V Sunday of Pascha: The Samaritan Woman. Tone four.

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John (Jn 4: 5-42).

"So He came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there. Jesus, therefore, tired from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, 'Give me a drink.' For his disciples had gone into the city to buy food. The Samaritan woman said to him, 'How can you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?' (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) Jesus answered her, 'If you knew the gift of God and who it is that is saying to you, "Give me a drink," you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.'

The woman said to Him, 'Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep; where then can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his flocks?' Jesus answered, 'Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.' .

The woman said to Him, 'Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.' He said to her, 'Go, call your husband and come back here.' The woman answered, 'I have no husband.' Jesus said to her, 'You are right in saying, "I have no husband"; for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.' .

The woman said to him, 'Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped God on this mountain, but you Jews say that Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.' .

Jesus said to her, 'Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.' The woman said to him, 'I know that the Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will proclaim all things to us.' Jesus said to her, 'I am he, who speaks to you.'.

Just then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, 'What do you seek?' or, 'Why are you talking with her?' So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 'Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?' They went out of the town and were coming to him.

Meanwhile, the disciples urged him, 'Rabbi, eat.' But he said to them, 'I have food to eat that you do not know about.' So the disciples said to one another, 'Has anyone brought him food?' Jesus said to them, 'My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. Do you not say, "There are yet four months, then comes the harvest"? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. For here the saying holds true, "One sows and another reaps." I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.'

Many Samaritans from that city believed in him because of the woman's testimony, 'He told me all that I ever did.' So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. And many more believed because of his word. They said to the woman, 'It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.'"

Homily.

Dear brothers and sisters,

the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

The Word we have heard today introduces us into one great spiritual movement, which begins with a personal encounter and leads to the birth of a missionary community. The Gospel of John and the Acts of the Apostles are not simply two texts placed side by side: they are two moments of the same mystery. In the first, we see how Christ transforms a heart; in the second, we see how transformed hearts build up the Church. Without the first, the second is impossible. Without conversion, there is no mission.

Let us then enter deeply into the Gospel scene. Jesus arrives at the well of Sychar, “wearied from his journey.” This weariness is not only physical: it reveals a God who accepts entering fully into the human condition. He does not impose Himself, He does not dominate, but He makes Himself vulnerable. He stops, He waits, He asks: “Give me a drink.” Saint John Chrysostom observes: “He asks not because He is in need, but to give an opportunity for giving” (Homilies on the Gospel of John, XXXII, 1).

Here one of the most striking features of the Gospel is revealed: God presents Himself as one who is in need of man, in order to give man what he truly needs.

This dynamic completely overturns our idea of religion. It is not man who first seeks God, but God who seeks man; it is not man who offers something to God, but God who asks in order to give. And thus the Samaritan woman becomes a figure of every person: she carries within herself a thirst she cannot name, a fragmented life, a story that avoids the gaze of others. She goes to the well at noon, at the most inconvenient hour, so as not to meet anyone. And yet she encounters the One who knows her completely.

The dialogue unfolds as a true divine pedagogy. Christ does not reveal everything at once, but leads step by step. From material water to living water, from curiosity to search, from search to truth. Saint Cyril of Alexandria writes: “He gently leads her from sensible reality to the contemplation of the spiritual” (Commentary on John, II). This is essential: God does not violate freedom, but educates it. He does not impose the light, but opens the eyes.

And yet, at a certain point, the journey must pass through truth. “Go, call your husband.” It is here that the Word becomes demanding. One cannot drink the living water without allowing oneself to be illuminated in one’s own reality. The woman is not humiliated, but unmasked in the highest sense: freed from illusions and brought back to the truth of herself.

This passage is the heart of conversion. Without truth, faith remains superficial; without mercy, truth becomes unbearable. In Christ, however, truth is always salvific. He does not say, “You are wrong,” but reveals what is wounded in order to heal it. And it is precisely at this moment that the woman’s perception changes: from a weary man to a prophet, from a prophet to a possible Messiah.

