Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Today, we celebrate the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time. We continue to journey with Jesus and his disciples through the Gospel of Luke. Last week, we reflected on the instructions that Jesus gave to the seventy-two disciples whom he sent out on their first mission. We heard Jesus calling his disciples to stay focused on fulfilling his mission and find joy in being his disciples and not worry about their accomplishments. Today’s Gospel reading holds many inspiring thoughts and challenges for our reflection, prayer and response. I want to reflect on two of them that seem to stand out.

First, we hear Jesus calling his followers and us today to let his way of love become our way of life – to let loving become tangible by loving people in actual, concrete, and real situations.  This reminds me of the story of a priest who gave a wonderful sermon on love – all about love being unconditional, generous, sacrificial, other-centered, etc.  The next day, he got someone to pour concrete around the steps in the backyard and a path through the middle of the back yard to the street. A little while later, he heard voices of children in the backyard and look out to find the children drawing stuff on the concrete. The priest went out and screamed at the kids and asked them to leave without messing up the concrete. One of the boys said, ‘Father you gave a wonderful sermon on love yesterday. what happened to it?” The priest replied, “Yes, I believe everything I said about love…..but not in the concrete!”

Ha! Ha! Ha! Not in the concrete!!! Today’s Gospel tells us the story of the Good Samaritan to teach us about what it means to love in actual, concrete and real situations. Jesus loved in the concrete, and he called all his followers and us today to love in the concrete – every day and in all situations as we go about doing our daily chores. The way of love that Jesus called us to practice is not an abstract idea, a lofty ideal or a doctrine of the Church. It is the very life of God, the way of God and the truth of God which we must embrace and live. This love must define who we are and how we live; how we treat ourselves and others around us; how we treat the world and respond to what the world has to offer us and define us into the future.

The second thought that I want to reflect on is the call to be sensitive and compassionate to people and care for those who are in need even when they have made unreasonable or even wrong choices. The man in the story of the Good Samaritan went down a dangerous road from Jerusalem to Jericho without any security precautions. Anyone in his day would have known that it was dangerous to travel that road from Jerusalem to Jericho. The man in the story was apparently reckless in making that journey alone.  He put himself into danger. Even at that, the Samaritan reached out and helped and went beyond attending to the ordinary needs and offered extraordinary assistance.

To read more of this Sunday’s reflection, please click on the link below...