I started this blog several months ago, with a slow trickle of thoughts. A persistent inner voice kept saying "write, write," and I was growing tired of running into old friends who kept asking, "How's the writing? Are you writing? No? Why not? You really should, you know . . ." Most of them have known me for many years, including through my twenties and early thirties, when I strived to be a writer. I happily dropped this pursuit when I became a chaplain. For one thing, I no longer had time or energy. Two, ministry was fulfilling in me what writing could not. And three, writing had always been a tormenting, painstaking process. Why would I want to write?
Lately, however, the desire has once again been welling up within me, and the writing is coming more easily. Perhaps I have finally tapped into that well of living water that Jesus offers the Samaritan woman. This inner wellspring effortlessly and endlessly flows. Which leads me to explain the title of my blog.
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Ivan Mestrovic, Jesus and the
Samaritan Woman, relief sculpture |
I had originally called it
A Woman at the Well, based on my affinity for the Samaritan woman and her encounter with Jesus at Jacob's well (John 4:3-42). I have long identified with her, especially in her fruitless search for fulfillment in a string of ill-fitting and disappointing relationships. Who among us hasn't travelled down that road? Thankfully, like her, I had a conversion experience that changed everything, not in any outward forms of my life (I was already a practicing Catholic and was not looking elsewhere for answers to my questions) but inwardly, in the depth of my spirit. Jesus (whom I prefer to call the Beloved) met me where I was, as I was, and completely reconfigured my heart. It was painful but also so compelling that I had no choice but to surrender to the process. And I imagine this is what happened to everyone in the gospels who "dropped their nets" to follow Christ.
Thus, my theological frame for my blog is this transformative encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well--a place, incidentally, that signifies marriage (think Jacob and Rachel), a union of human and divine. I imagine myself in this place when I wish to converse with God as intimate friend, lover, and spouse.
I was happy to find as my background image
Ivan Mestrovic's amazing relief sculpture of Jesus and the Samaritan Woman, which I first saw on a trip to Croatia in April 2001. It lives with twenty or so other relief sculptures in the the
Kastelet, across from the
Mestrovic Gallery in
Split.
Having said all of this, I recently changed the blog's name to Mariam's Well for various reasons, most of which are not worth mentioning. I will say, however, that Mariam is my confirmation name, which I prefer to use here in the wild and woolly blogosphere. Mariam is the Aramaic or Greek version of the name Mary, and I chose as my patron Mariam Magdalene for her extravagant and devoted love for her friend and teacher, Jesus.