The dialogue then opens onto an even deeper theme: true worship. “The hour is coming when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth.” Here Christ transcends every religious division: it is no longer a question of place, but of the heart. Saint Gregory of Nazianzus teaches: “God desires to be worshiped not in figures, but in the truth of the spirit” (Orations, XXXI). True worship is born from a converted heart, not from an external rite.

And at this point the decisive passage occurs: the revelation. “I who speak to you am He.” It is one of the highest moments in the Gospel of John. And the woman’s response is immediate and concrete: she leaves her jar and runs. Saint Basil of Caesarea comments: “One who has been touched by the divine word cannot remain inactive, but becomes a proclaimer” (Longer Rules, thematic adaptation). Authentic faith always generates movement.

And it is here that the Gospel opens onto the Acts of the Apostles. What took place in the heart of the Samaritan woman now unfolds in history. The disciples, scattered by persecution, arrive in Antioch and begin to proclaim the Gospel also to the Greeks. It is an epochal turning point: salvation is revealed as universal. But note this well: this openness does not arise from a theory, but from an experience. Only those who have encountered Christ can overcome barriers.

Saint John Chrysostom observes: “Persecution scattered them, but their zeal made them preachers everywhere” (Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, XXV, 2). It is the same dynamic as that of the Samaritan woman: from a hidden life to a public witness, from an individual thirst to a shared spring.

And perhaps the deepest meaning of community is born precisely here: in the ability to remain beside the other without pretending to solve everything. In creating a space where a person can still feel worthy of listening, of time, of presence. The Samaritan woman comes to the well at the hottest hour of the day, almost as if to avoid others; yet it is precisely there that Christ meets her. This reveals that the places of suffering are not only places of limitation, but also places where something profoundly human and spiritual can happen: the experience of being finally recognized.

This becomes particularly clear in those places where human fragility is lived every day, such as in communities that welcome people affected by mental suffering. My own work brings me daily into these spaces of vulnerability, where one often realizes that immediate answers or solutions capable of dissolving every pain do not always exist. Yet it is precisely there that something essential about the human person and about the Gospel is learned: that the first form of care does not arise from perfect words or ready-made answers, but from a faithful presence, capable of remaining without fleeing in the face of fragility. One comes to understand how important it is to create a space in which a person can still feel worthy of listening, of time, of attention, even when they carry within themselves deep or difficult-to-express wounds. In these experiences one discovers that, before healing, every human being needs to feel recognized in their dignity. And perhaps this is one of the most authentic faces of Christian community: not a place that seeks to eliminate every wound, but a human and spiritual space in which no one is left alone within their suffering.

In the life of the Church one then understands how important it is not always to have something to say, but simply to be present. For there are wounds that do not ask for immediate explanations, but for a presence capable of not fleeing from pain. And perhaps this is the living water spoken of in the Gospel: the possibility of still being seen as whole persons, even in the midst of one’s struggle. It is there that every Christian community is deeply challenged: in the ability to see the person before seeing their wound.

This vision of care and healing also profoundly permeates the apostolic tradition of the Church. It is no coincidence that among the Evangelists it is precisely Saint Luke who shows particular attention to Christ’s mercy toward the wounds of humanity. A native of Antioch and a highly educated physician, he understood that the Gospel concerns not merely the soul separated from the body, but the entire human person.

Indeed, in his Gospel, the healings performed by Christ are never merely extraordinary acts; they become signs of the profound restoration of the human being. Through his attentive and concrete perspective, Saint Luke bears witness that divine Grace possesses the power to heal not only physical wounds, but also those that are interior and spiritual.

As a physician, he cared for the community through the art of medicine and the remedies offered by nature. Yet as a disciple of Christ, an Evangelist, and a father of the early Church, he proclaimed an even deeper healing: the healing that comes through the action of the Holy Spirit and renews the human person from within.

