Over the last twenty-five years of giving homilies, I’ve asked you probably hundreds of questions. And although I have another one for you today, I do not expect you to answer it either out loud or by a show of hands. However, it’s a question I hope you’re able to answer for yourself. The question is this: After some two or three years of a national presidential campaign, are you ready to vote ten days from now?
Here’s an even more important question for you. Again, I do not want an explicit response, no show of hands. And the question is this: Will you be able to live with the results of the millions of fellow citizens who will be voting a week from Tuesday? It appears it’s, again, going to be a very contested race. A close race. Once more, our nation seems to be about equally divided on who should lead us and much of the rest of the world for the next four years.
The stakes are high, but they always have been high. However, given what is happening throughout the world in economics and in military actions these stakes may be higher than ever. Because the results of this election will bear directly on so many people, there is another question which also needs to be addressed. No matter who is elected in November 2008, can we, as a nation, respond with civility? I fully believe the answer to this question influences our destiny as a nation.
Civility. The ability to interact in our society with consideration for other members of our society. The ability to get along with one another, even when we disagree with the beliefs or behaviors of other people. Civility. Civilized. Citizen. Words which go back to the formation of the city-states of Greece and the ancient world, when families of people first gathered together for their mutual welfare.
History speaks of the need for laws, for basic rules to guide our ancestors who came together in these first communities. History speaks of the Laws given by God for the welfare of God’s people. Torah. The Law. The Way of humankind. Some two thousand years ago, a scholar of that Law, attempted to test the Son of God concerning which of the hundreds of laws is the greatest of all of God’s commandments. Jesus responded with the sacred words of the “Shema,” the holy prayer recited each morning by every believing Israelite. The prayer which begins: “Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone! Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind.” And to these words, he added others from the Book of Leviticus: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” He then concluded with the words: “The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”
A few moments ago, we heard this passage as recorded by Saint Matthew. However, many of us, in our own minds, thought of the additional lines from the Gospel according to Saint Luke, where Jesus elaborated on who is this so-called “neighbor” that I am to love as I do myself. Every one of us is familiar with the story of the “Good Samaritan,” the one least expected by an Israelite to offer help to a wounded Jew. There is certainly no reason for me to retell the story now.
However, I wonder if, should Jesus tell this story to us today, if he might replace the “Good Samaritan” with the character of a “Good Republican” or a “Good Democrat?” Might he use a “Good Right-Wing Conservative” or a “Good Left-Wing Liberal.” For this, of course, is what Jesus meant, the neighbor we are to love is the one we would least want to love, the one least lovable because of the stereotypes we hold in our hearts and minds. The ones we must treat as brothers and sisters even though we do not agree with what they might believe or how they might behave.
Loving such a neighbor means I must eliminate my stereotypes. I must treat each person as an individual who has good intentions for all of us, even if these intentions are not the same as mine. I am not to vilify my neighbor as being evil or as an enemy. I am to accept my neighbor as another child of God.
This has never been easy to do. Jesus knew this. Surely, he recalled the words contained in the Book of Exodus that we heard in our first reading for today. “Thus says the LORD: ‘You shall not molest or oppress an alien, for you were once aliens yourselves in the land of Egypt. You shall not wrong any widow or orphan.’” Did not the prophets say that we are all the same? Did they not say we journey together in an unknown land. We are as unprotected, as alone as anyone without a spouse, without parents. But nevertheless, the LORD is compassionate to all who cry out to Him.
In a short time, we will learn whom we have elected to lead us in a very troubled nation and world. We all hope whoever is chosen by the people will be a leader capable of guiding us through a bewildering period in our history. But whoever is elected by the people, let us hope we can set aside the anger and passions of the past and work together in our common journey. Perhaps, it is then we can put into practice words based upon Saint Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians and become imitators of the Lord … receiving the word in great affliction and … with joy from the Holy Spirit … become a model for all …
30th Sunday in Ordinary Time; October 26, 2008
Ex 22:20-26; 1 Thess 1:5c-10; Mt 22:34-40