FAITH MATTERS ‘Who Is My Neighbor ?’

The parable of the Good Samaritan is understood in popular culture to be a lesson in providing aid to the unfortunate stranger.

In the Gospel of Luke, where the story illustrates Jesus’ reply to a lawyer’s question, “Who is my neighbor?” it may offer us in Northwest Arkansas a more profound statement about the nature of love and neighborliness.

It was certainly a powerful story for Jesus’ listeners. The Samaritans were a despised people, neither completely Jew nor Gentile, aliens in the land of Israel, undesired immigrants.

The entire parable, especially if it includes the conversation between Jesus and the lawyer about neighbors and love,demonstrates how love arises in unanticipated places and how we can learn about life and love from sources that might surprise us.

You might think that love and the law don’t mix. But this lawyer, trained in the art of making fine legal distinctions, was attempting to determinelegally who the outspoken prophet Jesus thought should be considered a neighbor, and thus worthy of his love.

Jesus’ reply, contained within the parable of the Samaritan, turns the question of who deserves our love completely upside down. Instead of passing judgment on the legal boundaries of compassion, the actions of the Samaritan tell us that we are to seek out neighbors to receive our love, even when barriers of prejudice or legal distinctions might tell us otherwise.

The Samaritan in this parable is the one who sets for us the example. The Samaritan, the alien, the undesirable, is the one from whom the upstanding citizen, the man most concernedwith the law, has the most to learn. The outsider is the one from whom we learn. He is the teacher.

The Good Samaritan in this story isn’t just the exemplar of one who shows kindness and compassion toward the stranger.

The Samaritan is the one who offers us the lesson about the true nature of love. The Samaritan is the foreigner who has something to teach us, and from whom we have much to learn.

For us, in Northwest Arkansas, to properly understand the story of the Good Samaritan, it is useful to think of the Hispanic immigrant as the 21st century Samaritan.

Consider what we can learn about the nature of “family values” from the Hispanic community. The strength and closeness of Latino families is obvious - and often the envy of Anglo parents and grandparents whose children and grandchildren are geographically or emotionally distant.

The industriousness and willingness to work hard is readily apparent in the Hispanic community. One of our parishioners, who started doing clothing repairs in her home, now employs 10 people, doing alterations for department stores and dress shops. Another bought a used tortilla machine, and now manufactures tortillas and corn chips, distributing to four states and meeting a demand for fresher goods with fewer preservatives.These are people with the entrepreneurial spirit needed to start a business, when a willing employer can’t be found.

And what courage it took for these people to leave behind a country that they knew and come settle with us in this foreign and often hostile land. It was the kind of admirable courage that our own forefathers and mothers also exhibited, only a few generations back.

Contained within the story of the Good Samaritan is a call to show compassion toward those who need it. But the larger message for us is to open our eyes to the teacher that has appeared in an unexpected place. Our vision of what it means to be Christian is expanded by our encounter with the immigrant. We can learn from the immigrant who we are as God’s people and we can discover new ways to share the love of Christ.

The lawyer who confronted Jesus asked who his neighbor was, so that he might know to whom the law required he becharitable. Instead of learning that the limits of charity are reserved for family or tribe or those in close proximity, the lawyer learned that the love of neighbors knows no boundaries, that the love of God is limitless.

Jesus affirmed what the lawyer already knew: if you want to truly live, then love God, love yourself and love your neighbor. The immigrant shows us the way.

THE REV. ROGER JOSLIN IS THE VICAR AT ALL SAINTS’ EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN BENTONVILLE.

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