If Trump Really Is My Neighbour, What Should I do?

Last Sunday, the Gospel reading was the parable of the Good Samaritan.  I am sure that you know the parable of Jesus where it is the despised Samaritan is the one who saves the traveller who is mugged on his journey ‘from Jerusalem to Jerico and fell among robbers who beat him and left him to die’ – to use the lyrics of the Medical Mission song, ‘Who is My Neighbour’. 

 

This opportunity for Jesus to tell the parable occurred when a lawyer tries to entrap him by asking him the question.  Jesus is confronted by the person who is a trained expert in the law of Moses. The "Lawyer" as the scripture calls him, isn't interested in learning about eternal life from Jesus at all. He hoped to use the law to set Jesus up. He figures this carpenter - from Nazareth no less - will make a fool of himself and possibly even incriminate himself by attempting to answer such a weighty question as... "What do I have to do to go to heaven?"

 

Jesus turns the lawyer’s technique back on him.  He responds to the question with a question.  Jesus lays a trap for him just as the lawyer attempted to do to Jesus.  Jesus plays to his pride and ego.  The lawyer responds, as it is an opportunity to show his knowledge of the law but not his wisdom. His answer in part quotes Deut. 6:5 along with Lev. 19:18 "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself."  Jesus’ answer could have ended the encounter, “You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.”  However, the lawyer being true to who he is, does not let it go – he cannot.  I believe that he does just what Jesus expects him to do.  He tries again to entrap Jesus - to show him up - to show those around him that he knows the law better than Jesus does.

 

This arrogance allows Jesus to draw him into Jesus’ world, away from legalism – legalistic interpretation of religion, that Jesus tries to show so many times and in so many ways, is not the way to understand God’s law.  In choosing the hero of the Good Samaritan parable, Jesus is setting a trap for all of us.  The Samaritans were neighbours and relations of the Jews.  They were sort of the black sheep of the family.  They were like someone who claims to be a cousin and is an embarrassment to the family. In Jewish eyes, Samaritans were half-breeds, ethnic traitors, and all-round black sheep of the Jews.

 

A Samaritan was not someone that they would expect to behave like an observant Jew who is called to treat others with charity.  Therefore, the lawyer cannot escape from the conclusion that Jesus forces him into. 

He cannot use his legal maneuvering to give an acceptable answer - acceptable in the eyes of his legalism.  It is the outcast that has acted as the neighbour.  It is the outcast that has fulfilled the law.  And here we come back to our response to the passage.  The plain sense of the text does not let us avoid Jesus’ message.  Jesus does not tell us that we must love our neighbour if that person is loveable and is someone we want to have as a neighbour.  We are to love the neighbour regardless of who he is.  He is the one who we would not normally associate with – whoever that is.   

 

So, today we Christians in Canada are faced with a rather awkward situation regarding our neighbour to the south.  There is no way that we can consider the leader of our closest neighbour, Donald J. Trump, to be a good neighbour.  So, can we ignore the lesson in the Good Samaritan Parable, and, as the commandment requires us, love our neighbour as ourselves?    Not loving my neighbour as myself because my neighbours are not particularly loveable is not fulfilling what Jesus requires of us.  We are to love the neighbour – I won’t say because he is unlovable but whether or not he is loveable. 

 

But, come on!  How can a Canadian love Donald Trump?  It really doesn’t seem possible.  But that is what we Canadian Christians and all Christians are required to do.  What then does it mean to love Donald J. Trump as a neighbour.  Well. I think it means that we don’t allow him to bully us.  We are not doing anything loving, to allow a bully, to bully us or others.  It is not good for either the bully or the bullied.  To allow the bully to continue to bully is to enable him or her to continue to damage his immortal soul.  We hear that friends don’t let friends drive drunk.  In that vein, friends don’t let friends bully friends or anyone else.    

 

So. Let us do all in our power to stand up to Trump as an act of love.  As they say, love is stronger than hate. 

 

 

A Parable for Our Time

I have had a book sitting next to my computer for three or possibly four months now.  I have intended to reflect on many of the ideas in that book in this venue.  However, the Corona Virus pandemic has shoved it to the back burner – at least until this morning when it feels right to explore it.  The book is, The Dignity of Difference by Jonathan Sacks.  I reread this book just prior to the pandemic and all its consequences that has taken all of our attention in recent months. 

Jonathan Sacks is a theologian who was the Chief  Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth and, as such, brings a unique perspective to the idea of there being dignity in  differences which has been a concept which has been more honoured in the breech than the observance in the history of humankind.  The subtitle of the book is, How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations.  I believe that what we have been experiencing in the current pandemic is just that, a clash of not only civilizations but a clash or race, creed, colour, and class especially within our civilization.  This has always been there and has been brought to the fore by the impact of the Corona Virus.  So perhaps it is just the time to explore the ideas which the author puts forward in this book.

When I read a book–particularly one of substance rather than one read for pure entertainment – I am in the habit of noting in the back cover or any other blank pages at the back of the book, ideas which are noteworthy and ones which I possibly want to return to in the future.  On turning to the book this morning, I found all the available spaces filled with annotations of things of note – a true embarrassment of riches and an indication of how valuable I found this book.  The first notation that caught my eye was page 65 “the Good Samaritan Parable expanded.”  Turning to the source, I found that it did not refer to the parable directly.  It was the following passage:

Nothing has proved harder in the history of civilization than to see God, or good, or human dignity in those whose language is not mine, whose skin colour in different, whose faith is not my faith and whose truth is not my truth.

This truth, which I believe is so important for us today, is the essence of the message in the Good Samaritan parable.  The priest and the Levite – both ‘holy men’ were not able to see any of those qualities in the man who was lying mugged at the side of the road.  The person who saw, “God, or good, or human dignity” in that person was the despised Samaritan, who could have been excused for walking by on the other side, was a person who had been treated as ‘the other’ by the Jews of that time. He was the true neighbour as Jesus forced the lawyer to recognize. 

I believe that the Good Samaritan parable is, more than ever, a parable for this time of Corona Pandemic.  We have been faced with the reality that collectively we have not seen many people as the Other - the old, Canadians of colour, the poor, migrant workers, and xxx (fill in the blanks for yourself) – and our society has passed by on the other side. 

Blessings on your journey where you never know who might by lying on the side of that journey.