Proper A15 / Everyone a Winner

We have before us in today’s readings two contrasting images of God's mercy.
In the reading from Genesis, we have the joyful reconciliation among Joseph and his brothers. In the Gospel, we have the mercy of God, strained through a sieve.
For Joseph, his purpose and destiny becomes clearer. For Jesus, his mission just seems all the more complex -- as it appears, far more than he bargained for.
There are those who might have difficulty with the exchange between the Canaanite woman and Jesus in the gospel from Matthew. Both sound determined -- robust. Some might say, "Defiant."

In short, I would suggest that this passage was one of those situations characterized by the moment where Jesus leaves the sages in the Temple.
Lk2: [52] And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.

Matthew, as a gospel prominently for gentiles, demonstrates how Jesus becomes aware of his expansive and inclusive ministry.
While earlier in this same gospel, Jesus says, in Mt5:17

‘Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill,

Nonetheless, Jesus was getting quite fed up with the importance the Scribes and Pharisees were assigning to their own interpretations of the law, as if the law wasn't already so cumbersome.

We have become used to the Pharisees being given the "Bum's rush," (as if they deserved it.) But the treatment of the Canaanite woman leaves us cold.

David McCracken in The Scandal of the Gospels

The central issue of this passage is not Jesus' mission to Jews versus Gentiles; it is not even cleanness versus defilement. The central issue is offense versus faith. And it is posed in a highly offensive way: pious and law-abiding Pharisees lack faith, and a Gentile dog has great faith.

Some may actually see the woman who confronts Jesus as one who might be forcing Jesus to come to terms with some of the prejudice that might have rubbed off on him from within his culture. Others suggest that Jesus purposefully used such harsh words against the Canaanite woman to set the stage for the expression of the faith that he knew would emanate from her. And there are actually a few who find this line of dialogue so foreign to the mission of Christ that they dismiss this event as reported here, and in a slightly different way in Mark 7, as incompatible with the mercy of Jesus, and thus, perhaps, some later insertion to show the broadening mission of Christ to the Gentiles.

Grant LeMarquand sees a juxtaposition between the Joshua of the OT, who leads the Israelites into the Land of Canaan by conquest, and the Joshua, (that is, Jesus,) who is led by a Canaanite to the New Promise of mercy. In an online essay "The Canaanite Conquest of Jesus," LeMarquand writes

In fact, it may be that it is not just the woman who is converted but Jesus himself. In the midst of his testing of this woman, Jesus’ attitude appears to shift...It appears that Jesus has been turned; he has been confronted with and has learned the meaning of his own teaching concerning “mercy”. The story of the Canaanite woman is a story of Jesus’ own “conversion.” In this narrative the Israelite is conquered by the Canaanite.

Chris Haslam, a Lay Theologian in the Diocese of Montreal, tells us

In (Middle Eastern) cultures, barb is traded for barb, and insult for insult. It is a kind of wit unknown to Westerners. As one commentator puts it: “It is good peasant humour, not theological debate.” Here insult is turned into commitment.

We are not dogs. The Canaanite woman used the image to drive home a point, but we are not dogs. Nor are we worms. In Ps. 22:6, when the psalmist says, "I am a worm and not a man," he was speaking of the manner in which his detractors saw him.
When we allow ourselves to think of ourselves as dogs or worms, it becomes all the easier to think of others the same way, even if we're not prone to "name-call."

The great faith of the Canaanite women is enough for Jesus. He doesn't know anything else about her, and that doesn't seem to matter.

The challenge for us is to have the courage of the Canaanite woman. To be self-assured as she to our own intrinsic value. And to be able to express the deepest desires of our hearts.

Here comes the Dreamer.

Now this is the introduction to the easy sermon today.

[Unfortunately, this acclamation at Joseph's arrival amongst his brothers follows an incident omitted from today's passage, where Joseph reveals dreams that he had that his family might be subject to him, as we know becomes the case through the drought that drives the Brothers later to Egypt.]

So to suggest that the message to be drawn from this rendition is merely that dreamers are people with ideas, and that ideas are to be held suspect, or that one should never let go of ones dreams would be an altruism that doesn't do justice to the complexity of this moment.

Today, however, I'd like to plumb the depths of the story to indicate a further problem, with, in this case, not the best of resolutions – greed and vengeance.

Recall, if you will, the tensions within this house.

