Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 144

And when he saw them, he said, "Go show yourselves to the priests."

As they were going they were cleansed.

And one of them, realizing he had been healed, returned, glorifying God in a loud voice; and he fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him. He was a Samaritan.

Saint Luke doesn't tell us whether the healed men followed precisely Jesus' command. Did they show themselves to the priests? He does say one fellow, realizing he had been healed even before the priests could certify his cure, returned and loudly glorified God. He did, in fact, show himself to the Priest who was Jesus. He also demonstrated his inner healing as he thanked God.

Saint Luke makes much of the fact that he was a "foreigner," a Samaritan. The same Evangelist tells us the story of "the Good Samaritan" who alone showed compassion to the victim of robbers.

Neither gentleman is named; they represent those aliens who astonish us when they evince the virtues in which we -- meaning "my kind of people" -- are supposed to excel. I hope we have all had that embarrassing experience. It's certainly not unusual in the United States to meet people of different class, ethnicity, race, religion, or sexual identity who surprise us with their simple, very familiar humanity. There I was in that strange neighborhood, hearing what seemed to be English with an indecipherable accent, and someone asked in the kindest way, "May I help you?"

Even Jesus was surprised by the Samaritan's enthusiastic gratitude. No doubt, someone had told him not to expect much of the Samaritans and he had no reason to doubt that teaching until this incident. Always open to new experiences and people, even strangers, Jesus was a quick study. He had no need to hold onto someone else's prejudice.

Every human being is a prisoner of a certain time and place. Most of what we know is what others tell us; and that is supplemented by our own experience. And, more often than not, our experience validates what others have said. No one survives in this world who will not listen to advice. We need each other. That's what we mean by culture.

Perhaps the young man discovered, as he left Mary's home, "Whatever they tell you is probably wrong; or, at best, only partly true."

God's grace enables an open mind and learning from new experience. Sometimes an incident is so unexpected and unforeseen it comes as a surprise; and we have to step back and say, "Okay. What does that mean?" We cannot ignore it even if it doesn't fit everything we thought we knew about the world and its people.

Jesus was willing to receive strangers even to his last breath. The same Evangelist, Saint Luke, tell us another stranger called to Jesus as he hung in agony, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom." Had he been the least bit jaded by his bitter pain the Lord might have supposed the criminal's cry was a taunt, a sarcastic gibe. But he heard sympathy in the voice, and a believer's genuine confidence that he was, despite his wretched helplessness, the King of Heaven and Earth. Summoning all his charity for strangers and his dignity as the Son of God, he replied, "Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise."

May the Lord grant to you and me that same open readiness to welcome strangers.