I was in the sacristy at Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome.
Two of my brother priests and I were on a kind of pilgrimage, offering Holy
Masses throughout the city and the country, really, and at various significant
places: the altar at Saint Catherine of Siena’s house; the Portiuncula in
Assisi; Padre Pio’s parish in San Giovanni Rotundo. And on this day we were at
Saint Peter’s. And we had made a request of a friend of ours—requested a favor,
really—to be able to offer Holy Mass where I would typically have no business
entering: at the very tomb of Saint Peter.
My brother and his wife were with me and I remember us passing a security guard and then the velvet rope and then the stairwell downward into the crypt. An exception had been given to us. And, because of that exception, that favor, I got to offer Holy Mass in one of the most beautiful and memorable places on earth.
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At the heart of the readings today is this reality of the exception. The favor.
Exceptions and favors are wonderful—unless we presume them. At that point, we lose the sense of the greatness of the exception.
So, for example, when we approach Jesus in prayer, we simply presume that He is going to give us what we ask. While this is good (we should have great confidence in our Lord), the temptation is that we turn Him into our slave—like a candy machine that gives so long as we have paid—instead of remembering that He is also our Master. He doesn't have to do what we ask.
We can also lose the reality of a favor when we think there was no plan at all.
So, for example, it is easy to believe that Jesus is purely reactionary. What I mean is: we think that He only responds to our prayers and that He really doesn’t have a proactive plan. But Jesus is and indeed calls Himself “the Way”; He says He comes to fulfill the Father’s plan.
When we lose that sense that God actually has a plan and that Jesus doesn't have to answer in the way we want and that, when He does, He is extending mercy-- when we lose that, it is easy to lose the sense of gratitude that comes with knowing an exception was given to us.
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She has asked Him to help her daughter who is possessed by a demon. And the odd thing is that Jesus says nothing. Why? Why is He being rude—or so it seems?
At the heart of the Father’s plan is the salvation of His Chosen People, the Israelites, the Jews. This is the mission that Jesus is given: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” In other words, “I wasn’t sent to help that woman. It’s outside the Father’s plan. The Father's plan is to save the Children of Israel first. That's the order of things. So, I’m neither her master nor her slave." Hence, silence.
Despite this, the woman draws closer and says, “Lord, help me.”
In a word, the woman understands, by Jesus’ silence, that her request is outside the bounds. She is literally asking for an exception.
To this, Jesus responds in a way that seems even more rude: “It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” Did He just call her a dog?
Here, a little history serves us well.
At this time, there were two kinds of people in the world: Jews and Gentiles. Jews were the Chosen People and the Gentiles were seen as everyone else. The Jews were the Children of God, the Chosen, the Light—and the Gentiles were not (or so it seemed). As a result, there was a condescension: some of the Jews looked upon the Gentiles as dogs. The Canaanite woman is not a Jew; she's a Gentile.
So, when Jesus says “… and throw it to the dogs,” it appears as though He is continuing the Jews’ way of thinking.
He’s not.
On the one hand, He is alerting the woman that she is correct: she is asking for an exception and, for Him to grant it would be seen in the eyes of those around them (there was a group of Jews there)—it would be seen in their eyes as wasting food on dogs. “You are correct, Woman. You are asking for an exception.”
But on the other hand, Jesus is also alerting the onlookers that, yes, to reach out to her would scandalize them: “I understand that you look upon her like a dog.”
Why does He alert them like this? Because He is going to make the exception.
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In the first reading, you heard from Isaiah. And in the prophecy it says that “foreigners... [will] join themselves to the Lord”—foreigners were Gentiles—and that “I [the Lord] will bring them to my holy mountain… for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.”
In the prophecy, Isaiah is saying that God has a plan for the Gentiles. And this plan, in the time of Jesus, had been forgotten.
For example, in the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, there were several gathering areas for prayer, like extended courtyards. The outer courtyard of the Temple, for example, was in Jesus’ day famous for gatherings of money changers and their tables and the selling of animals for sacrifice. When Jesus enters into the Temple, you recall that he makes a whip of cords and drives out all of the money changers and flips over their tables while saying: my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples.
Do you know what that outer courtyard was called? It was called the Court of the Gentiles.
It was the part of the Temple that was made especially for the Gentiles.
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To this, she responds with great respect for Jesus, with
deference to the Jewish people, and with self-deprecation: “… even the dogs eat
the scraps that fall from their master’s table.”
And her reward is not only the healing of her daughter and the praise of the master, but even the reception of the archetypal name given to Mary, “O woman.”
The exception is granted. And it becomes the rule.
Indeed, the Church that Jesus Himself established on this earth is called Catholic—meaning "universal"—precisely because She is a Mother who embraces all Jews and Gentiles, "all peoples," in all places, and in all times.
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So…. What does this mean for us?
Unless you were born of Jewish parents, you are Gentiles. You are able to enter the Father’s House because that exception has been granted to you. As Paul, the “apostle to the Gentiles,” says in the second reading today: “… you once disobeyed God but have now received mercy because of their disobedience”—
Who is he talking about there? The Chosen People, the Israelites. Because they had rejected Jesus, the Gentiles were invited in.
You are here because God wants you, He has chosen you, but it started out as the exception.
And why does God allow this exception?
So that “by virtue of the mercy shown to you, they too may receive mercy.”
In other words, when we—when that woman—realize the great generosity of God; when we realize that He didn’t have to extend His gifts and His call (which are “irrevocable”); when we realize that the velvet rope has been pulled back and we are granted access into places that we have had no right to claim as our own nor to enter on our own accord—the Holiest of Holies being communion with the very Son of God, Jesus Christ, in the Eucharist—
When we, like that woman, see that this was an exception and not something that should be presumed, we start approaching the Father’s House and these Sacred Mysteries and even heaven itself with a greater humility, a greater appreciation of the generosity, and thus with a greater joy at having been so called. It will necessarily lead to a proclamation to others about Him who has been so good to me.
I am here today, about to receive Jesus and His many gifts, because He has made the exception for me. Because He wanted me.
Sit with that for a while and I promise you will be changed.
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit. Amen.
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