20th Sunday Surprised by Faith

There is the saying, “out of the mouth of babe…” Those who work with kids know kids can say some outrageous and funny things, and also can express matters and ideas that are deep and wise beyond their years. I have heard kids express thoughts on God and their understanding of God that took my breath away; catching me by surprise.

A danger for Catholics is our egotism, or chauvinism. We can fall into the trap of literally believing that we have the Truth, therefore there is no Truth outside the church. Which means we can have a tendency to ignore other Christian faiths and even some Non-Christian faiths, and lose out on some wisdom and insight. One of the more brilliant Scripture scholars in the world is N.T. Wright, who happens to be Anglican. I really enjoy on TikTok Dr. Dan McClellan, also a biblical scholar, who also happens to be Mormon. But I know some Catholics, including priests, who would never ever listen or read them or others, because they don’t belong; they are not part of us.

Faith means to believe in the Love of God for us. Faith means to believe that God is at work in our world because of this love. Faith means to trust that God loves us and we have worth and dignity through this. Faith is a gift. God initiates it, God gives it freely. Faith is instilled in us; no matter who we are, no matter where we are; no matter male or female, Christian or not, God instills faith in us, because God wants us to be free in God’s love.

I, as priest, we as Catholics, do not bring Faith to people. Our role, our mission is to open people to the Faith that is already there. The seed is planted, we need to nurture it. It begins with the assumption that God already loves them, that there is the seed of faith in each person; It begins with us looking at others and believing in their worth and dignity. This is intrinsic to our Catholic faith.

When we believe in this great things begin to happen.

Jesus goes into foreign land. We are not really told why, but he goes. He is in the land and is confronted by a woman. Matthew makes a point of calling her Canaanite which hearkens back to ancient enemies of Israel. This woman is also without a male escort in public, which would be a cultural no no in Jesus’ time and she dares to speak out another cultural taboo. Quite the contradiction for the Jewish people of Jesus’ time. So everything about this encounter screams “WRONG” “DANGER” “TROUBLE”

And yet, to the surprise of them, Jesus pronounces her faith as a great faith. Ironically think back to last week’s gospel; Jesus had just called Peter’s faith “little”, but that was sufficient for him to walk on water. Now he calls the faith of this abrupt, maybe desperate, Pagan woman, “great”. Sufficient for her daughter to be healed.  This pagan woman would not have known Torah or fulfilled the necessary worship. So how could she have faith? God at work. 

Clearly, she has heard of Jesus. She has used a title for him that implies some foreknowledge. Somehow she has heard of him, his work and miracles, his teaching, and it awakened within her an awareness of divine love, a strength to risk it for her daughter. She knew her daughter deserved what others had also received from Jesus.

Disciples of Jesus need to be open to surprises, open to the mystery of the work of God. We must be open to where Jesus leads us, and be open to where we can serve others, and promote faith. That may be with others and in other places we would not normally think would be where God is; where people of faith may be. It could be out of our comfort zone. 

We must believe in God’s capacity to love; and not rely on ours. We must not go out and attack and demean others, but help them to see their dignity. We must not be these “Cultural warriors” which seems to be only about serving egos, who go to attack and insist on our way of doing things. It does not mean we ignore evil; we can’t. Jesus never did. He cured, he defeated evil by faith, by love. So must we.

Jesus’ source always was his trust in the love of the Father. From it, all else flowed, including his willingness to die through human sinfulness, so that we can all know and experience God’s love! We come to this Eucharist to be renewed in our faith, to be reminded of the Father’s love, and to be strengthened to go out, to be surprised by God in this world, and to do whatever God asks of us to make others see. Whether it be in those we consider “Enemies” in enemy land; or simply in our school, work place, parking lot, the person sitting next to you right now in the pew.

Faith is all around, and disciples with open hearts and minds will see it, and rejoice in it.