Jesus and the Samaritan Woman, Japan, artist unknown
Some people don’t belong at St. Paul’s.
We don’t want to admit this. You may even strenuously disagree. This week our staff planned and ordered the large canvas banner we hang outside every year announcing the Holy Week and Easter services, and an early draft had it saying, “All are welcome.” I changed it, for a few reasons. First, I think the phrase “All are welcome” has been used so much that it now suffers from “semantic satiation,” that is, “All are welcome” is now (at least for me) just four syllables without much meaning, let alone power. The second reason is that I thought of a powerful alternative, or at least I think I have: the sign will say, “We’d love to see you.” This makes the message about the person who is reading the sign. We aren’t just saying “All are welcome” to no one in particular; we’re addressing the reader directly: We’d love to see you.
But there’s a third reason I don’t care for the phrase “All are welcome” on the sign: I just don’t really believe it’s true. If it were true, lots of folks who rarely or never come here would be here already. Now, it may be true that we authentically want everyone to be welcome here, particularly those who have been notoriously unwelcome in churches—those who are GLBTQIA+ in particular. We also consciously want Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) folks to be welcome here. But while we certainly have many people here in one or another of the GLBTQIA+ demographics, we see BIPOC persons here much less often. It’s not never! But it’s not exactly frequent, either. There is a scandalous historical legacy of segregation in Christian congregations throughout the world, a tragic and often violent division of Christ’s Body that transcends region, nation, and generation. St. Paul’s Seattle can’t easily overcome that. We work on it! Yes, we work on it. Under your previous rector, you made good strides working on anti-racism practices, and our work on land acknowledgment and reparations exemplify how the Holy Spirit is moving here.
Still, are BIPOC persons welcome here? I want to say yes, and I think on a basic level the answer is yes—we authentically can say to persons of color, “We’d love to see you”—but I think we should suspend judgment about whether they truly are welcome here until we invite some number of BIPOC persons to offer their opinion. Whenever there’s a power differential—and the evil legacy of white supremacy has placed those with white privilege in a position of power, whether they think so or not, and whether they like it or not—whenever there’s a power differential, the person with less power is the better judge of how welcome they are.
And how about GLBTQIA+ folks? As I said a moment ago, I think we can more confidently believe that this group is welcome here. I’m your rector, and not your first gay rector, so I am mindful of our proud legacy of prophetic queer ministry over much of our parish history. But I may not be the best judge, because I have cisgender-male privilege. I might be missing microaggressions against—and subtle rejections of—trans and non-binary persons. Are they welcome? I hope so…?
But there are so many demographic categories to consider when we’re trying to be a welcoming community. Children, seniors, people with ability and mobility differences, unhoused persons, teenagers, neuro-diverse folks, those whose first language is other than English, those who have literacy challenges (our bulletin assumes everyone can read), those who are politically conservative… Are all of these folks really welcome?
Here’s a better question to ask: do all of these folks really belong? It helps to notice the difference between “welcome” and “belonging.” “Welcome” is easier; it’s a lower bar. When I see someone who, let’s say, can’t walk into this space but comes here anyway, and when I see us working hard to accommodate them in a 61-year-old building that wasn’t designed with them in mind, I feel good, and rightly so: persons who use wheelchairs are truly welcome here. But the harder, more complicated test is whether they truly belong. That’s the level of incorporation that only the persons themselves can tell us we are offering and practicing with them.
Today we hear a story of welcome and belonging, a challenging story of a journey into a land filled with people who do not belong. We find Jesus today not in Jerusalem, not in Galilee, not in any of the safe and straightforward places where an educated Jewish male teacher lives and works. We find him in Samaria. We are told that he “had” to go there on his way from Jerusalem to Galilee, except that’s simply not true. He could have traveled the distance of about 100 miles by following the Mediterranean coast, or he could have gone up the Jordan river valley. Samaria is avoidable. (If you enter the locations on Google maps today, they will recommend only these two routes! The Samaria route will take you through the controversial West Bank. The more things change, the more they stay the same.)
