The Woman at the Well and Women in the Church
The third week of Lent is lived in company with the Samaritan
woman whom Jesus met at Jacob’s well (John 4:5-42). She came looking
for ordinary water and Jesus led her to the source of living water,
which is his gift of the Holy Spirit. St. Augustine calls the
Samaritan woman “a symbol of the Church not yet made righteous
but about to be made righteous.”
Once introduced to Jesus, the woman at the well invited her friends
and fellow citizens to come and listen to him. They, in turn,
accepted him as Messiah. She made the invitation to others on
the basis of her own conversation with Jesus. He told her who
she was: a sinner loved by God. Instead of resenting Jesus’ frankness
about her sinful life, she understood that he was opening to her
an authentic relationship to God, a relationship grounded not
in self-deception but “in spirit and in truth”; and she became
an evangelizer.
At the rite of election Feb. 21 in Holy Name Cathedral, I was
struck by how many of the catechumens and candidates for reception
into full communion with the Catholic Church were women. They
evidently encountered Jesus at a contemporary equivalent of Jacob’s
well and accepted his invitation to worship God in spirit and
in truth. They join those millions of women around the world who
help create the Church, along with millions of men, by living
the Gospel faithfully and calling others to friendship with Jesus.
Think of the many women who have graced the journey of faith in
all our lives: in our families, in religious orders and congregations,
in parish centers and movements in the Archdiocese. The Archdiocesan
Council of Catholic Women is the umbrella for most of the organizations
of laywomen, connecting them to similar organizations in other
dioceses across the country. The Archdiocesan Women’s Commission
has been reconstituted, and the Auxiliary Bishops are seeing to
the selection of members so that it can begin meeting in the spring.
As an instance of governance in the Archdiocese, it will work
in conjunction with the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council. I look
forward to working with its members.
A week ago, the Holy See participated in the 43rd annual session
of the United Nations’ Committee on the Status of Women. Ellen
Lukas, the spokesperson for the Vatican, focused on two critical
areas of concern: healthcare for women and their “Institutional
advancement.” Drawing on the Church’s experience in a worldwide
network of health care facilities, most of them headed by women,
Ms. Lukas criticized the United Nations’ plan of action because
it largely ignores diseases which kill tens of millions of women
and girls in developing countries each year in order to concentrate
on population control. Missionaries have long complained that
countries without even aspirin to dispense to their people have
the latest in birth-control drugs and technologies, because it
is in the interest of developed countries giving aid to reduce
the numbers of the poor.
Ms. Lukas reaffirmed the Holy See’s support for a woman’s right
to a healthy pregnancy, adequate health care to reduce maternal
and child mortality, and protection from violence and abuse. In
the Archdiocese, protection from domestic abuse is available through
programs created by city, county and suburban governments and
by Catholic Charities, but many women are not aware of these programs.
When the Church gives information about where an abused woman
can find help or when a priest in a homily mentions spousal abuse
as sinful, many women are psychologically freed to seek protection
from an abusive situation.
At the U.N. meeting, the Holy See protested a “too-narrow view
of women’s interests...excluding the concerns of aged or other
women who can no longer contribute to the economy.” In the last
several decades, in order to create a new cadre of wage earners
and keep the economy growing, women have been encouraged to work
outside the home. Often now, women have to work in order to assure
their families’ livelihood. Too often, however, the freedom to
compete in the marketplace has been purchased at the cost of children’s
lives. A “right” that plays off a woman’s, or a man’s, personal
liberty against the death of their children creates a social order
that destroys human dignity along with human life.
At times, the Church is accused of treating women unfairly or
disrespectfully because she proclaims a moral vision which condemns
artificial birth control and abortion; but it is a strange kind
of respect which forces women to betray their own bodily nature
in order to be “free”. The practice of natural family planning,
in which the biological urges of a husband are freely submitted
to the biological rhythms of his wife’s body, can help to create
a climate of mutual respect and self-discipline which makes violence
between husband and wife unthinkable. The teaching about the nature
and use of sexuality in marriage presupposes, of course, a highly
developed sense of personal integrity.
Jesus respected the woman at the well. Both a foreigner and a
sinner, she found in Jesus the one who was to save the world because
he loved it. We do not know what happened to her. Two thousand
years later, however, we must come to the Lord, as did she, in
order to find living water. May it cleanse and refresh us as we
continue our Lenten journey. God bless you.
Sincerely yours in Christ,
