With my graciously granted discretion, after a long day working, I simply attended the Sunday Vigil Mass at the Cathedral last night. Once again, it was beautiful just to worship. How I love the Mass! Like last week, I heard a good homily. I walked away grateful and a little tired.
In considering our readings for this Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time and Year A of the Sunday lectionary, I couldn't help but think about the the scholar of the Law who, in Saint Luke's Gospel, poses the question to Jesus about what is required for eternal life is answered in true rabbinical fashion when Jesus asks him what he thinks. This scholar then gives the correct answer: one "inherits eternal life" by loving God with one's whole self and by loving one's neighbor as oneself.
"Because he wished to justify himself," the inspired author of Luke tells us, this scholar posed a further question, the answer to which is less obvious and is still a matter of contention: "And who is my neighbor?" In response, Jesus tells the Parable of the Good Samaritan (See Luke 10:25-37).
Whether we are reading Saint Matthew's version of this teaching of our Lord's or Saint Luke's, it is important to note that loving God with your entire being and loving your neighbor as you love yourself are commanded in the Law (See Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18b). This is why, in Saint Luke's version, the scholar of the Law answers his own question so effortlessly. As noted, his follow-up question, which, according to Luke, is asked from a less than pure motive, remains the question.
Jesus, as he does more than once in the Luke's Gospel, uses a Samaritan as the protagonist of his story. A Samaritan? Can you believe it? Not only a Samaritan, but a Samaritan who ministers to a Jew, one whose plight is actively ignored by his fellow, obviously observant, Jews! We usually fail to grasp the provocation in this. It might be useful to imagine something like the Parable of the Good Muslim or the Parable of the Good None as someone who exemplifies what it means to love one's neighbor as oneself, even as we go about what we imagine to be our love of God.
I know this is drawing from another Gospel to reflect on a passage from our Gospel for today. This is typically frowned on because each of the four Evangelists sets forth his own theological program, which should be respected. But, since I am not currently preaching, I'm allowing myself this liberty because I think it is very useful in our present moment.
Early in 2025, there was an attempt to distort and misapply the ordo amoris (the "order of love") for some less than laubable political ends. Essentially, the distorted version of the ordo amoris was an attempt, not to pose the question anew, but answer the question, "Who is my neighbor?" in a way that perhaps the scholar of the Law in Luke's Gospel would've answered it had Jesus also turned that question back to him.
Highlighting the silence of U.S. episcopate in the aftermath of this public distortion of the ordo amoris, Pope Francis wrote a letter addressed to the bishops of the United States concerning this matter, lest there be any confusion about what the Gospel demands. In his letter, the Holy Father insisted,
The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan,” that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception (see "Letter of the Holy Father Francis to the Bishops of the United States of America")Like Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18b, our reading from Exodus can be taken as the locus in the Law where the answer the question "Who is my neighbor?" is found.
Your neighbor is the alien, that is, the immigrant, the refugee. Your neighbor is the widow, the orphan, the poor and dispossessed person whom you encounter. God says in Exodus, "I am compassionate." Getting back to Saint Matthew's Gospel, as his followers, Jesus himself commands us to "be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48).
Being like God is to be like Christ. This certainly means perfecting my compassion by materially and spiritually caring for those who are vulnerable. While it certainly includes those who are like you, your neighbor isn't limited to members of your own race, sex, class, nation, profession, sports nation, or, as Jesus shows in his parable, even your religion. To cite an oft-used quote, the Catholic Church doesn't care for those in needbecause they're Catholic. We do it because we are.
Our reading from 1 Thessalonians continues without a break from last week's "epistle" reading. Paul commends the members of this Church for imitating him and those who accompanied him to ancient Thessaloniki. By doing so, they imitated Christ, thus serving as an example for others. Among other things, following Christ meant ceasing to worship idols.
Today, there are many idols. One idol that seems to have gained a following is nationalism. Nationalism is often accompanied by implicit or, increasingly explicit, racism and exclusion of other kinds as well. Sadly, this can bleed over into the Church. At root, this is a manifestation, an unhealthy contraction, of one's understanding of who my neighbor is.
Don't get me wrong, patriotism, which is a properly ordered love for one's country, is a virtue, one that is ordered toward pursuing the common good. Nationalism, by contrast, is a disordered attachment. Nationalism is to patriotism what lust is to love or what gluttony is to hunger.
A recent showing of this unhealthy tendency is the distored and hopelessly simplistic (i.e., race-baiting) political explanations for the rioting in France (for an on-the-ground take by an American in Paris listen to The Bulletin from Friday, 23 October, this discussion runs from 17:24 to 32:57).
In the end, Jesus is quite clear that "The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments"- "love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind" and "love your neighbor as yourself." In Exodus, God speaks quite clearly, not about the importance, but of the necessity to love your neighbor. And so, the question remains for each of us, And who is my neighbor?
I'm going to end by returning to a chapter of Sacred Scripture that I see as more and more fundamental all the time: 1 John 4:
If anyone says, “I love God,” but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother (verses 20-21)While love of God is distinct from love of neigbor, they two are not and cannot be separated. They are so inextricably bound together that you can't have one without the other.
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