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The Pries “Ah, Yaweh, the Temple! What a glorious weekend it was! I can’t wait
to tell my wife and neighbors tonight. Praise you! Thank you for
choosing me as your priest, unworthy as I am! I felt so humble within
the awesome splendor of your temple! And when the high priest, Ol’
Annas, went into the Holy of Holies, oh, I almost swooned for I felt my
very soul being drawn within that inner sanctuary…to be one with you!!
Uh oh, what’s that on the roadside? Looks like a body…It is a body!
That’s the third one I’ve seen this year on this road. Poor soul! Curse
those thieves, Yahweh, they not only rob a man but murder him as well!
Hmmm, maybe I should go over to that ditch and see? NO! If that Levite
sees me too near that body, he’ll report me. Then I’ll be unable ever
again to share in the temple services. I hope that the other stranger
coming up the road doesn’t think I am calloused and cowardly. I am a
priest, I am simply following the law. How come, then Yaweh, I don’t
feel justified….”
The Levite
As he turned to the form on the road, he immediately noticed that there
was a Samaritan not far behind him. “I know what’s going on”, he
thought, “because it happened to friends of mine on this very same
road.” The body is a plant. A perfectly healthy man who is to draw me
to the side of the road and attack me. Then with the help of the
Samaritan, they will rob me, strip me, and leave me half dead. “Praise
the Holy name for the glance over my shoulder and the wisdom that
Yahweh gave me for protection! This day, life has been spared in
Israel.” He hurried quickly along the road and even as he continued he
noticed the Samaritan stop to speak with his accomplice lying at the side of
the road:
The Samaritan
“Oh, poor man. What in the world has happened to him? Have people just
passed him by all day? There are lots of people who travel this path, and no
one has stopped to help him. I’d better stop to see what I can do for him. What a mess he is in: bleeding, bruises, black eyes, and he has been robbed!
I’d better do something with him, I just can’t leave him here. I know what it
is like to be neglected, to be left for dead, that is how people treat me so
much of the time. I can see why people neglect me, I am a Samaritan, but
why have they neglected this poor man. What is happening to people? I have
really felt that neglect, and I know how terrible it is to be left for dead. I am
not going to let that happen to him. I will clean and dress his wounds, put him
on my donkey and take him to the Inn down the road. I am not a rich man,
but I have a little money. That should take care of him for a day or so. I can’t
believe that people just pass him over. Maybe they should be in the position
of desertion and aloneness once in a while, so they really know that it means
to be down and out.” People are just too concerned about what others are
going to think if they do something out of the ordinary.”
The Unfortunate Victim
“What’s happening to me?” I was walking along, minding my own business
and now this: abandoned, rejected, left to die. Why don’t these people help
me? Oh! They’re coming over (priest & Levite)… Now they’re leaving! They were only curious, not really interested or concerned. Death would be
better than just lying here in pain, watching people pass me by. Wait, who is
this guy (Samaritan). Is he going to be like the others and treat me like I don’t
exist? Wait, he is bending over! He must be up to something. I don’t trust
him! He is helping me. Oh, how different life looks.”

Lord, we hear today that You sent many others out before us as
instruments of Your peace, and I am told that You want all of us here to
be instruments of Your peace; I am feeling a little overwhelmed by all of
this and so I have to ask, where do we begin?
A woman was standing on a curb, waiting for the light to say
WALK so that she could cross the street. Directly across from her on the
opposite curb was a girl of about 17. She too was waiting for the light to
say WALK so that she could cross the street.
The woman couldn’t help but notice that the girl was crying. In
fact, her grief was so great that she made no effort to hide it. For a
moment their eyes met. It was only a fleeting glance, but it was enough
for the woman to see the terrible pain that filled the girl’s eyes. Then the
girl looked away.
At that moment the light changed. Each stepped off the curb into
the street and started across. As the girl approached, the woman could see that she was quite pretty, except for that terrible grief in her face.
Just as they were about to meet, the woman’s motherly instincts came
rushing to the surface. Every part of her wanted to reach out and
comfort that girl. The desire was all the more great because the girl was
about the same age as one of her own daughters.
But the woman passed her by. She didn’t even greet her. She just
passed her by. Hours later the pain-filled eyes of that girl continued to
haunt the woman. Over and over the woman said to herself, “Why
didn’t I turn, fall in step with her, and say, ‘Can I help?’ But I didn’t. I
walked on by. Sure, she might have rejected me and thought me a nosey
person. But, so what! “Only a few seconds would have been lost, but
those few seconds would have been enough to let her know that
someone cared. But, instead, I walked on by. I acted as if she didn’t
even exist.” I have been reminded many times that a person in need does not
always need a great expenditure of our energy, or our time, or our
money. What they need most is a simple and sincere sign that we care Our Scriptures this week, last week and next week, do not invite us
to go out, risk our lives, and become religious heroes or superstars; they
invite us to reach out, risk our pride, and become humans; they invite us
to ask sincerely, “Can I help?” Instruments of Your peace . . . “Can I
help?” – that is where we begin

How could anyone who has struggles with alcoholism stay sober
for a dozen years and suddenly go on a bender? Yet it happens again
and again. A recovering alcoholic, who has all but destroyed his or her
life once already, sets off again down the same path of self-destruction.
For a long time, the medical community could not understand how this
could happen. But after many years of study, psychiatrists discovered
how. Those who move from abstaining to the joy of sobriety seldom
return to drinking. But until they make the transition from struggling to
abstain to embracing sobriety, they are vulnerable.
We tend to think of faith as a series of passive “thou shalt not’s,” a
list of things we promise to avoid to stay on God’s good side. But true
discipleship is a matter of “thou SHALL,” actively and intentionally
embracing the justice, peace, compassion and forgiveness of the Gospel.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus calls those who would be his disciples not to
look back with regret or fear to what we leave undone but to look
forward to the possibilities we have to create and build the reign of God
in our own time and place.