“In their thirst for water, the people grumbled against Moses.” The Lord said to Moses, “Strike the rock, and the water will flow from it for the people to drink.” In the Gospel, a Samaritan woman thirsts for water and goes to a well. She meets Jesus at the well and grumbles a bit with him. Their encounter though is ultimately a healthy one. They talk about water for the body and water for the soul, “living water.”
Water is necessary for life. So too for community. Any watering site is a life-giving gathering space. It is a place of health and well-being. To be denied water, to thirst for it yet be unsure if our thirst will be quenched with clean, fresh water, is to have our lives put in peril. Such is the condition of billions of people across the world, for example, near the Tigris-Euphrates river basin, downstream of the Mekong River and also of the Nile. In the U.S., historical and structural inequalities due to classism and racism are resulting in water deprivation and threats to life across the nation. Grumbling and taking action about threats to life is encouraged by free thinkers. It is forbidden by dictators, including U.S. ones. Most notably GOP dictators or “Emergency Managers” in Michigan have long been denying the people clean, fresh water. LeeAnne Walters provided a healthy place for her husband, for the children they brought into the world, and for the community in which they were raising them. Mona Hanna-Attisha provided a healthy space for people she cared for as a doctor, doing all she could to keep people healthy. Miguel Del Toral was also a healer, specifically providing clean, healthy water for people through his job. Then, each became aware that others, who were responsible for providing healthy water, were making it unhealthy instead. Michigan GOP politicians were waging war against the people and were using toxic water as their weapon. LeeAnne, Mona, and Miguel started to grumble. They grumbled about the poisons spewing out of Flint, Michigan’s water supply. They took healing action across their own town of Flint, and, in a ripple effect, across many other towns. They got to work, as mom, doctor, and EPA clean water manager to help cure many who were sick from poisoned water. They grumbled about and took action about rulers who were targeting the people as enemies in a war. They did so with Gov. Rick Snyder who knowingly infected the water with toxic chemicals, including lead (legal allowance of 15 parts/billion was 400 parts/billion in Flint). They acted to remove him from office and he was charged with “willful neglect of duty.” They did so with Director of Health and Human Services, Nick Lyon, and its Chief Medical Executive, Eden Wells, and removed them. Both caused the toxicity by “willful neglect of duty” resulting in charges of “involuntary manslaughter.” They did so with EPA division chief Susan Hedman, who rejected Del Toral’s formal complaint detailing the water’s problems and they removed her. The grumbling actors of Michigan took action for healthy water for the body and healthy water for the soul. We can do the same this Lent. We can be Living Water, a fresh nourishing source of Life.
I do not know much about gods; but I think the river Is a strong brown god… unhonoured, unpropitiated By worshippers of the machine… The river is within us, the sea is all about us.” (T.S. Eliot – The Dry Salvages)
Prayer: Spirit of Life, flow through us.
Question: How do I act for healthy water for the body and healthy water for the soul?
March 7, 2021 Gospel John 4:5-42 Third Sunday of Lent