Outcast woman - 3

Just then a Canaanite (Syro-Phoenician) woman from that region came out and started shouting, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.” But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.” He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” He answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” Then Jesus answered her, “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

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'Dogs'?! A bit harsh, no? Well, maybe not. It's worth another look. 

We are like the disciples at Emmaus who got it all wrong and despaired until 'He opened their minds to understand the scriptures' (Luke 24:45).  We can only understand what we are reading with His help. So, if I don't understand something at first reading, I pause briefly to ask Him to help me see what He wants me to see, and not what I think I see. 

If I read something in the New Testament accounts of Jesus's words which seems harsh, I remind myself what Jesus is like, and if my reading clashes with that understanding, then I know it's my reading that's wrong. I go over it again, looking for another way to see it, with His help, until I get a glimmer of something more obviously in keeping with what we know about Our Lord.

In this reading, for example, I remember, 'I have other sheep who are not of this fold...'  And that Jesus has a tender heart. And that Faith in Him makes us whole.

I also remember that what we have in the Scriptures of Jesus's saying are merely some remembered (though critically important) snippets from His three years of constant teaching, written down decades later. Just the words, with nothing about facial expressions, smiles, laughs, winks or unspoken communication between His eyes and those of whomever he is speaking to. 

It's always worth taking time to read between the lines. 

Making some space for a few unwritten but hardly unlikely details, then... 

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The Canaanites were definitely 'not of this fold'. For a start, there was ancient enmity between them and the Hebrew people who had taken over their land a thousand years ago. (Not much seems to change in Israel/Palestine.) The Canaanites had their own gods. They had no truck with the Hebrews' Yahweh. Hardly surprising, then, that the two peoples referred to each other as infidels... dogs. And worse. Common parlance. 

Placing myself among the bystanders, I watch this encounter again, and now I see a wry expression on Jesus's face - is that a raised eyebrow? - as He turns round to look into the face of this persistent infidel woman who is annoying His friends. Ah, but soft eyes as He teasingly tests her with mention of the distance between His people and hers. His head on one side, I think He is smiling as He quizzes her: 'Mm-hm? You come to me? To one of those ghastly Jews, those old enemies who call your people dogs - those whom in turn, you'll agree, your people call dogs?'

Tricky. She thought this might happen. But the medical people have tried everything and given her daughter up for dead. She has nowhere left to turn. She is not of His faith, no, but... here she is. What has she heard about Him that was evidence enough to utterly convince her that He has a power to heal, such as no-one else has? And this Jesus looks and sounds... different. It seems that, unlike most others, He does not hate anyone. She is more than ever determined to plead with Him for her daughter. 

But look - she sees that He reads her heart! He already knows everything about her, and about what she needs. The relief is overwhelming and she is warmed enough now to answer His tease with one of her own. With a small shrug she gives Him a small, lopsided smile as she answers, 'Crumbs from the table, sir...' 

He appreciates her wit and acknowledges her courageous determination. They acknowledge each other. She now believes absolutely that He has this power she has heard about. It must all be true, then. Her heart tells her that her daughter was cured the instant He wished it and, touching His feet in gratitude, she hurries home to her girl, rejoicing and with a wholly new faith.

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel.

Trudging on trustfully - in the footsteps of doofuses

'The promise of the Holy Spirit is not that he will give you perfect people to teach you, but that he himself is the soul of the Church and that he will not allow it to define error as truth. When (not if) some member of the Church is shown to be flawed, that is not an appalling revelation of the horrible truth that everything you have ever believed is a lie. It’s a confirmation of what we’ve known ever since Jesus himself chose 12 doofuses to be his apostles and suffered betrayal and abandonment at their hands. And the chief of them was, in Chesterton’s phrase “a shuffler, a coward, and a snob—in a word, a man”. That’s good news, because it means that if Peter can be a saint, so can a couple of drips like you and me.' 

 Source:

"Fear not." Hearing God's loving laughter in the Divine Office.

Woke up ridiculously early this morning and decided to read my email... big mistake!

