A homily for the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, July 13, 2025
Deuteronomy 30:10-14, Colossians 1:15-20, Luke 10:25-37
It’s something of an urban legend that Amazon delivery drivers go undetected by Ring doorbell cameras. They place packages on our doorsteps, photograph them and email those photos to us as confirmation of safe deliveries.
Invisibly, somehow.
UPS or FedEx? Their drivers always set off the familiar jingle-jangle of a fake bell that sends the cats diving under the bed for safety.
Postal Service? Not only do these public servants make the Ring ring, they also usually make the mailbox clank (the hinges need WD-40).
But Amazon? Either the drivers are equipped with a Harry Potter™ Cloak of Invisibility (pat. pend.) or they carry some sort of electronic jamming device.
Whatever.
Because delivering good and goods to people in secrecy has its roots in Christ’s teaching and living.
To appreciate one great aspect of today’s parable of the Good Samaritan, as recorded in Luke’s Gospel, let’s jump to Chapter 6 of Matthew’s good news for a moment.
“[T]ake care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them; otherwise, you will have no recompense from your heavenly Father. When you give alms, do not blow a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets to win the praise of others. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right is doing, so that your almsgiving may be secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.”
Simply put: Do good without fanfare. But make sure to do good.
The story of the Good Samaritan is one of the most familiar morality tales throughout Western civilization. Even the moniker “Good Samaritan” — “Good Sam” in some places — immediately conjures up the image of an altruist.
The good in this man’s heart and hands far outweighs the ancestral enmity between his people and the Israelites.
And the Good Samaritan whom Jesus references does the right things for the right reason, out of love for his neighbor.
Now, this is where we have a point to ponder, stemming from the question in today’s Gospel, “And who is my neighbor?”
Our neighbors are everyone on this blue marble we call Earth, everyone we know, and especially everyone we’ve never met and probably never will meet.
Yeah, especially the latter group.
The Good Samaritan didn’t know the man left for dead by the robbers. Jesus makes that clear in his recounting of the event.
Meanwhile, the victim most likely didn’t get a glimpse of his rescuer, because he was beaten unconscious. When he awoke in the hostel under the care of the innkeeper, the wounded traveler would have been told of the kindness of a stranger. But it’s not clear that even the innkeeper knew who Good Sam was.
And God says that’s perfectly fine.
God gave us more than 8 billion sisters and brothers and aunts and uncles and cousins. They’re tall and short; blond, brunette or redhead; muscular or cerebral or both. Their bodies carry varying amounts of melanin, making their beautiful skin glisten in an artist’s palette of hues.
They all know things we don’t know, and vice versa.
They may not call their daily burdens “crosses” the way we Christians do, but they haul them nonetheless. They can be monstrously heavy, sometimes far heavier than anything we carry or try to.
And if we’re seeking bespoke answers to the scholar’s question, “Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” then the answer for each of us is to love our neighbors in ways only each of us can.
Through time spent with people who need sympathy, empathy or maybe simple acceptance.
Through our God-given talents that range from the skilled trades and manual labor to the artistic, the intellectual or the spiritual.
Through the sharing of our treasure, as appropriate for the needs of the recipients and ourselves.
The world’s conflicts and natural disasters don’t have to affect us directly for us to care about the people who are affected. Good Samaritans know who their neighbors are, and they make sure those neighbors are uplifted.
Good Samaritans know that their case-specific acts of charity and justice need no ballyhooing. That’s what’s implied in our passage from Luke today, what’s written between the lines:
Good Samaritans deliver the good as discreetly as Amazon delivers the goods.