Joseph's brothers are the offspring of Leah, Rachel's sister, Leah's maidservant, and Rachel's maidservant. Joseph is the only child of Rachel, who took a very long time to conceive.

Now, while Joseph is the offspring of Jacob's preferred spouse, this grants Joseph no rights over the elder brothers.

They are disappointed that Joseph is obviously in such high regard with their father. They are also angry, because Joseph ratted them out to their father about their poor workmanship.

What pushes these brothers over the edge to the point that they were ready to kill him? They were envious, but which siblings aren't?

Let me suggest that what puts these brothers over the line is their collective disdain. As herdsmen,they had a lot of time on their hands to compare notes.

These boys were brought up in the rivalrous enmity of the mothers, characterized best in Chapter 30, where, among other things, Rachel forfeits bed rights to Leah once, so that Leah might give Rachel some of the mandrakes Leah's son, Reuben, brings home. These women are nothing short of nuts, and their children have to try to grow up with some semblance of normalcy in the midst of it. This enmity cascades through these kids along the lines of loyalty to their mothers, and of course, Joseph finds himself "odd man out" -- the common enemy, if you will.

Joseph is of no significant threat to them. His dreams of lordship might tick them off, but to the point of death? Not in and of itself.

The feelings their mothers had together against Rachel was perfectly understandable, except when you consider the level of deference God had for Leah's plight and the level of devotion Leah had toward God. Again, in the details the lectionary can't possibly serve, God blesses Leah with children, because in Genesis 29:31, God sees Leah is unloved. In verses 32 through 35, Leah names her children in recognition of God's favor toward her. She continues to praise God, as her maidservant Zilpah bears more children through Jacob on her behalf.

In the company of mixed ages, there's not too much more I'm comfortable saying about the backdrop of events leading to Joseph's ill fortune other than to ask this question, (albeit, with the hindsight of 21st Century eyes,):

Doesn't it strike you odd how Jacob compensates for his remorse over Rachel's apparent barrenness?

Again, two of these brothers have tasted blood already. Simeon and Levi, in Chapter 34 of Genesis, to avenge the rape of their sister, Dinah, by Scehkem, son of Hamor, persuade all of the able-bodied men of Hamor's clan to endure circumcision, so that their clan can intermarry into Jacob's clan. While the men were recuperating, the two of them swept through Hamor's city, slew the men, and paved the way for the rest of the brothers to sack the city, take their women, their children, and their wealth.

This family has some real issues with anger and its inappropriate and disproportionate response to crises.

While quite extreme in their final actions, the forces of collective rage has similar effects within our own families and Church.

We think the bickering going on in recent years within the Church and amongst our families is justifiable and maybe even healthy.

The impact of that illusion in another day may not have been that significant exponentially. But that day is long gone -- especially within the Church.

Consider the arrogance of both extremes in Church regarding the sexual morality debate. Our children see us fighting and are forming their own moral base for what's euphemistically called "just rage." And it's my opinion that that issue will come up in their lives with far greater consequences than just the confusion regarding appropriate sexual decision making. It's this sense of collective rage that continues to tighten the trigger on decisions leading us to war and on decisions rendering the plight of the poor as the problem FOR the poor to sort out alone.

Arrogance amongst adults in families is observed as adults model to their children. Kids cannot sort out the nuances in moral decision making in the absence of Christian or even civil demeanor.

We set all of this against the challenge of Paul to the Romans today:

But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him? And how are they to proclaim him unless they are sent? (Rom8:14-15a)

If we persist in the venomous practices of rage and enmity, however just, within our families of origin and our families of Faith, we will not be about the task of the Great Commission -- to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. We cannot let issues stand in the way of our obligation as Christians to live out and bring about the Kingdom without excuse, compromise, and above all, without "Just rage."

Let me place this in the example of the response of one Christian herald, in the face of those who would do less for the poor, in light of the abuses of which they are accused, one Thomas of Villanova, a 16th Century Augustinian, who said:

If there are people who refuse to work, that is for the authorities to deal with. My duty is to assist and relieve those who come to my door.

Our duty is nothing less than that of Peter in today's gospel: To call out for Jesus; to recognize his power to deliver us as we submit to his will in obedience. And to rest assured that even in our less-than-astute challenges we place before him, he will still be there to pull us up out of the mire of our own doubt and lack of courage.