Memo to self: do not read email and especially not Catholic e-newsletters before (i) Morning Office to put the world into God's perspective and (ii) a decent breakfast. Both are necessary to fortify you to deal with the daily flood of Really Bad News. 

Of which one piece this morning was an absolute corker - real Handcart to Hell stuff. What was worse than the catalogue of doom-laden facts was the comment section. (Will I never learn?) Obviously some Hell-bound handcarts have been customised with slick tyres and go-faster stripes.

As I read about species-self-hate and gobbets of the hate-filled ignorance which now seems to pass for serious debate about how to handle humanity's unprecedented technical power over its own life and death, I got very depressed. Not for the first time I found myself fearing that, in today's world, Catholic truth is... well, drowning. That the Church is losing the war. Or at least, some awfully big battles. (No, wait... it got better.)

Sometimes these days, apart from the sadness of it all, I often get frightened as, aghast, I hear the Devil laughing: laughing at the inhuman paths which, in many critical respects, our world is choosing. Laughing at his triumphal persuasion of millions of people that he does not exist, which of course leaves him free to rampage at will. And laughing loudest of all (or so it seems, because it's right here in my ear) at goody-two-shoes-faithful-Catholic me, for my gloomy, weak and wobbly faith in the Omnipotence of God.

Lord,  save us! We are sinking! Mt 8:25

And I think...

Christ has no body on earth now but yours; no hands but yours; no feet but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which the compassion of Christ must look out on the world.
Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good.
Yours are the hands with which he is to bless people now.

I ask myself, What can I do for heaven's sake? I am a Dominican. I am to preach, but how, Lord, how, when I am so tiny? I am just a grain of sand...

... or a grain of mustard-seed, maybe? ... 

... caught in a tsunami of anti-Christ, anti-Catholic, anti-human forces. What can I do, against so many powerful people so much cleverer than I. Charismatic, popular people, many in positions of power and influence from which they persuade my friends, my government, whole societies, even some in the Church, that their way is truth and will benefit humankind. It won't. It won't. Their way is death, for souls and for the world.

I remind myself that, even though it can feel like it in the silent pre-dawn darkness, I am not alone, and that so many other people who are cleverer than I, and charismatic, popular and influential, are Christian (many even Dominican!) - the Body of Christ! They have stronger faith than I and are better-armed than I who am just a water-carrier in the rearmost rank of what we used to call the Church Militant.

So with a deep breath I take up my little sword breviary and, as the Enemy scuttles off, his chortling turning to snarling, I begin to read, and suddenly there is the glorious sound of the Son of God laughing, MUCH louder, a cosmic laugh, loud enough to banish all my fear.

It happens every single time. There, in the page of the Divine Office for THIS day, EXACTLY the reassurance I need in THIS moment.

You looked kindly, O Lord, on your land: you ended the captivity of Jacob.

You forgave your people’s unrighteousness and covered over their sins.

Truly the Lord will give generously, and our land will be fruitful. 

Justice will walk before him and place its footsteps on his path.

Trust in the Lord for all ages, for the Lord is your strength for ever.

He knows. He hears. 

I laugh and cry at the same time, and God laughs and embraces me. Ashamed of my lack of faith, I bury my face in Jesus's breast.

And I remember that, of course, Our Lord spoke of 'the Prince of this world' for a reason and the Almighty Father not only sees all the dreadful stuff that I see but sustains it in being for love's sake when He could wipe it out. Which is what I would do, of course, being extremely stupid.

"My thoughts are not your thoughts, and my ways are not your ways," says the Lord. Isaiah 55:8

No, Lord. Quite. Just as well.

Pilate therefore said to him, "... Do you not know that I have power to release you, and power to crucify you?" Jesus answered him, "You would have no power over me unless it had been given you from above." John 19:1

Yes, Lord. Yes.

This Church, this 'drowning' Church (ha!) is the Body of Christ through Whom all things were made and without Whom nothing was made that was made. Oh, how fear drives out thought.

Oh, Lord, I do believe. Help thou my unbelief.

Let nothing disturb thee;

Let nothing dismay thee:

All thing pass;

God never changes.

- St Teresa of Avila

All will be well, and all manner of things will be well. - Julian of Norwich