Daily Reflection Monday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time

Today through Wednesday we will be in the rather wonderful Book of Jonah, one of the twelve minor prophets. Although only four chapters long, it is hardly the shortest of the minor prophetic works. What sets it apart from all the rest, however, is that it contains no preaching of the prophet but is told entirely as a story. And it has become a rather beloved story. Unfortunately, we can talk of Jonah or we can talk of the parable of the Good Samaritan we hear as our gospel passage today, but we can’t do both. Since Jonah will last for three days of the liturgy, we’ll talk of the Good Samaritan since that only occurs today.

The parable (in Luke 10) is found only in Luke, one of several passages only found in that gospel account, like the great parable of the Prodigal Son, the Road to Emmaus and Jesus’ calling of Peter, James and John in their boat with the miraculous catch of fish, as well as others. The parable is elicited from a scribe’s initial question to Jesus of what one must do to inherit everlasting life. Jesus replies by asking the scribe what he thinks is the answer. The scribe answers with the exact same thing that Jesus had told the scribes and Pharisees in Mt 22:34-40 and Mk 12:28-31 when they asked him what was the greatest commandment. Therefore, we can assume that the scribe has heard Jesus say this before and is somehow now testing him by repeating it. Any scribe as well as any Jew of Jesus’ time would say that the greatest commandment is to love God with all your heart, being, strength and mind. That is the “Shema Yisrael” (Hear, O Israel) from Deuteronomy that every Jewish male recited every morning and evening. But Jesus adds to this “and love your neighbor as yourself,” from Leviticus 19:18. This addition by Jesus essentially equates loving God with loving your neighbor. As 1Jn 4:20famously asks, “How can someone who does not love their brother or sister whom they have seen, love God whom they have not seen?” This addition of Jesus’ is unique and his expanding the Shema to include love for everyone in addition to love for God. Jesus says we cannot have one without the other.

The scribe, seeing he has been bested, then attempts to get the upper hand by asking Jesus, “But who is my neighbor?” And that launches Jesus great parable of the Good Samaritan. The final question is the Lord’s, “Which of these, do you think, was the neighbor to the robber’s victim?” The scribe can only answer the truth, “The one who showed him mercy.” “Go and do the same,” we are told. For Jesus, there is no one who is not your neighbor, no one you cannot show mercy, you cannot love.

Jesus says to the Pharisees twice in Matthew, 9:13 and 12:7, “Go and learn the meaning of the words, I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” Mercy has to do with love whereas sacrifice has to do with religion. Again, no amount of religion can ever make up for a lack of love, as Paul plainly told the Corinthians in 1Cor 13. We are called to love our neighbor and nothing else. Love does not judge or find fault or condemn or scold or berate. It does not ask the beloved to earn our love or behave in any lovable way. It does not ask for anything. Love and mercy only gives, without exception, without strings, without any conditions. It seeks nothing in return. It is entirely from above, from God who is love and the source of all love like this. We must decide we want to love like this, to seek it and then begin to practice it in every situation.

We may go to church every week, every day, pray daily, give alms and do good works, but if we are still looking askance at certain people, if we are still being contemptuous or disdainful in any way, looking down on anyone in any way, thinking less of anyone in any way, judging in any way, thinking we are somehow better in any way (like the Pharisee praying in the temple with the tax collector- “Thank God I am not like other men!”), it will do us no good.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of iniquity.’” Mt 7:21-23