-
March 12, 2023
The Samaritan woman, whose name we know from tradition was St. Photina, went away enlightened after her encounter with Christ at the well — so much so that many other Samaritans of that town also came to believe in him based on her word. Critical to her enlightenment were Christ’s plain words very simply pointing out to Photina (literally “enlightened one”) the nature of her past sin and promising her the Living Water, the grace of Divine Life in the Holy Spirit, welling up to eternal life! Can we implore Christ to do the same for us? “Lord, give me this water!”
And it does not stop there. St. Josemaria Escriva says that “Grace works in us like a magnifying glass, and even the tiniest speck of dust or an almost invisible grain of sand can appear immensely large.” Growing in grace brings to the soul not mere scrupulosity but rather a “divine sensitivity” finding delight “only in the limpid clarity of God.” The more we advance in spiritual life, the more we thirst for this Living Water. Do we have the courage to ask this for ourselves before we can, like Photina, preach it to others? Can we echo her in saying, “Come see a man who told me everything I have done!”