True Compassion is Not a Feeling, but an Action!
The parable of the Good Samaritan is one of Jesus’ most provocative Parables. He had just set out on His journey to Jerusalem with His Disciples. He encounters a lawyer with whom He dialogues about how to inherit eternal life. The lawyer is trying to test Him on one of the most debated questions of the day: What is the most important commandment of the Law on which eternal life depends? The situation inspires the parable of the Good Samaritan, which unravels the intricate relationship between the Law and its central core.
Jesus sums up this Gospel reading on the Good Samaritan when He answers the question: “Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers victim?” “ The one who treated him with mercy.” This is about how we are all called to live our Vincentian vocation. This is about: Love, Compassion and Mercy. Jesus tells us in this Gospel: “ 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.” True compassion is not a feeling but an action that results in caring for the other. Jesus recounts the help the Samaritan gives the dying man with attention to the specific details: Jesus tells the Parable how the Samaritan approaches him, he cleans him up, he binds up his wounds, he sets him on his mount, he takes him to the inn and he takes care of him there. After the man lives through the first night (when there is the most risk of his dying), the Samaritan then gives the innkeeper two denarii, the equivalent of two days’ wages. When he leaves to continue his journey, he guarantees the innkeeper that if there are other expenses, he will repay him on his return.
From beginning to end, there are no details about the dying man. He is not described in terms of his origins or his social status. All the attention is on who is taking care of him and paying for him. True compassion leads a person to be merciful in doing good on behalf of the one who is helped. St. Ambrose says it well: “Mercy, not kinship, makes someone a neighbor.”
The parable of the Good Samaritan gives meaning to our lives. We become a neighbor to each other because God transforms us and through Christ we are concerned about our human wounds. That kind of reversal draws the lawyer in and obliges him to change his mind. It is not a question of choosing between love for God and love for our neighbor but of recognizing that people who love a brother or sister also love God. However, it is a bitter reality in our lives that the reverse is not always the case: love of God does not automatically imply love of neighbor. True Love for God, however, is always operative in love for the other.
At the conclusion of today’s Parable, Jesus asks the lawyer, “Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the robbers victim? The lawyer answered, “The one who treated him with mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
Vincentians, in our daily interactions with our neighbors, as we encounter their needs, let’s us be the Good Samaritan to others. Let us always treat others with mercy as Jesus tells us, “Go and do likewise.”
