Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church

Homily for July 15, 2007
Liturgical Year C - Cycle I
15th Sunday in Ordinary Time
By Fr. Joshua Nyone
 Topic: The Good Samaritan
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Reading 1
Dt 30:10-14
Moses said to the people: “If only you would heed the voice of the LORD, your God, and keep his commandments and statutes that are written in this book of the law, when you return to the LORD, your God, with all your heart and all your soul.
 
“For this command that I enjoin on you today is not too mysterious and remote for you. It is not up in the sky, that you should say, ‘Who will go up in the sky to get it for us and tell us of it, that we may carry it out?’  Nor is it across the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross the sea to get it for us and tell us of it, that we may carry it out?’ No, it is something very near to you, already in your mouths and in your hearts; you have only to carry it out.”
 
Gospel
Lk 10:25-37
There was a scholar of the law who stood up to test him and said, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  Jesus said to him, “What is written in the law?  How do you read it?”  He said in reply, You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”  He replied to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.”
 
But because he wished to justify himself, he said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”  Jesus replied, “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.  A priest happened to be going down that road, but when he saw him, he passed by on the opposite side.  Likewise, a Levite came to the place, and when he saw him, he passed by on the opposite side.  But a Samaritan traveler who came upon him was moved with compassion at the sight.  He approached the victim, poured oil and wine over his wounds and bandaged them.  Then he lifted him up on his own animal, took him to an inn, and cared for him.  The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper with the instruction, ‘Take care of him.  If you spend more than what I have given you, I shall repay you on my way back.’ Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers’ victim?”  He answered, “The one who treated him with mercy.”  Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
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In the first reading, we have part of Moses’ farewell speech to the Israelites.  We all know that when someone is passing, someone is dying, his or her last words are so precious and we keep them close.  This is what we see in the first reading today.  Moses, in a way encourages the Israelites to observe the law, to observe the Commandments.  For him, these Commandments were not to be considered as something that is out there on tablets of stone but as something that is springing from within.  In fact, in the reading it says, “The law is very near.”  It is something that is so close to you.  It is in your mouth, it is in your heart.  The actual point is this: that you know of God and it is in fact in our hearts.  We know what is right and what is wrong.  We know deep down in our hearts, if we are truly sincere.  This is exactly what Moses was pointing at--believe what the law says.
 
When we come to the Gospel today, Jesus has just told us the parable of the Good Samaritan.  In this parable, I think you all know what Father is going to say.  You have the Gospel reading.  When we read it, it could be the same old story but there is always something new.  One aspect of your life, which you never considered will be pointed out to you and that is the point that Jesus wants to bring to each one of us today. 
 
What is the point?  The story as we all know has those three characters:  the priest, Father Joshua who is here; the deacon, sorry the Levite, our modern deacon, who is also here; and the Samaritan.  Now who is the Samaritan?  Any one of you, I will put it like that.  Now, a situation confronts these three.  They are faced with a decision; to stop and help the wounded man or to continue with their business.  What do they do?  The priest and the Levite decide to pass by.  These holy guys, they are not so holy, eh?  They pass by.  They think first of themselves and then they pass by.  Then the Samaritan comes by.  What does he do?  He decides to stop and help. 
 
Now the real point is this:  crisis does not create character but it merely reveals it.  What do I mean by that?  In times of crisis, in moments of tough decisions, people reveal who they are:  a generous person or a selfish person.  This is what we see today.  When the crunch came, what happened?  The priest and the Levite passed by.  The Samaritan stopped and helped.  In that moment of a great decision, what would you do?  What do we do? 
 
Now this reminds me of Africa.  You see, when Christianity came, we embraced it.  I think we took it lightly somehow.  Deep down in our hearts we still have our traditional religion, eh, you see.  Then when someone dies in the family, we don’t so much trust in Christianity.  What do we do?  We go back to our roots.  When the crunch comes, what do you do?  This is the real point we see today. 
 
The Samaritan, on the other hand, was unselfish.  He put the other person first.  He stopped and helped.  I would like to say here, not only was the priest and the Levite self-centered, I think they were also guilty of the sin of omission.  I think this scene is the one which most of us will be caught when St. Peter is on the door in heaven.  You may say, how about this?  Sometimes these sins of omission, they are, in a way, the worst of our sins.  Sometimes, we think that as long as we don’t do anything hurtful to the other person, we are OK.  OK for a Christian.  Perhaps, someone is being attacked and we have not even come to the rescue of that person.  We have, in a way, decided to distance ourselves from any trouble. 

Christianity is all about caring.  It is all about involvement.  It is all about compassion.  The Samaritan I think, the Good Samaritan was really careless.  Careless of what other people would say.  The Good Samaritans are in fact the souls of the earth and the light of the world.  They don’t care, I mean, they don’t do it out of the sense of just law.  They do it because their hearts would tell them not to do anything different.  Each one of us has that capacity to care.  There are small opportunities of caring that come our way, day in, day out.  For instance, it is within our power to say a kind word.  It is within our power to offer the good smile to someone that might change his or her day.  It costs us nothing but it is something, which we can offer.  It is something that can reveal that we are, in a way, some kind of a Good Samaritan to the others.  It is within our power to offer a little sympathy, to offer a little support to the other.  These little things that we do, they in fact reveal whether we are Good Samaritans or not.  When we are, in a way, used to doing these little things of life, when great things, when an opportunity for something great avails itself, you will agree with me, you will just be led to doing it because you are so used to the little things that you do.  It will just flow.  Therefore, I encourage you, let us do these little things that will in fact show how Good  Samaritans we are or we are just like that priest, Father Joshua, and the Deacon Bob, who just pass by.  May these few words help us to reach the God of Jesus Christ.