Homily: Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)
Isaiah 56:1, 6–7 • Romans 11:13–15, 29–32 • Matthew 15:21–28
16 August 2026
Fr. Ricky Cañet Montañez, AA
A few years ago, I was standing in a long queue to leave a plane after a delayed flight. Everyone was tired, frustrated, and anxious to get home. No one seemed to have the patience to let anyone else go ahead. Then a young mother came running toward us, carrying her feverish little boy in her arms. She politely asked if she could go ahead because she needed to get him to a doctor. Most people immediately stepped aside. But one man protested, “Why should she go first? We have all been waiting.” The mother turned to him and gently said, “Sir, if it were your child, you would do the same.” In that simple moment, the whole line seemed to receive a lesson in compassion: sometimes, we understand another person’s urgency only when we imagine that their child could be our own.
Something similar actually happened in today’s Gospel about Jesus healing the daughter of the Canaanite woman. I invite you to consider that two miracles may have taken place in the story. The woman was not the only one who needed help. Perhaps the disciples di, too. Notice the first words of the disciples. They did not say, “Lord, help her.” They did not even ask who she was or what she was going through. They simply said, “Send her away, for she keeps calling after us” (Matthew 15:23). They saw her not as a person in pain but as an interruption. Her cries had become an inconvenience.
Isn’t that painfully familiar? We have all experienced moments when we silently wished someone would just go away: the demanding client, the parishioner who always complains, the relative who keeps asking for money, the child who asks one question after another, the homeless person who approaches our car at the traffic light. We hardly take the time to learn their story—perhaps it is the story of a lonely widow, a father carrying unbearable burdens, a teenager quietly struggling with depression, or an elderly man abandoned by his family. As a result, we allow judgment to replace compassion. Without saying the words aloud, we sometimes echo the disciples: “Send them away.”
And yet the Canaanite woman refuses to disappear. She is willing to risk embarrassment because her love for her daughter is greater than her concern for her own dignity. She persists, even when Jesus’ initial response seems discouraging. Finally, Jesus declares, “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish” (Matthew 15:28). It is remarkable that in Matthew’s Gospel, such extraordinary praise is directed at a foreign woman whom the disciples initially wanted to dismiss. Suddenly, the story takes on a different light. The outsider becomes the teacher. The one considered unworthy becomes an example of faith. The disciples may have thought she needed to learn from them. Instead, they had something to learn from her. The miracle was not only that her daughter was healed. Perhaps another miracle was that God used the very person the disciples wanted to exclude to expose the narrowness of their own hearts.
This is precisely what Isaiah had foretold centuries earlier. When the Lord said, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples” (Isaiah 56:7), He revealed that His family is always larger than we imagine. Saint Paul echoes that same conviction when he reminds the Romans that “God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all” (Romans 11:32). No one has an exclusive claim on God’s mercy. It reaches farther than our categories, our prejudices, and our expectations.
One of the greatest temptations in the spiritual life is thinking that we already know through whom God can speak. Yet throughout the Bible, God continually surprises His people. He chooses a shepherd boy to defeat Goliath, a tax collector to become an apostle, a persecutor to become the Apostle to the Gentiles, and today, a Canaanite woman to show His own disciples what great faith looks like. Perhaps He still works that way. Sometimes the child who tests our patience teaches us tenderness. Sometimes an aging parent teaches us selfless love. Sometimes the parishioner who constantly challenges us reveals how impatient we have become. Sometimes the person who interrupts our plans is the very person God has sent to stretch our hearts. The people we are most tempted to send away may be the very people God is using to draw us closer to Him.
Perhaps the greatest miracle in today’s Gospel was not only that a daughter was healed from a distance but that through her persistent mother, Jesus also opened His disciples’ hearts—teaching them that faith, humility, and courage can be found in the most unexpected places. So, when someone interrupts our day this week, let us resist the temptation to think, “Send them away.” Instead, let us ask ourselves, “Could this person be the one God is using to teach me something about compassion, patience, or faith?”
Sunday Gospel Reflections 