To listen to this homily, click here.
Looking over past homilies, I realized I’ve preached on the Good Samaritan many times. While there are nuances to what I’ve focussed on, the main message of the homilies was to be aware of the needs of your neighbor and not limit who you define your neighbor to be. Pretty good stuff and more than enough to challenge most of us in the way we live our lives, practice our faith, and interact with others. We all have blind spots and types of people we tend to avoid as we make our way through life.
But there is another lesson in the gospel we heard today, one that is more subtle and easy to miss. The scholar of the law who asked the question, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” wasn’t confused about the commandments. In fact, he answered his own inquiry when Jesus asked what he thought he had to do to make it into heaven. What this scholar was actually asking, which is made clear by his second question, “who is my neighbor?” is “what is the least I must do to gain eternal life?”
The more you think about his question, the more strange, yet familiar it seems. He doesn’t ask: what is the best way to fall deeply in love with God and bring joy to his Divine Heart by fulfilling all the commandments. He asks, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?” He is looking for the bare minimum to get into heaven! We certainly can’t be too hard on this biblical minimalist. How many Catholics, perhaps even ourselves, have asked, “how late can I come to Mass and still have it count?” Or we go to a wedding on Saturday and figure that it is a two-for-one deal. Do I have to go to mass again that weekend?! How spiritually cheap! I’m ashamed to say that some of the most precise and punctual moments of my life have been when I am wrapping up prayer. If God was budgeted 30 minutes or an hour for that day, that is pretty much exactly what he got. But binge-watching on Netflix or researching some random interest online? What’s another few minutes? Or hours?! This attitude doesn’t stay simply with time but also bleeds over into how we allocate our other resources of talent and treasure. How generous we can be to ourselves and at the same time, so stingy, so technical and legalistic with God!
Eternal life and our spiritual lives are meant to be a union, a relationship with God. Who would want to get married to someone who said, “what’s the least I have to do so you won’t divorce me?” How many of you parents would be heartbroken if your children came to you and asked, “what is the minimum love, respect, and attention I need to show you so that you won’t disown me or stop caring about me?” No person, serious about a meaningful, healthy, nurturing relationship would ever ask that sort of question. And yet, how often do we, if not with our words, then with our actions and attitudes, do this when it comes to the Lord?
Jesus, wonderful teacher that he is, gets the lawyer to answer his own question, and the lawyer gives the right answer. This is not a matter of knowing the right thing but rather of wanting the right thing. What you have to do, the minimum necessary, is everything. Love God wholly, and love your neighbor as yourself. This is an unsettling answer, of course, because in this life none of us is ever going to do everything. So if everything is the minimum necessary, then none of us is getting in. At least not on our own power and effort. This is why we need God’s help, I.e. the sacraments, especially the eucharist and confession. It’s no longer enough to say, “I didn’t hurt that person.” We are now accountable if someone needed our help and we didn’t provide it.
The lawyer realizes what he is getting himself into and expresses his anxiety with the question of “Who is my neighbor?” He wants a definition of neighbor which gives him the minimum number of people to count as the people he has to love. But Jesus continues to frustrate the lawyer’s desire for the minimum by giving him another maximum: everyone you can love is your neighbor. If you can do good to a person, he or she counts as your neighbor.
I imagine the lawyer kicking himself after Jesus walks away. In his heart, in our hearts, we know Jesus is right. We are called to do the maximum, to shoot for the stars when it comes to charity. But we are much more comfortable with trying to find the bare minimum. There is probably part of the lawyer that wishes he would have just kept his mouth shut and continued to make his own rules about who deserved his love and concern. Don’t we sometimes wish for moral ignorance instead of the burden of knowing the truth and the responsibility that comes with it?
But that is the price of eternal life! It is gained only by entering into a relationship with Jesus Christ. And that relationship must be defined by generosity, respect, care, and concern for all those we can help. We must be influenced by the heart of Jesus that constantly expands to reach out to all those in need; not simply the people we like or who are like us. Heaven will not appeal to those who only want to do the bare minimum and so we need to use our time on earth practicing that holiness which is defined by offering ourselves generously.
Giving everything out of love for God is a holiness we can find only through grace. We cannot do it on our own! We receive that Divine Help in the sacraments, in daily prayer, and in holy, healthy relationships with others and with the Church. May you and I cultivate hearts that seek to do the maximum for God and for anyone the Lord sends our way! May we be Good Samaritans defined by generous love, kindness, and concern!
