HELLO!

March 8^th is International Women’s Day.  A United Church Archives initiative honours women who had the fortitude and courage to pave the way for gender justice and equality in The United Church of Canada. Ann Evans (Bartram) is one of those women. She was 26, married, and had a child when she applied for ordination in 1965. According to the Star Weekly magazine “She was accused of being a frustrated housewife seeking self-fulfillment. [Toronto] Conference delegates debated her motives, then voted three to two in her favor, but one clergyman still calls her our beauty chorus candidate.” Listen to Ann tell this part of her story in her own words: https://youtu.be/V9abFC-BawM

It seems appropriate that our service on Sunday March 8^th at 10 am will focus on this conversation between the Samaritan woman, married many times, and Jesus, parched and thirsty for water. First, many excellent feminist scholars have pointed out the marriages and divorces these women endured often had very little to do with their agency, they were given to their future husbands, and these men often abused them, or found other partners. But as usual, despite this, it would be the women who would endure the shame, from women and men in their communities. Nonetheless, she comes to draw her water at noon, as it is the hottest time and day and thus she is unlikely to meet anyone there. Jesus arrives. He begins their conversation with humility, he is thirsty. As the conversation evolves, we learn she is thirsty too, for “living water”.

There is genuine interest expressed in this conversation, both by the woman and by Jesus. They want to know what the other has to say. In a sacred conversation, whether in prayer with God or with another (stranger or friend) expect God to reveal something about God’s self that you have never seen before. The unnamed woman at the well is the first one to whom Jesus reveals his true identity — not to the leaders or to the disciples, but to her, a religious, social, outsider. Humility and genuine interest, an open-ended question, often leads to revelation/epiphany.

Note how this changes the woman at the well. Barbara Brown Taylor points out, Jesus’s dialogue with the woman at the well is his longest recorded conversation in the New Testament. Jesus talks to the Samaritan woman longer than he talks to his twelve disciples, or to his accusers, or even to his own family. And she cannot wait to tell those whom she previously avoided, for worry about shame, about these “living waters”. “Come and see”, she tells those who share a conversation with her.

“Come and see” tomorrow. Peace, Kevin

PS Five phrases you hear when no one can think of anything to say, 1) “we sure are getting a lot of snow this year”, 2) “there’s a cold going around”, 3) “it’s a sign of the times”, 4) “this is the Leaf’s year” and, 5) “don’t forget to put your clocks ahead an hour tonight”. See you at 10 am.