2026/01/12

230. The Gospel of John and the Priesthood of the New Covenant: Give Me a Drink

In John 4, Jesus speaks to the Samaritan woman who has come to draw water from the well, saying, "Give me a drink" (Jn 4:7), and a dialogue begins between them. The Samaritan woman exhibits a strong eagerness to continue the conversation and an attitude of wanting to know her interlocutor. Even if she did not recognise him as God, she possessed a sensibility capable of intuitively holding great expectation that she could empathise with Jesus. A woman who has been granted the womb to nurture the life of a person desired by God instinctively feels that she has received something “complete” from God within herself. For when the womb carries a child, life “is” there. This sensibility, overflowing from this feeling, has drawn many women towards God. 

In the dialogue between Jesus and the Samaritan woman, an intuitive and smooth flow is discernible. This is because Jesus, who is "I AM," was guiding the Samaritan woman who possessed this sensitivity. These exchanges occurred while the disciples were absent (cf. Jn 4:8) because the sensibility of the disciples, who were not yet endowed with that priesthood, would not be able to follow the dialogue between Jesus and the Samaritan woman even if the disciples administering baptism with water foreshadowed the priesthood of the New Covenant (cf. 4:2). Yet their exclusion from this conversation was not solely for that reason. 

At the conclusion of his conversation with the Samaritan woman, Jesus revealed a crucial aspect of the priesthood of the New Covenant. Hearing it, she recognised that Jesus was "the Messiah" (Jn 4:25), drawing from him the words "I am he" (4:26), that is, "I AM". Jesus’ testimony was this: "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 now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for such the Father seeks to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth" (4:21–24). 

This teaching must have been unacceptable to the disciples at that time, who were Jewish men and had not yet been conferred the priesthood of the New Covenant. Yet these words of Jesus were a blessing for the Gentiles, and the Samaritan woman, guided by Jesus, was becoming the very worshipper the Father seeks. Jesus, who declared, "God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth," fulfilled these words by preparing everything necessary for future believers—those who would live directly connected to the Holy Spirit—to fully exercise the roles arising from their respective vocations, established by God’s creation of man and woman. 

The words "Give me a drink" evoke Jesus's words on the cross, "I thirst" (Jn 19:28). In that scene, Jesus received the sour wine offered to him, said "It is finished" (19:30), and breathed his last. That was because the night before, he had already instituted the Holy Eucharist and conferred the priesthood of the New Covenant upon the Apostles. Thus, the "kingdom of God" to which Jesus had said, "I tell you that from now on I shall not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes" (Lk 22:18), was proclaimed as having arrived. The "kingdom of God" refers to the space-time that brings forth the moment and place where Jesus instituted the Eucharist and conferred the priesthood of the New Covenant upon the Apostles with his command, "Do this in remembrance of me" (Lk 22:19)– namely, the space-time that emerges in the Mass liturgy. The priesthood of the New Covenant was present under the cross in the form of Jesus' mother and the "disciple whom he loved." This was so that Jesus' words might be fulfilled: "that whoever believes in him may have eternal life" (Jn 3:15). 

At this time, all those called to the cross of Jesus, except the "disciple whom he loved", were women (cf. Jn 19:25). The "my church" (Mat 16:18) born there seems as though it were founded upon women. The absence of the other male disciples here is partly because, for men, approaching the cross entailed too great a danger at that time. Yet there is more to it. Before the feast of Passover, Jesus "loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end" (Jn 13:1). The "disciple whom he loved" was among them, and he stood beneath the cross representing, as it were, the "beloved disciples." That is because all male believers are called towards the vocation of the "disciple whom he loved," who was bound to Jesus’ mother by a filial bond, that is, the priesthood of the New Covenant. 

Not all women conceive children, but there is no doubt that women are oriented towards conceiving children. Similarly, not every man born anew of water and the Spirit to enter the Kingdom of God receives the Priesthood of the New Covenant. Yet there is no doubt that the male believer is directed towards receiving the Priesthood of the New Covenant. The entire Scriptures bear witness to this. Therefore, just as a woman's womb is ever prepared to receive life, so too should the memory of the male believer be ever prepared to receive the Priesthood of the New Covenant. Even if a man is certain he will never become a priest for life, he must undergo the necessary stages of formation. This is so that he may be ready to respond to the Church's needs at any time, like Matthias, one of the disciples (cf. Acts 1:26). In modern times, attending such formation is readily possible, provided learning opportunities are offered. 

This entails women learning alongside men. Women must grasp the full scope of how men are formed for the priesthood of the New Covenant. Since all human life is born of women, so too is the priest, the man conferred with the priesthood of the New Covenant, born of a woman. It is this priest who, during the Mass, asks the Father that the bread and wine become the Body and Blood of Christso, so that the Eucharist may be born. The Eucharist, consumed by the faithful, can thus serve all human life born of women. That is as Jesus said, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst" (Jn 6:35). 

Maria K. M. 

(Notice) 

A new article has been posted on the blog, TheWind of Patmos. It is a translation of an article I submitted to and was published in the Japanese internet magazine, Catholic Ai.