Readings for the 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time:
Deuteronomy 30:10-14 | Colossians 1:15-20 | Luke 10:25-37

Who is my neighbor?

I remember one time when I was driving on the outer loop of the Beltway toward Virginia and I started to smell burning rubber.  I rolled down my window and discovered, to my shock, that it was one of my tires.  Immediately, I pulled my car over under and an overpass near the exit for 270.  The back left tire was ruined.  It popped while I was driving and became torn to shreds.  My heart sank.  I didn’t know what to do.  So, I called my dad, and he talked me through changing my tire.  He even stayed on the phone with me while I drove home with the spare.  I knew how to change a tire, but I panicked because I was on the Beltway.  I needed help.

The situation is similar but worse for the man beaten up in the parable of the Good Samaritan.  Jesus paints a vivid picture of this wounded man’s woes: "A man fell victim to robbers as he went down from Jerusalem to Jericho.  They stripped and beat him and went off leaving him half-dead.”  Perhaps we tend to identify with the Good Samaritan in the story, the one who comes along and treats the wounded man with mercy.  Instead, I ask you to identify with the wounded man.  What might it have felt like to get robbed, beaten, and left for dead? 

Has anything like this, any emergency situation happened to you?  If you have experienced an emergency, I am willing to bet you would not care about the background of a person who is willing to help you.  If someone had stopped their car and helped me change my tire, I would’ve been grateful.  I can assure you I would not have cared whether the person helping me was Muslim, Jewish, Sikh, a Palestinian or an Israeli.

Jesus’ point in the Good Samaritan parable is remarkably simple.  Our neighbor is whoever is in need.  The kingdom of God manifests in anyone who shows mercy.  Notice, the Jewish people considered Samaritans to be heretics.  The Samaritan was hated.  Yet, Jesus has the Samaritan represent the one who is living in the kingdom of God because he acts with mercy.  This should be a signal for us concerning our obsession with needing people to agree with us.  Samaritans and Jews did not agree about where to worship.  They hated each other.  Still, Jesus says the reign of God transcends such small-minded divisions.  Wherever there is mercy, there is God’s kingdom.

Mercy happens, though, only when we are plugged in to God.  Today’s Gospel starts with the Greatest Commandment: love God and love neighbor as oneself.  Love for our neighbor is rooted in our love for God.  The closer we come to God, the closer we come to our sisters and brothers.  Loving God or being in communion with God leads, simultaneously, to communion with other people.  If our lives revolve around the divine center, it is quite simple to love our neighbor, whoever they are, because we are in communion with them.  We experience our unity with all people.  Furthermore, we can love other people from our relationship with God.  We love with God’s love. 

While it’s theologically accurate to say the Gospel calls us to “love everyone,” but where do we start?  It is an overwhelming command, to say the least.  Therefore, we need to start somewhere specific.  We can start by being kind to those with whom we share a house.  We can start by choosing a social issue like poverty, human trafficking, or homelessness and working toward helping those who are victims of such social ills.  It is far too easy to say we love everyone in general and to love no one in practice.  Whatever way you choose to follow the commandment to love your neighbor as yourself, to show mercy, start with someone specific.

So, who is my neighbor today? What neighbor is in trouble at this moment? Nationally, is it a neighbor being arrested or even abducted by ICE? It might be Transgender person suffering harassment. It might be a lonely elderly person. It might be a Palestinian. Indeed, our neighbor is each and every one of these people. Will we show them mercy?