We began the season of Lent with Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday as we know, and as we have been told, is a day of obligatory fasting and abstinence.
The other day of obligatory fasting and abstinence is Good Friday.
We may think that it is only two days of fasting in a year, so there is no big deal about it.
But there is something strange about those two days of obligatory fasting.
More than any other day, on those two days of obligatory fasting, very strange thoughts come into the mind.
What we won’t usually think about, suddenly creeps into our minds out of nowhere.
Yes, it is strange that on days of obligatory fasting, thoughts about food come into our minds and makes our stomachs rumble with hunger.
Well, I have to admit that on Ash Wednesday, thoughts about food came into my mind (flooded my mind).
And it is quite unbelievable, I had thoughts about a specific kind of food.
Just imagine, on Ash Wednesday I thought about roasted pork, the type that they serve in restaurants, those little cubes of roasted pork, tender and juicy with the crunchy roasted skin.
I wasn’t just thinking about it, I was craving for it, on Ash Wednesday!
So, it is rather embarrassing to say this, that on Ash Wednesday, I was thinking about where to go the next day for a feast of roast pork. (I don’t know what I will think about on Good Friday!)
Maybe it is the hunger. Hunger can make us have weird thoughts about food, and even make us behave strangely.
Well, if hunger can have that kind of effect, then what about thirst? It is said that we can survive for a time without food, but we can’t last long without water.
Thirst can make us become irrational and our behavior can become abnormal.
In the first reading, we heard that tormented by thirst, the people complained to Moses for bringing them out of Egypt and to die of thirst in the desert.
Yes, thirst made them reveal their true colours – they said very harsh things and were going to turn violent even.
When people get real thirsty, they show who they really are – they reveal what is in their hearts.
In the gospel, we also hear of two thirsty persons – Jesus and the Samaritan woman.
They are not desperately thirsty but water was their topic of conversation.
Jesus was thirsty enough to ask the Samaritan woman for a drink, though Jews do not associate with Samaritans; the gospel makes it a point mention it. Furthermore it was a Jewish man and a Samaritan woman!
But thirst can make people discard formalities and reservations. Jesus was tired and thirsty and He wanted a drink.
The Samaritan woman was also thirsty and that was why she came to the well to draw water, although it was at an odd time – it was at noon, a time when people would stay indoors because of the heat (and that tells us something about her).
But as their conversation went on, more and more was revealed.
The Samaritan woman came to draw water from the well to quench her physical thirst. But there was another kind of thirst that she could not quench.
She could not quench her thirst for true love – she told Jesus she had no husband. But she already had five husbands and the one she has is not her husband.
Jesus knew her secrets, but He was gentle in revealing it to her. He revealed it to her with love and compassion
But He also knew that she had a thirst that wasn’t quenched and that’s why she had secrets that she wanted to hide.
Her thirst made her act strangely – she tried to avoid people and she tried to hide her secrets from Jesus.
But Jesus, who is the living water, slowly quenched the thirst in her heart, and with that she did the really astounding thing.
She hurried back to the town, to the people that she had been avoiding, and to tell them to come and see the man who had told her everything she ever did!
Her spiritual thirst had made her hide her secrets from people. But Jesus gave her the living water and the courage to face the truth.
Yes, the thirst of the heart can make us irrational and act strangely.
In our spiritual thirst, we will even turn to dead waters. But that will be like trying to quench our thirst with sea water; the thirst will come back with a vengeance.
We turn to dead waters when we give in to our desires – our desire for attention and status.
Our desire for success and to prove that we are better than others and to show-off.
Our desire for pleasure by indulging in pornography and engaging in immoral acts with others.
Yes, we try to quench the thirst of our hearts with dead waters.
But Jesus knows all that we have done.
He wants to cleanse us with His living water in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
Jesus wants to quench the thirst of our hearts with the living waters of true love, which only He can give.
Let us turn away from those dead waters that will create more dark secrets and make us hide from God and from others.
Let us turn to Jesus who gives us the living waters of truth and love, so that our hearts will be at peace with God and with others.