Homily for the week of July 18, 2010

Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, 2010

Deuteronomy 30:10-14

Psalm 69:14, 17, 30-31, 33-34, 36, 37 or Psalm 19:8, 9, 10, 11

Colossians 1:15-20

Luke 10:25-37

Most of you have heard many times the Gospel story known as the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus told the story because a lawyer who ask Jesus how he could be sure to get to heaven. Jesus says a man is robbed and left for dead on the side of the road. First a priest passes by, then a Levite, both of them professional religious types. But no one stops to help. Finally a Samaritan stops, bandages the man's wounds, takes him to a place for medical care, and promises to pay all the bills while the man recovers. It is a story about compassion and care for the hurting ones in our society, which is the reason so many hospitals and churches and social agencies bear the name of Good Samaritan today.

But what does the story try to tell us? Is it a reminder to pick up hitchhikers and gives coins to beggars at street corners. Or a call to give more of our money to hurting and victims? There are all kinds of good reasons for not stopping to help a stranger: It’s dangerous—what if the robbers are still lurking and attack me? I don’t have any professional skills or resources to help this person. If I move him and make his injuries worse he might sue me. And on and on.

I can easily talk myself out of any good deed, just like the lawyer in today’s Gospel. He knew what to do. He knew what his religious convictions prompted him to do. He was a good lawyer. He could recite the law perfectly. He also knew what his heart was urging him to do. He just needed somebody to reassure him that his rationalizations were well founded and that no one would expect him to do anything for some stranger in need.

It would have been easy for Jesus to give him the answer he wanted: “Yes, of course you’re right. It is not your responsibility to take care of this man on the side of the road. Someone better equipped will tend to him.” But Jesus does not. Jesus knows it will not be easy for this lawyer to hear his answer. So Jesus thinks a story will help the lawyer move out of his head and listen to his heart. There is, however, a twist to the story that Jesus tells.

The complication is that the lawyer would never identify with a hated Samaritan at the time of Jesus. Jews regarded Samaritans as half-breeds, as persons to be avoided like terrorists. From his perspective the lawyer would probably see himself more as the person in need at the side of the road. He would complain that the do gooders as priest and Levite passed by and did not help. To receive lavish aid after that from a despised Samaritan would make him uneasy enough to refuse the help.

The question is not really, “Who is my neighbor?” Deep down the lawyer knows that each human being and every creature are neighbor, all relying on one another in the fragile web of life. The lawyer does not want to admit this to himself because of what it will ask of him. In the depths of his heart, however, he knows what he must do to aid a fellow traveller in need. It is not really too hard or too mysterious to figure out, as Moses tells the Israelites in the first reading. You do not need someone to “go up in the sky” or “cross the sea.” How to live out God’s way as elaborated in the Bible is actually “something very near to you, already in your mouths and in your hearts; you have only to carry it out,” as Moses asserts.

Heeding the voice of God to know what is the right action and the right time requires deep listening, in silent prayer, in honest conversation with trusted friends and in openness to hearing the cries of needy neighbors at hand and throughout the globe. We do not know whether the lawyer let go of trying to justify himself and was able to “go and do likewise.” The story remains open-ended, inviting us to hear it addressed to ourselves. How will it end?

Who can I be neighbor to? My neighbor is any person I meet: the person I meet grocery shopping; the person driving the car ahead of me; Democrats and Republicans, Southerners and Northerners, freckled, tan, brown, yellow,; classmates; a baby or a senior citizen; the family next door; my family; Catholics, Protestants, Buddhists, Muslims, those who have not yet found a faith; immigrants, a son or daughter tormented with shyness or confusion; the prisoner; the sinner and the saint. There are no limits to whom is our neighbor. There is no one who is NOT our neighbor. Consequently, we cannot ignore another's suffering no matter who they are or where they live. Our neighbor includes the whole human family.