Rosy Kandathil’s Homily, June 12, 2016

Do You See This Woman?

2 Samuel 11:26-12:15b; Galatians 2:16-21; Luke 7:36-8:3

 

When I was a child, I came across a book in the library called One Thousand and One Arabian Nights.  You may remember it yourself. A dusty tome filled with the kind of adventure stories I liked as a young girl: Aladdin’s Lamp, Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves, genies and sorcerers, caves and palaces.

But the main frame story is about a king driven mad by jealousy.  He marries a series of women only to execute each one at dawn, before she has the chance to break his heart.  As the number of marriageable women in the kingdom dwindle, the heroine, Scheherazade hatches upon a plan and offers herself as the next bride.  On their wedding night, Scheherazade tells the king a story but stops on a cliffhanger, forcing the spellbound king to postpone her execution so he can hear how the story ends.  The next night, Scheherazade ends the first tale and immediately begins a new one, stopping short once more. The curious king, eager to hear the ending of this next story, postpones her execution again.  And so it goes, night after night…for 1001 nights.

The brilliance of these stories lies not only in their content, but in the dramatic tension of Scheherazade’s predicament.  Her life hangs in the balance.  Her stories are keeping her alive (and all the other women in the kingdom who have been spared execution in the meantime).  Even as a child, I grasped the truth, although still dimly: There are some stories that have the power to save our lives, and daily.

Nathan tells David such a story.  On the surface, about two men; a rich man who willfully takes advantage of a poor man.  Designed to arouse the king’s sense of justice, David reacts predictably and swiftly to Nathan’s story.  “The man who has done this deserves to die; he shall restore fourfold, because he did this thing, because he had no pity!” (2 Sam 12:5-6).  In a masterstroke of prophetic storytelling, Nathan turns the table on David, crying out: “You are the man!”  You are the man, David. And to David’s everlasting credit, the breath of self-righteousness goes out of him immediately as he whispers in shocked self-recognition: “I have sinned” (2 Sam 12:13).  Nathan’s story allows David to see what he couldn’t see before: the evil he had done, the relationships he’d ruined, the mercy and forgiveness he desperately needed.

There are some stories that have the power to save our lives, and daily.

Luke’s Gospel tells us such a story. A Pharisee invites Jesus to his home for dinner, but the meal is interrupted by an uninvited guest, a woman with an alabaster jar.

You might recognize her.  All four Gospels record some version of this story.  But in Luke’s twist on the tale, she is an unwelcome nameless “woman in the city, who was a sinner” (Lk 7:37).  She enters Simon the Pharisee’s home, and walks toward a table filled with men, the pre-eminent theologians of her day – only to offer own master lesson in Lukan discipleship.

Luke paints the scene graphically. The sound of her anguished sobs.  Warm, fresh tears.  Calloused, dirty feet. The feel of oil on flesh.  Hushed whispers around the table. The lingering scent of perfume. Long hair, tumbling unbound, slick with dirt and oil. The searing sound of repeated kisses on Jesus’ soles, his toes, his ankles.  As far as we know, there are no words exchanged between Jesus and this woman.  But they are clearly communicating; their bodies are doing the talking.

However I may try to clean it up, theologize around it, anesthetize it, there is nothing that makes the scene less shocking.  All four Gospels tell the story of a woman who dared to love Jesus not only in spirit, but in the flesh — to love his body with her own.  And at its core, no matter how you cut it: it remains one of the most intensely sensual in the New Testament.  And if it doesn’t make us squirm in our seats, then we’re probably not paying attention.

Luke is careful to describe in cringe-inducing detail just how physical and scandalous the woman’s behavior was. Simon the host is repulsed — understandably so – not only by the woman, but by Jesus.  It’s the woman’s touch that makes Simon see red: “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him — that she is a sinner.”

Focused as he is on his own thoughts and the woman’s status as a sinner, Simon is in danger of missing the act of silent, profoundly holy communion happening right under his own nose at his own table.  But Jesus forces Simon — and all of us– to see. He sets up with a softball story about two debtors and a generous creditor who graciously forgives both, then goes for the jugular: “Do you see this woman?”

It’s a question that has been rattling around in ever-more uncomfortable ways for me, in the events of my days: Rosy, do you see this woman? 

As most of you know, Sr. Joanne fell a few weeks ago, injuring her back and abdomen.  Sitting with her these last weeks, watching her in pain and feeling helpless and afraid, put new life into this Gospel story for me. There I was in the hospital, among so many bodies in various states of sickness and health, and Love gave me eyes to see for a moment. How precious, how holy and mysterious each of our bodies.

But for most of my life, I have had an ambivalent relationship with my own body.  It is a body that makes me feel vulnerable in the world, eroticized, sexualized, weak, emotional, prone to monthly bleeding, too fat, too short, too brown, you name it. For so much of my life, I have felt that I needed to fight to be seen as an equal to the men at the table…but this anointing woman at Jesus’ feet, this woman who loves Jesus with her body, puts the lie to my efforts. She points to the priority of the body, to the ability to preach clearly and eloquently without words.  She is in touch with Jesus, and He with her. Skin on holy skin. This is the kind of woman who touches God: a woman who was a sinner, a body that knows its need.

And I’m with Simon, God help me.  I’m just as embarrassed, and shame-ridden, and frightened by what that means.

With her hair, her tears, her touch, she forces me into my own skin.  Do you see this woman?  This woman who kneels, who weeps, who washes, who anoints?  She embodies Paul’s message in his letter to the Galatians: it’s “not by following the rules, but through faith in Jesus Christ” that we get in touch with this God “who loved us and gave [His Body] up for us” (Gal 2:20).  She’s the one who sees and knows.  She’s a disciple and a prophet.

There are some stories that have the power to save our lives, and daily.

“This is my body,” Jesus says, “given for you.”

We are a people called to Incarnation.  The Body of Christ.  Not an abstraction, but flesh and blood. Called to see and to feel, to break bread, share wine, wash feet, offer peace—skin on holy skin.  Can we learn to see our own bodies, our senses, as the vehicles of divine grace?  Can we offer God the gift of our whole selves: soul, spirit and body?  Perhaps.  Perhaps we might let this weeping, loving, prophetic woman lead the way.

 

 

Let us turn to God in prayer.

For the gifts of our bodies, and for a renewed sense of reverence for the Word made flesh within us and among us, we pray…

For the Body of Christ gathered here: that we may be instruments of God’s mercy and love to all who are burdened by brokenness, alienation and pain, we pray…

For the ability to repent and ask forgiveness of those we have offended – as individuals, as institutions, as a nation, we pray…

For what else shall we pray…

We now lift up all the prayers listed in our book of intentions, the prayers we hold silently in our hearts, and mention quietly the names of those we wish to pray for.

O God,

In stories of sin and repentance,

Of mercy and forgiveness,

You embrace the human heart, mind and body together

To bring about our whole salvation.

May these stories trace our own journey,

Respond to our wants and needs,

And enliven our faith in a saving God,

Who lives and reigns for ever and ever.

 

Let us offer each other a sign of peace.