ECUMENICAL PATRIARCHATE

Exarchate of Parishes of Russian
Tradition in Western Europe

ON THE GOSPEL OF THE SAMARITAN WOMAN

Sermon preached by Bishop Basil of Amphipolis at the Parish of the Dormition, London (Holborn) on Sunday 17 May 2009

John 4:5-42

It is impossible to read or listen to the story of the Samaritan woman and not to realise that it is extraordinary. Simply from a historical point of view,  I do not think there is anything like it in ancient literature, and I suspect there is nothing quite like it in world literature. What we see here is a picture of inner development in a situation of dialogue between two figures. It is an open-ended process, and we do not know how this is going to end.

In more recent times, Mikhail Bakhtin, the Russian philologist, described this aspect of Dostoevsky’s novelistic style as ‘the dialogic imagination’. What this means is that the author is able to enter into the spirit of two radically different people and portray their interaction as if he were not even there: they exist in their own right and they simply talk to each other. That is what we have in this Gospel narrative. What we see is the way in which the Samaritan woman takes possession of her life, and she takes possession of her life in order to give it to Christ. This is absolutely essential – because until we have taken possession of our lives we cannot give them to Christ. You cannot give something that you do not have.

We emerge as human beings from the created world. In our own consciousness there is nothing behind us; we simply emerge as persons, we come into existence.  These are strange words, with ‘existence’ having a Latin origin: it says that we ‘stand out’ from some previous reality, very much in the same way that other existent beings come to us, enter our horizon and become existent for us.

What, then, does the Samaritan woman learn about herself in this encounter? The first thing she learns, I suppose, that Jesus is well ahead of her in terms of his understanding of her and of the situation. She learns that Jesus is the Christ: ‘I am he.’ And this means that salvation, God’s salvation, is at hand; just as the Kingdom of God is at hand in the proclamation of Christ. But here we see it in the interaction of two people.

Then, in the second place, she learns that belief in Christ turns the whole world into a Temple: ‘The hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain [where the Samaritans worshipped], nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.’  The Father is everywhere and expects those who worship him simply to worship him ‘in spirit and in truth’. Christ places us, as worshippers of God, in the very centre of creation, no matter where we are. It is from that point that we see this world as the Temple of God’s presence.

Thirdly she learns from him that the time for harvest has come. It is not a question of waiting for four months until the harvest is ready. The fields are white already. We need not wait. We can begin to work now. For she learns that Christ is always present to her; that the Kingdom of God is therefore always present to her; that the place from which she is to worship is this place where she is, and that the task before her is a task given to her by God.

In the present moment we are, in a strange way, related deeply to this story. How easy it is to see constrictions in the world. But for us, in our relationship with God, this need never be the case. The circumstances of life cannot prevent the gift of God being present to us. And that gift is not tied to any particular place: it is tied to our place in the world. The gift enables us not only to see this world as a universal Temple but also to see our own hearts as temples of the living God. That reality enables us to bring everything and everyone into relationship with the Kingdom, into relationship to Christ. This is Christ’s gift to us through the Church and it is the presentation of the possibility of resurrection, of rebirth, of entering fully into the life of Christ, given to us in his resurrection body, the Church. Let us accept it, knowing that in Christ, that gift which we may experience initially as burden is nonetheless life.

Amen