The Samaritans are not welcome in the religious, social, and political world that Jesus occupies. Their ancestors intermarried with Assyrians and other groups; their temple is not in Jerusalem; they do not belong. Yet Jesus “had” to go through their territory, and here he is, talking not only with a Samaritan but with a Samaritan woman. His disciples come back with food and are “astonished” to see him speaking with her. Astonished. That’s how much she does not belong.
But notice the time of day: it is about noon. While Nicodemus—a well-connected insider who definitely, most assuredly belongs—approached Jesus under the cover of night, the Samaritan woman encounters Jesus at noonday, when the sun is highest in the sky. In Eastern Orthodox tradition, she is given a name: Photini, a name that means “luminous.” She shines with light: she is a noonday saint, someone who is quick to glom on to what Jesus is saying and doing, and who Jesus truly is. Photini is sometimes called the “first evangelist,” the first person to preach the Good News. But to reach her, Jesus had to take the least likely and most dangerous road; he had to be alone so that he could approach her without his friends’ objections; and her solitude also enables this encounter: many have said that she collects water at noon—the worst time of day in a desert climate to do this kind of work—because the complications of her personal history prevent her from going when all the other villagers get their water, in the cool hours of early morning.
And so the encounter becomes possible: both Photini and Jesus are alone, and in the same place at the same time. But the encounter also is chosen: Jesus most certainly did not have to be there, and Photini could have kept her head down and ignored this odd stranger, or politely demurred when he asked her questions. Yet she holds her own in a lengthy, complicated conversation with him, in contrast to Nicodemus, who mostly listens to a monologue and is only able to say things like, “How can this be?”. Photini truly is luminous: she is bright.
But does she belong? If you ask Jesus, you hear a strong, vigorous, authentic Yes. Jesus is willing to place himself and his friends at considerable risk to incorporate Photini and her other-side-of-the-tracks village into his movement. But his friends are astonished. And they’re scared to ask him why he is doing this.
And so I wonder, and I ask you: who is Photini, at and around St. Paul’s? We could find our answer this way: in today’s Good News, we hear that the disciples “were astonished that he was speaking with a woman”; we could modify that sentence a few times to find our Photini. Just remember: Photini is luminous: she is bright, she is on to something, she has something to offer that we do not have, that we do not know. Okay, here are some possible ways to find Photini here, and now:
They were astonished that he was speaking with a person who could not read or write in English, and did not care for western liturgical music.
They were astonished that he was speaking with an unsheltered person who looked dangerous.
They were astonished that he was speaking with a neuro-diverse child who was given a 504 plan at school and has a hard time sitting still and staying quiet.
They were astonished that he was speaking with an Evangelical Christian who sings Christian rock and weeps with gratitude at the thought that Jesus died for their sins.
They were astonished that he was speaking with a Trump voter, whose resentment of wealthy liberal cities makes a whole lot of sense in her neglected town deep in the Rust Belt.
We may be astonished that Jesus is leading us into uncomfortable territory—into places where our beloved liturgy and music is incomprehensible or unappealing; into Seattle’s tents and shelters; into chaotic grade-school classrooms, into megachurches, into red states. And we may be astonished that Jesus is modeling for us encounters with people who—let’s be honest—we don’t really want to talk to, let alone encourage to feel that they belong here. We may even be scandalized by all this. We may, in our anxiety, focus on practical matters rather than accept this hard teaching. Like the disciples who stammered, “Rabbi, eat something” as they tried to work out what was going on, we may want to stall, to just stumble our way through all this, and get on to Galilee as soon as possible.
But if we want to follow Jesus, we need to—we have to—go through Samaria. But do not be afraid! Jesus our friend, Jesus our teacher, is here with us. This meal he serves—a meal of his own self—gives us strength. And when the people we least expect are not only welcomed here but actually belong here, then all of the many Samaritans in this city will rejoice, and this parish will flow abundantly with God’s living water.
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Preached on the Third Sunday in Lent (Year A), March 12, 2023, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Seattle, Washington.
Exodus 17:1-7
Psalm 95
Romans 5:1-11
John 4:5-42