Homily

The beginnings of the human race are described in the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. The author of Scripture wants to make it clear that in those days Adam had an intimate relationship with God. We’re told God walked in the Garden of Eden to come and see Adam. But the Lord God did not want Adam to be alone in creation, so He made Eve, the mother of all the living. She was made from Adam’s own rib, the first transplant in human history. They were meant to live in perfect peace and harmony with one another and with God. But since they were given free will they had to choose to live in that unity. Eve was tempted first to break it off with God by eating the forbidden fruit, and she then, in turn, tempted Adam who also ate and struck his own mark against God. So now those relationships are damaged. Adam and Eve with God, and because of that Adam and Eve with one another. The fruit of that broken tie with God will soon produce the first murder in human history.

So, it is about relationships. God wants to have a relationship with us, a bond with us, a bond of love and of life with us. In the terrible way that some people see the Faith, they imagine it to be a set of laws and rules that have to be obeyed or else God will punish you. If that were true then the Ten Commandments and the Law of Moses would be all we would need, right? God could just give us the Big Book of Rules and that’s all we would need, right? In fact, however, the Ten Commandments and the Law of Moses were not designed as something to cripple the freedom of humanity, but rather to help men and women draw closer to God and to one another.

But the Lord God had an even better plan to restore the original relationship between us and Him. The Son of God became a man. He entered into the world He created and became a part of it. He walked among us as the Lord did in the Garden of Eden, but now he walks as one of us. How much deeper can the love of God be than to stoop so low from the greatness of His eternal glory to become one of us? How much greater can the love of God be than to suffer and die for our sakes? And all this was to restore the original unity that Adam and Eve enjoyed back at the very beginning. But now, in an even more spectacular and glorious way, in Christ the Most Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, share the divine life with us. God became man so that man could become God; so that we could be filled with His own divine life. (Filled with the living water.) So that we could live in an intimate relationship with God, not just as His creatures but as His beloved, in Christ. That relationship then extends its life to those around us. If we love God we will love one another as well. St. John puts it so beautifully when he writes, “God is love, and he who abides in love, abides in God, and God in him.” One way to look at the Bible is to see it as the Great Journal of Relationships—both ours with God, God with us, and we with one another.

So our Lord, Jesus Christ, sits down with the woman at the well. And she basically tells Him she’s tired. Tired of coming to get water all the time, but He knows that she is bothered by a deeper weariness—she is tired of life. Five men plus one more reveal the depth of her unhappiness as she looks for a relationship that will fill her life up. But she has not found it. Yet this Samaritan, sitting with a Jew at the well of Jacob comes to see the truth of the love of God here in this conversation, in this person speaking with her. And as she opens her heart to Him, He fills it with His divine grace. She is changed by this brief relationship. No longer tired or weary of life she becomes like an apostle and starts telling everyone to come and see Jesus. And so they do. When they come and meet Him and listen to Him they also believe. The relationship is established. Men and women speak with God, and God Himself reveals His love for them. Tradition says the Samaritan woman’s name was Photina (Svitlana in Ukrainian) and that she became a disciple of Jesus and would later die as a martyr for Him.

The Gospel suggests that she was looking for fulfillment in her relationships with men, but she did not find it until she entered into a relationship with Jesus. And once she did that, she wanted to share the love she experienced with the rest of her neighbors, because that is the nature of true love; it seeks others to share love with them. When Adam and Eve turned in on themselves, disaster took place. When a Samaritan woman opens her heart to Jesus, a Samaritan town rejoices as they come to know Christ and believe in Him. She was restless and tired and unsatisfied. Now, in the presence of Christ, she feels alive! As St. Augustine wrote, “Our hearts are restless, Lord, until they rest in You.”

How many restless hearts are out there today, seeking to find a satisfying life, looking for it in this or that, in this person or that one? How sad it is if we allow other people to describe our faith as some kind of set of laws and rules, or some vague notion of religious thinking. My favorite line is “I’m spiritual but not religious.” What does that even mean? So, dear friends, never let people describe your faith in these false ways. Correct them every time so that they understand. Our Catholic faith is not simply some kind of religion, nor is it some system of laws and regulations and commandments. Our Catholic faith is all about relationships. My relationship, our relationship with God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. And from that relationship comes my relationship with all those in the Body of Christ, His Church. And from that comes my relationship to everyone else in the world, for the love of God. We should never let other people describe our faith as simply as a bunch of beliefs and a set of rules. Our faith is all about relationships. It is all about persons, both Divine and human.

Now in an age where people are so much more focused on themselves rather than on each other, to talk about relationships is not quite so easy. When people think they can create their own meaning to life and make up their own view of reality and purpose, it is not an easy job to try and tell them “it’s not all about you.” And relationships are not easy to maintain and build. One, because sometimes other people do not treat us well. Two, because we can be self-centered and not treat others well. So, we can be selfish and self-centered with God, unwilling to trust and obey, and we need to continue to work and pray for the grace to give ourselves whole-heartedly to Christ. When we are sad, or lonely, or afraid, when we are happy and confident and feeling great, when we are tempted to sin, when we are acting in virtue, in all times and in every situation let us call on Jesus to be with us and be our life. He is the only one Who knows everything we ever did and yet He loves us in spite of it all. He is the only one Who knows who we can yet become, and He loves us that we might be that person.