July 14 – Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time: What We Must Do

In today’s Gospel we are given the summary of Christian belief: Love God & Love Neighbour. This command is nothing remote or mysterious - it’s already written in our hearts, in the book of sacred Scripture: “You have only to carry it out,” Moses says in this week’s First Reading. Jesus tells His interrogator the same thing: “Do this and you will live.” -The scholar, however, wants to know where he can draw the line. That’s the motive behind his question: “Who is my neighbor?”. In his compassion, the Samaritan in Jesus’parable reveals the boundless mercy of God - who came down to us when we were fallen in sin, close to dead, unable to pick ourselves up. Like the Samaritan, He pays the price for us, heals the wounds of sin, pours out on us the oil and wine of the sacraments, entrusts us to the care of His Church, until He comes back for us. Because His love has known no limits, ours cannot either. We are to love as we have been loved, to do for others what He has done for us - joining all things together in His Body, the Church. This is the love that leads to eternal life, the love Jesus commands today of the scholar, and of each of us - “Go and do likewise.”