Reflection for the 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Christ and the Canaanite Woman
Jesus needs nothing but your humility and your confidence to work marvels of purification and sanctification in you. And your confidence will be in proportion to your humility, because it is to the extent that we realize our need of Jesus that we have recourse to Him, and we sense this need to the extent that we justly realize our unworthiness.
Think of the woman of Canaan: she is a pagan, a foreigner. She asks Jesus to cure her daughter who is possessed by a demon. Jesus lets her see that since He has come for the lost sheep of Israel, He has nothing to do with her. Humbly she accepts this, which is the truth, but confidently she insists, 'Lord, come to my aid.' And Jesus shows Himself to be apparently even harder. Often He acts in this way with souls to whom He wishes to grant a high place in His love, in order to test their faith. He answers her, 'The bread of the children is not to be thrown to the dogs.' The Canaanite woman then finds, in her humble confidence, this exquisitely appropriate response: 'That is true, Lord, but even the dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their master's table.' She asks no more than a crumb at the banquet of merciful love! Jesus is conquered.
'O woman, great is your faith; be it done to you as you will': Fiat tibi sicut vis. (Matthew 15:28)
Collect Prayer
O God, who have prepared for those who love you good things which no eye can see, fill our hearts, we pray, with the warmth of your love, so that, loving you in all things and above all things, we may attain your promises, which surpass every human desire. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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