March 27, 2011
A Word from Fr. Hilary…

This weekend’s Scripture Readings focus
on water and thirst, but what exactly do

water and thirst mean in the Gospel
context? It’s not just water as we know it
that Jesus is talking about, but the saving
love of God poured out into our hearts

enabling us to find life and peace.
stands for the absence of God in our lives

Thirst
–

that  unsatisfied  longing  within  every
human heart.  St. Augustine talks about “our hearts being restless until
they find their rest in God.”

Since the pleasures of life fail to satisfy the

thirsting human spirit, the only remedy
Christ
spring of life within us.

is a relationship with Jesus
who provides a mysterious type of water producing a well-

What took five husbands to teach the Samaritan woman, we learn
from the mistakes of over-indulgence in drink, drugs, promiscuity and
gambling. Her conversion gives us great hope
a worthwhile life was beyond her.  Yet her past did not hinder her from
coming close to Christ.

because in human terms
Jesus won her over by gently leading her out of

herself and raising her mind and heart to higher things.  At Jacob’s well
a man, by asking for a drink of water, restored a woman’s dignity and
changed her life.  

When we were baptized we received this saving water of life
first time. It was a mere beginning which planted us, seed-like, in the
garden of God.  As life goes on we need to be constantly in touch with
this fountain of living water which Jesus gave us

for the

–
and the miracle of growth in godliness does not take place.

otherwise we wither

Today Jesus asks us to have a look at how we
baptism.  Friends, if we are suffering from thirst, simply remember
that the Spirit of the Living God

are living out our

is always
for the unending, the unchanging and the eternal.  

at hand to refresh us and

lead us in our search
Let us be faithful,
Fr. Hilary