Twentieth Sunday: All Equal, Each Unique

Aug 14, 2014

20th Sunday of Ordinary
Time (Year A)
Readings: Isaiah 56, 1 6-7;
Romans 11, 13-15, 29-32;
Gospel: Matthew 15, 21-28

That ancient problem of the one and the many has taken a million shapes. It is seen in the battle of change with continuity, the clash of novelty with permanence, the claims of individuality versus universality.

The conflict also appears in passages of scripture that contrast the particularities of Judaism or Christianity with the universality of God. Isaiah announced a God whose salvation and justice would be open to aliens. “For my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.” Thus, the psalmist wrote that all nations would come to praise God. St. Paul, in his reconciling claims of Jew and Gentile, reminded the Romans that a more universal truth of God’s mercy is revealed in the failures of both.

Even the accounts of Jesus’ meetings with Gentiles balance the claims of inclusion and exclusion. He seems rather harsh to the Canaanite woman who seeks healing for her demon-possessed daughter. At first Jesus does not even respond, and his disciples nag him to dismiss her because of her stubborn shouts. When Jesus remarks that his mission is only to the lost sheep of Israel, the woman presses her point, not only begging more insistently for help, but rebutting his rejection. “Even the dogs eat the leavings that fall from their master’s tables.”

Although the issue of tribal and religious inclusion might be discussed here, especially in light of Isaiah’s promise of universalism and Paul’s appeal to Gentile and Jew, what might be more key about this story is the revelation of that common trait of all men and women which engages the healing power of Jesus.

It is the heart, the plea, the persistent hope. “Woman, you have great faith. Your wish will come to pass.” And her daughter is healed.

The Canaanite woman embodies the constant and universal quality that every human heart—Jew or Gentile, woman or man, slave or free—possesses. It was her and our own willingness to call out in faith. This power, slumbering in us all from the moment of our beginnings in our mothers’ wombs, whether ever actualized or not, is what each of us uniquely possesses and yet has in common with all the rest of us. From the time of Sarah and Abraham to Mary’s yes and Joseph’s word of trust, from Romans to rabbis, Africans to Indians, it is the endowment of our personhood that unites us all in our humanity. It is also what makes everyone of us singularly strategic in playing our particular life drama.

Human persons are endowed with the capacity to take possession of their lives and offer their lives in faith. This is what makes every man and woman wholly equal before the world and God.

Yet the universal blessing of our humanity is found only in individuals. Each of us must act out the drama of a single life alone. There is no understudy, no replacement in these matters. Our common gift is displayed in singular and particular beauty. Thus, the paradox of the one and the many is that the very gift that makes us all most alike makes each of us altogether unique. -- By Fr John Kavanaugh, SJ

Thoughts of the Early Church
The Canaanite woman whose daughter was tormented by a devil came to Christ begging his help. Most urgently she cried out: “Lord, have pity on me. My daughter is grievously tormented by a devil.”

Notice that the woman was a foreigner, a gentile, a person from outside the Jewish community. What was she then but a dog, unworthy to obtain her request? “It is not fair,” said the Lord, “to take the children’s bread and give it to the dogs.”

Nevertheless, by perseverance she became worthy; for Christ not only admitted her to the same noble rank as the children, dog though she was, but he also sent her away with high praise, saying: “Woman, you have great faith. Let it be as you desire.” Now when Christ says: “You have great faith,” you need seek no further proof of the woman’s greatness of soul. You see that an unworthy woman became worthy by perseverance.

Now would you like proof that we shall gain more by praying ourselves than by asking others to pray for us?

The woman cried out and “the disciples went to Christ and said: Give her what she wants—she is shouting after us.” And he said to them: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

But when the woman herself, still crying out, came to him and said: “That is true, sir, and yet the dogs eat what falls from their master’s table,” then he granted her request, saying: “Let it be as you desire.”

Have you understood?

 When the disciples entreated him the Lord put them off, but when the woman herself cried out begging for this favor he granted it.

And at the beginning, when she first made her request, he did not answer, but after she had come to him once, twice, and a third time, he gave her what she desired. By this he was teaching us that he had withheld the gift not to drive her away, but to make that woman’s patience an example for all of us.

Now that we have learned these lessons, let us not despair even if we are guilty of sin and unworthy of any favor. We know that we can make ourselves worthy by perseverance. -- By John Chrysostom (c.347-407)