Scott Hahn with David Scott
We are to love God and our neighbor with all the strength of our being, as the scholar of the Law answers Jesus in today’s Gospel.
This command is nothing remote or mysterious—it’s already written in our hearts, in the book of sacred Scripture. “You have only to carry it out,” Moses says in today’s First Reading.
Jesus tells His interrogator the same thing: “Do this and you will live.” The scholar, however, wants to know where he can draw the line. That’s the motive behind his question: “Who is my neighbor?”
In his compassion, the Samaritan in Jesus’ parable reveals the boundless mercy of God—who came down to us when we were fallen in sin, close to dead, unable to pick ourselves up.
Jesus is “the image of the invisible God,” today’s Epistle tells us. In Him, the love of God has come very near to us. By the “blood of His Cross”—by bearing His neighbors’ sufferings in His own body, being himself stripped and beaten and left for dead—He saved us from bonds of sin, reconciled us to God and to one another.
Like the Samaritan, He pays the price for us, heals the wounds of sin, pours out on us the oil and wine of the sacraments, entrusts us to the care of His Church, until He comes back for us.
Because His love has known no limits, ours cannot either. We are to love as we have been loved, to do for others what He has done for us—joining all things together in His Body, the Church.
We are to love like the singer of today’s Psalm—like those whose prayers have been answered, like those whose lives has been saved, who have known the time of His favor, have seen God in His great mercy turn toward us.
This is the love that leads to eternal life, the love Jesus commands today of the scholar, and of each of us—“Go and do likewise.”
St. Severus of Antioch
from Homily 89
“A man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho.” Christ did not say, “somebody went down” but ” a man went down”, because this passage concerns all humanity. For humanity, as a result of Adam’s sin, left Paradise, our tranquil home on high, where there was no suffering and which was filled with wonders; this place was rightly called Jerusalem, a name which means “God’s Peace “.
And all mankind fell towards Jericho, a hollow and low country, where the heat is stifling. Jericho is the feverish life of this world, a life that separates us from God… And once humanity had thus turned away from the right road towards this life, a troop of wild demons came to attack us like a band of robbers.
They stripped us of the clothing of perfection, and left us no trace of the strength of mind, purity, justice, or prudence, or anything else which characterizes the divine image (Gn 1:26); but striking us repeatedly by the blows of various sins, they knocked us down and finally left us half dead…
The Law given by Moses passed by, but it lacked strength; it did not lead humanity to a complete cure; it did not raise us up from where we lay… For the Law offered sacrifices and offerings “which could not make perfect those who practised this worship” for it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats take away sins” (He 10:1.4)…
Finally a Samaritan came to pass. Christ deliberately gives himself the name Samaritan… For he himself came to us, carrying out the intention of the Law and showing by his acts “who is our neighbor” and what it is “to love others as oneself”.
Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address July 15, 2007
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
I thank the Lord who this year has granted me the opportunity to spend a few days of rest in the mountains, and I am grateful to all who have welcomed me here at Lorenzago, in this enchanting setting with the peaks of Mount Cadore in the background, which my beloved Predecessor Pope John Paul II also visited several times. I offer special thanks to the Bishops of Treviso and Belluno-Feltre, and to all who in various ways have helped to assure me a peaceful stay that serves its purpose. Before this view of meadows, woods and peaks soaring to the sky, the desire to praise God for the marvels of his works spontaneously wells up in one’s heart and our admiration for these beauties of nature is easily transformed into prayer.
Every good Christian knows that vacations are an appropriate time for relaxation and also the nourishment of the spirit through more extended periods of prayer and meditation, in order to grow in one’s personal relationship with Christ and to conform increasingly to his teachings.
Today, for example, the liturgy invites us to reflect on the famous Parable of the Good Samaritan (cf. Lk 10: 25-37), which introduces us into the heart of the Gospel message: love for God and love for neighbour. But the person speaking to Jesus asks: who is my neighbour? And the Lord answers by reversing the question and showing through the account of the Good Samaritan that each one of us must make himself close to every person he meets: “Go and do likewise” (Lk 10: 37).
