encounter, the Lord is asking her to let go of everything she thought would satisfy her, and make space for something new. Living water, that, as he promised, will become in her “a spring of water, welling up to eternal life”. Not just a few drops to get her through the day, but abundance.
Jesus is the fulfillment of every desire that we have. He is our desire when we know it, and when we don’t. His love has the capacity to fill every crack in our hearts that we try to fill ourselves, and the joy of being known by Him can give us the courage to leave our own “jars” behind. Will we allow Him to be the one thing that satisfies?
Andrea Garcia
Assistant Young Adult Coordinator