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15th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C
Church of the Nativity
July 14, 2019
What It Takes to Be a Good Samaritan
By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato
Hurrying and Helping
Several years ago, Princeton University did a study on what they called “Good Samaritan.” The study has become a classic.
The University divided some students into three groups. Each group was told to report to another building across the campus to take a test.
The FIRST GROUP was told to get there immediately and they were called the “high hurry” group. The SECOND GROUP was told to get there in fifteen minutes and they were called the “middle hurry” group.
And the THIRD GROUP was told to get there sometime that morning and they were called the “no hurry” group. Without knowing it, the students were being set up for a study.
Along the way, various individuals posed as “persons in need.” One was crying, another pretended to be sick, and another had a flat tire.
Interestingly, no one of the students from the “high hurry” or “middle hurry” groups stopped to help anyone. But every student from the “no hurry” group did stop.
This was one indicator that led the Princeton study to conclude that as the hurry in our lives increases, our caring decreases. This finding strikes me as pretty accurate
The Good Samaritan
The Princeton “Good Samaritan Study” gives us a helpful angle for looking at today’s Gospel.
The Gospel says that someone asks Jesus, “What do I have to do to inherit eternal life?” Perhaps this person is really asking,“What do I have to do and what don’t I have to do?”
Jesus ends up telling the parable of the Good Samaritan. As I look at the parable, I have to imagine that there are three levels of response to the man lying by the side of the road: (1) Seeing him, (2) Having Feelings about him, and (3) Acting or not acting.
Seeing, Feeling, and Acting
All three folks who are walking on this road see the injured man lying there. The first two, the priest and the Levite, just keep walking.
They know that if they get near this guy or touch him, the religious law makes them ritually unclean. And if this happens, they will have to jump through some time-consuming hoops to become ritually clean again.
So the first two folks seethe man, but don’t slow down to really see what has happened or to help. Then the third man comes along, a Samaritan — a sinner and outcast to Jews — and he both seesthe injured man and then acts; he slows down and stops.
The Samaritan sees to the point that he feels compassion for the beaten man. And with this compassion, he then acts and does what he can to help.
So, to go back to the Princeton study, it seems that we have to first, slow down enough to see, to really see the person who is in front of us. For us, it could be a homeless person at a traffic light, carrying a cardboard sign asking for help.
Or it could be a son or daughter who is upset about a relationship that has fallen apart, but is trying to hide it.
Or it could be an aging parent or neighbor who’s feeling alone and left behind.
We have to be slow down enough to really see who is before us. In the very slowing down our seeing can lead us to compassion and action that wouldn’t be there if we were scurrying to the next 101 things we have to do today!
However, if we do allow ourselves the luxury of slowing down, we are most likely to feel compassion for the person or persons who are hurting.
Honestly, all it takes is slowing a bit and the feeling of compassion will bubble up , much to our surprise to do what we humanly can do to help.
Conclusion
So, (1) Seeing leads to feeling and (2) Feeling leads to compassion and (3) Compassion leads to acting.
But the initiation of this life giving process — for both ourselves and the other — is that we are willing to slow it down: (1) To live slowly enough within ourselves (2) To really see (3) To really feel the other person’s plight and then (4) to take “the next step” to help.
That’s the answer posed to Jesus regarding: “What do I have to do to inherit eternal life?”
Slow down NOW, TODAY and NOTICE. The rest of the empowerment flows from God’s grace and it flows through you! Imagine that!
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