Loving, Jesus says, means acting like the Good Samaritan. And we know that he himself is the Good Samaritan par excellence; although he was God, he did not hesitate to humble himself to the point of becoming a man and giving his life for us.
Love is therefore the “heart” of Christian life; indeed, love alone, awakened in us by the Holy Spirit, makes us Christ’s witnesses.
I wanted to present this important spiritual truth anew in my Message for the 23rd World Youth Day which will be released next Friday, 20 July: “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses (Acts 1: 8).
This is the theme on which, dear young people, I ask you to reflect in the coming months in order to prepare yourselves for the great event that will take place in Sydney, Australia, in a year’s time, precisely in these July days. The Christian communities of that beloved Nation are working hard to welcome you and I am grateful to them for the efforts they are making to organize it.
Let us entrust to Mary, whom tomorrow we shall invoke as Our Lady of Mount Carmel, the process of preparation for the next meeting of youth from across the world, to which I invite you, dear friends from every continent, to take part in large numbers.
Thank you once again for coming! I wish you all a good Sunday!
Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address July 11, 2010
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
A few days ago, as you see, I left Rome for my summer stay at Castel Gandolfo. I thank God who has offered me this possibility of rest. I extend my cordial greeting to the beloved habitants of this beautiful little town, to which I always return willingly. This Sunday’s Gospel begins with the question that a lawyer asks Jesus: “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (Lk 10: 25). Knowing him to be expert in Sacred Scripture, the Lord asks this man to give the reply himself; indeed, he formulates it perfectly, citing the two main commandments: you shall love the Lord your God, with all your heart, and with all your mind and with all your strength, and love your neighbour as yourself. Then the lawyer, as if to justify himself, asks: “And who is my neighbour?” (Lk 10: 29). This time, Jesus answers with the famous words of the “Good Samaritan” (cf. Lk 10: 30-37) in order to show that it is up to us to make ourselves the neighbour of all who are in need of help. In fact, the Samaritan takes charge of the condition of a stranger whom robbers have left half dead on the wayside; while a priest and a Levite had passed him by, perhaps thinking, on account of a precept, that they would be contaminated by the contact with blood. The Parable must therefore induce us to change our mindset in accordance with the logic of Christ, which is the logic of charity: God is love, and worshipping him means serving our brethren with sincere and generous love.
This Gospel account offers the “standard”, that is, “universal love towards the needy whom we encounter “by chance’ (cf. Lk 10: 31), whoever they may be” (Encyclical Deus Caritas Est, n. 25). Besides this universal rule there is also a specifically ecclesial requirement: that “in the Church herself, as family, no member should suffer because he is in need” (ibid.). The Christian’s programme, learned from Jesus’ teaching, is “a heart which sees” where there is a need for love, and acts accordingly (cf. ibid., n. 31).
Dear friends, I would also like to recall that today the Church commemorates St Benedict of Norcia the great Patron of my Pontificate the father and legislator of Western monasticism. As St Gregory the Great recounts, “He was devout and religious… by name and through grace” (Dialogues, II, 1: Bibliotheca Gregorii Magni IV, Rome 2000, p. 136). “He wrote a rule for his monks… both excellent for discretion and also eloquent for its style”: indeed, “the holy man could not otherwise teach, than he himself had lived”. (ibid., II, XXXVI: op. cit., p. 208). Pope Paul VI proclaimed St Benedict the Patron of Europe on 24 October 1964, recognizing the marvellous work he did for the formation of the European civilization.
Let us entrust to the Virgin Mary our journey of faith and, in particular, this holiday period, so that our hearts may never lose sight of the Word of God and of the brothers and sisters in difficulty.
After the Angelus :
I am happy to greet all the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors present for this Angelus prayer. Today’s Liturgy reminds us that to be Christians means to be faithful to the words and example of Jesus, especially by living a life of love of God and neighbour. May the Lord give us grace and courage so that we may always respond generously, as good Samaritans, to the needs of all who suffer, near and far. I wish you all a pleasant stay in Castel Gandolfo and Rome, and a blessed Sunday!
