15th Sunday in Ordinary Time, July 14, 2013 (Deuteronomy 30:10-14; Colossians 1:15-20; Luke 10:25-37) Sundays reading

from Deuteronomy presents Moses summarizing all of its previous contents. The instructions contained in the book are not too hard to understand. It is not secret or mysterious. It is not up in the sky so that someone would have to go up there to bring it down. The teaching is plain and simple. It is already within their grasp. All they have to do is carry it out. Because the text for Sunday mentions the Lords commandments and statutes that are written in this book of the law, we get the impression that then entire collection of Torah is about law; but in Hebrew, Torah is more about teaching than about law. The Gospel asks a question posed by an expert in the Law of Moses, testing Jesus: What must I do to inherit eternal life? The scholars question was not directly related to the Law but thats where it winds up. Jesus directs the man to the Law for an answer. He actually asks of the scholar two questions: What is in the Law? and How do you read (understand) it? The discussion uses elements of Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18 and 18:5 in providing an answer and a response. The scholar wanted to justify himself so he asks who his neighbor is. Whether this is still part of the testing or not, Jesus answers with the story of the Good Samaritan, which is unique to Luke. Like with most good stories, there are three characters: a priest, a Levite and a Samaritan. Three works well in stories. Note how the Samaritan does three things for the victim: binds his wounds, takes him to an inn and makes provision for him there. The priest and Levite are those we would expect to do something for the man, but they pass him by on the other side of the road. Their avoidance has been explained by arguing they were avoiding ritual impurity (touching a dead or nearly dead body). Yet the fact that they

were going down the road meant they were leaving Jerusalem and therefore not intending to do anything ritually in the near future, since the Temple was in Jerusalem, and they were going away from Jerusalem. The Samaritan however was deeply moved when he found the man and had compassion on him. When the lawyer is asked who was neighbor to the robber victim he says the one who showed him mercy. Often the meaning of these stories depends on the listener. At the Catholic Biblical Association convention some years ago a Lutheran professor illustrated the point. He polled a number of his (mostly white) Sunday school children what the point of the Sundays parable was and most answered along the lines of how we should imitate the Samaritan and be kind and merciful to people less fortunate than ourselves. He then volunteered for a mission outreach program in some country in Africa and tried the same approach to this parable with African Sunday school children and their answer to the meaning of the parable was universally Look how God always provides someone to help when youre down and out! They identified with the man who had been beaten and left for dead, in part because they had often lived such difficult lives. Good old God always sends someone to the rescue. What a refreshing new insight they brought to this parable and to all parables! The understanding and experience of others makes all the difference in the world in how parables can be interpreted. I wish I could have remembered that professors name. Hes a keeper. Fr. Lawrence Hummer