Day 24: It’s All About Love

Today’s Mass Readings

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In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus makes it very simple.

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The Good Samaritan, by Dinah Roe Kendall

It is all about love. Love of God expressed in love of our neighbor, of the people we live with and meet in our home. Love in the grocery store, at work, or on the street.

And what is love? I understand it to be the decision, the choice, the willingness to give value in my decision-making to what is important to the other person. So “to love your neighbor as yourself” tells me to make the needs of my neighbor just as important as my own needs. It doesn’t say anything about that person’s race or nation of origin or skin color or religious beliefs.

In fact, at the end of the parallel passage in Luke’s Gospel (Lk 10: 25-28), Jesus goes on to tell a parable (cf. 10:29-37) about a Jewish man being helped by a Samaritan, a person from a different culture, someone the strict Jews shunned. That encounter changed both people, and gives us an example of a key ingredient in the healing of the divisions across racial lines in our land.

It will take time and effort—persistent effort—to reach across this divide to form relationships that open the way to healing. Who will be wise enough to walk this path?

Reflection Questions:

  • What in our culture makes it so hard to reach out to a person of another race?
  • What is at the root of my personal reluctance or hesitation? Is that how I want to live?
  • Where have I experienced a relationship that has been a source of healing?
1 reply
  1. JL & Triny Rivas
    JL & Triny Rivas says:

    Hi, we are José Luis y Triny Rivas from México City. We were members of Marriage Encounter local chapter and over 38 ys ago, we hosted a wonderful priest named Mark McKensie and we grew very fond of him, so much that a few years later we named our youngest son Marcos. We wonder if the author of this article is the same P. Mark McKensie and if so, we would love to reach him and catch up. Please, reply this message. We would very much appreciate any info.
    Love,
    JL & Triny Rivas

    Reply

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