Daily Gospel Reflection for August 7, 2024

Join us as we reflect, ponder, and pray together inspired by today's Gospel.

Reflection by Leslie Lynch

Today's Gospel: Matthew 15:21-28

I recently heard a priest say that Jesus lost only two arguments in the Scriptures, and those were both to women.

You might have already guessed the first one: Mary’s request for Jesus to help the hosts of the wedding in Cana when the wine ran out.

The second was the Canaanite woman in today’s Gospel reading. She has come to ask Jesus to heal her daughter, who is tormented by a demon.

Jesus ignores her.

What? He ignored her?

But the woman is so persistent that the disciples tell Him to send her away.

And THEN, Jesus insults her.

“It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.”

But she says, “For even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the tables of their masters,” and Jesus is moved to compassion.

“O woman, great is your faith!” He marvels, and the daughter is healed.

I love this woman’s persistence, her faith, her trust. I love her quick wit and her doggedness (pun intended) in refusing to back down in the face of invisibility and scorn. I have felt her desperation.

I love that both Mary and this unnamed Canaanite woman are our role models. They show me that Jesus has a soft spot for women, that He listens, that He cares.

Like Mary, I can trust that Jesus will respond. Like the Canaanite woman, I can persist. Jesus is approachable, and I can be bold. I can be vulnerable enough to show Him my desperation.

Perhaps Jesus’s un-Jesus-like response to the Canaanite woman was so we could learn boldness, persistence, and trust from her. May we each be blessed with the Canaanite woman’s faith.

Ponder:

How can the Canaanite woman’s example strengthen my faith today?

Pray:

Dearest Jesus, I often feel invisible, unheard, and sometimes scorned. Please, in Your mercy, grant me the grace of the Canaanite woman’s faith.

Copyright 2024 Leslie Lynch

Leslie Lynch lives near Louisville, Kentucky, with her husband and a rescued, feral-turned-sweetheart cat. She’s written three full-length novels: Hijacked, Unholy Bonds, and Opal’s Jubilee; and two novellas: Christmas Hope and Christmas Grace. She is a freelance contributor to the Archdiocese of Indianapolis’s newspaper, The Criterion, and holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University. Learn more at www.leslielynch.com.