For Saint Luke, true healing did not consist merely in the recovery of physical health, but in the transfiguration of the whole person into a living icon of Christ. This is the mystery of deification — theosis — the path through which humanity, by means of Grace, participates in the divine life. And this is precisely the highest vocation and ultimate destiny of every faithful heart.

According to holy Tradition, Saint Luke was also an artist and iconographer, for what he proclaimed through the word, he also desired to contemplate and communicate through sacred beauty. He is traditionally credited with writing the first icon of the Most Holy Virgin Mary holding Christ Emmanuel in her arms.

Through this sacred image, he sought to point toward the One who first received deification in its fullness through the presence of the Incarnate Word within her womb: the Most Holy Mother of God, the Ever-Virgin Mary. In her, divine Grace is manifested in its most radiant fullness.

Mary is the Mother of the community of believers, the Mother of the Church, and the perfect model of humanity transfigured by the presence of God. Full of grace, she was overshadowed and sanctified by the Holy Spirit, becoming the living temple in whom the Lord took His dwelling.

For this reason, in contemplating the Most Holy Virgin, we also come to understand the heart of Saint Luke’s mission: to show that the Gospel is not merely a moral teaching or a historical account, but the living testimony of a humanity that, through Christ and the action of the Holy Spirit, can be healed, transfigured, and made partakers of the divine life. In Mary we see fully accomplished what every human being is called to become: a dwelling place of the presence of God, a heart transformed by divine love and made into a living icon of Christ.

And it is precisely this humanity, healed and transfigured by grace, that we also see emerging in Antioch, where for the first time the disciples were called “Christians.” This is not merely a name, but an ontological transformation. It means belonging to Christ, bearing His name, and reflecting His life. Saint Ignatius of Antioch states powerfully: “It is better to be a Christian without saying so, than to proclaim it without truly being so” (Ad Magnesios, IV).

In Antioch, a new identity is also born: “Christians.” It is not merely a name, but an ontological transformation. It means belonging to Christ, bearing His name, reflecting His life. Saint Ignatius of Antioch states forcefully: “It is better to be a Christian without saying it than to say it without being it” (Letter to the Magnesians, IV).

Here a decisive question opens before us: is our being Christian only a name, or a reality?

And the answer is measured in charity. The Acts of the Apostles show us a community that does not close in on itself, but takes responsibility for the needs of others. When famine is announced, the disciples send relief. Saint Cyprian of Carthage writes: “Charity is the bond of perfection and the unity of the Church” (On the Unity of the Church, 5). Without charity, faith is sterile; without sharing, community is only apparent.

Now the connection between the two readings appears in all its theological and spiritual depth: the Samaritan woman represents the encounter that converts; Antioch represents the communion that is born from conversion. The well is the place of beginning; the Church is the place of fulfillment. The living water received becomes charity lived.

And so the Word today addresses us with radical force. We cannot remain neutral. What is our thirst? Where do we try to quench it? And above all: do we have the courage to let Christ tell us the truth? For without this passage there is no living water.

True conversion is not a feeling, but a decision. It is leaving the jar: that is, leaving what holds us back, what deceives us, what prevents us from opening ourselves fully to God. It is accepting to be known and loved as we are, in order to become what we are called to be.

Dear brothers and sisters, the greatest risk is not sin, but superficiality. It is not weakness, but closure. It is not thirst, but the refusal of living water. Today Christ stops beside our well and calls us to a real passage: from an habitual faith to a living faith, from an external religiosity to a personal encounter, from a nominal Christianity to a transformed life.

Let us therefore ask for the grace not to flee this encounter, not to fear the truth, not to delay conversion. For only in this way can our life, like that of the Samaritan woman, become proclamation; and like that of the disciples in Antioch, become communion and charity.

May Almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Archpriest Michele Alberto Del Duca.