St. Paul’s United Church Sunday, July 11, 2010

The Power of Practical Love – Rev. David Mundy

Colossians 1:1-8 Luke 10:25-37

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Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish was born in a refugee camp in Gaza, the tiny area adjacent to Israel which is one of the most densely populated and desperately poor regions of the world. It is a breeding ground for hatred and despair but somehow this impressive man was able to work diligently to get the education no one else in his family was able to achieve and actually thrive in his profession.

Dr. Abuelaish became well known in both Gaza and Israel because he was invited to work in obstetrics and paediatrics in a major Israeli hospital. He worked alongside Jewish doctors and treated both Palestinian and Israeli patients, saving many lives despite the obstacles.

At times he would wait for hours at the border crossing into Israel, treated as though he was a terrorist rather than a doctor who saved lives. Some of his Jewish patients treated him with great mistrust, afraid that a Palestinian might not give the best care to their wives and children. Some of the people he lived with in Gaza regarded him as a traitor, saving the lives of children who would grow up to be oppressors. Despite this Dr. Abuelaish continued his work, living with the conviction that hatred is a malevolent force which only leads to suspicion and violence.

His convictions were put to the ultimate test in January of 2009 during a massive assault on Gaza by Israeli military forces. Rockets had been fired on Israeli settlements from Gaza and so Israel responded with terrifying force. Whole neighbourhoods were levelled even though they were the homes of civilians, but Dr. Abuelaish was convinced that he and his family would be safe because he was so well known. That assumption proved to be terribly wrong. While talking with an Israeli reporter on the telephone, his home was hit by tank fire, destroying an upper floor. The doctor rushed to check on the damage and found three of his daughters and a niece dead, in pieces, in their bedroom. They were young, between the ages of 13 and 20. Another daughter was seriously injured, as was another niece.

Yet despite this agonizing loss Dr. Abuelaish refuses to descend into bitterness and anger, or to believe that his neighbours are enemies, He has shared his story in a remarkable, deeply moving book entitled I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor’s Journey.

And Dr. Abuelaish is a Muslim. That may sound like an awkward and politically incorrect comment in this day and age, but it is important because he espouses so many of the principles and values we Christians tend to associate with the teachings and example of Jesus. I don’t need to tell you that there is a great deal of suspicion about Muslims in the Western world today, and some of it is justified because of the extremists who promote terror. He says that his Muslim faith motivates him to work for peace and justice.

I share this story with you today because the gospel passage we heard a few moments ago is a parable about compassion and concern for the other which goes across the lines of religion.

We’re told that a lawyer poses a question to Jesus and it is a sneaky question. You might be thinking that lawyers ask sneaky questions, but that wouldn’t be fair to lawyers, and besides, this is a teacher of the religious law rather than the civil law. The lawyer poses his question asking Jesus to name the greatest commandment, and Jesus responds with another question – what does the bible say? The teacher/lawyer says that it is to love God and self and neighbour and Jesus says “good answer, now move along.” So the lawyer asks another question, to justify himself we are told, and it is a pretty good question: “who is my neighbour?” Jesus tells a story this time, a parable and he tells it as though it really happened.

A man is travelling along a road and he is robbed and beaten and left for dead. A minister sees the man in the ditch but he passes on by. A member of the church board also catches a glimpse of the injured man, but he is on his way to a meeting so he too scurries past as well Then a no-good, dastardly Samaritan sees this person in distress and really, truly sees him in his need. Jesus knew that his Jewish audience had no use for Samaritans – there was no such person as a “good Samaritan”-- because of lingering historical suspicions and hatred.

But it is the Samaritan – would it be a Muslim or Hindu or Buddhist in today’s telling?– who gets the wounded man to medical help, and commits to paying his expenses. The People’s New Testament Commentary points out this part of the story is filled with active verbs: “the Samaritan . . . came near, saw, was moved with pity, went to him, bandaged his wounds, poured on oil and wine, put the wounded man on his own donkey, brought him to the inn, and took care of him. He then took two days wages, gave them to the innkeeper...”

I’m going to suggest to you this morning that we have heard this parable so often that we assume we know what it’s about before we even get to the end. At least, I do, but this time I wondered whether we need to hear it differently today as we consider the meaning of compassion, religiously motivated compassion. Do we actually hear Jesus telling us that love is shown in action, and that faith-full living is not just what we say, or even what we feel, it is also what we do? And because we live in a pluralistic world in which we live alongside people of other religions or no religion we need to be pushed to recognize compassion and justice, wherever it is displayed. Last week I urged you to speak about your Christian faith. Today we are reminded that we must live our Christian faith, alongside those who may be different from us.

It’s important to say here that not all religions are the same. Those who suggest they are just aren’t paying attention. There are significant differences, and for Christians the incarnation in Jesus, and the world-changing events of Good Friday and Easter morning set us apart from other religious traditions. It seems to me that it is perfectly reasonable to saw that we choose our faith because we do believe that Jesus is for us “the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”

Unfortunately some militant Christians argue that because of what we feel is the unique nature of our faith, other faiths should be totally discounted. For them there is no meeting place, no common ground, no recognition that these other traditions might share with us the principles of practical love and compassion because they are not centred around Christ.

I am inclined to call these exclusionary and sometimes abrasive Christians “Jesus’ bodyguards” as though Jesus needs protection the way movie stars’ bodyguards protect them from the paparazzi. What a colossal waste of time and energy! And what wasted opportunity! Jesus doesn’t ask us to be protect him, he invites us to be faithful witnesses and servants in the real circumstances of day-to-day life. The parable of the Good Samaritan directs us to actively “go the distance” the way the Samaritan did, to be neighbours the way he was a neighbour.

Brian McLaren has written a book called a New Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions that are Transforming the Faith. One of his questions is about how Jesus’ followers today relate to people of other faiths. Can you imagine which principal McLaren offers to guide us? It is Jesus’ example and teaching about neighbourliness. When he speaks about the Golden Rule with groups be begins by saying:

Our first responsibility as followers of Jesus is to treat people of other religions with the same respect we would want to receive from them. When you are kind and respectful to followers of other religions, you are not being unfaithful to Jesus, you are being faithful to him.

I would take this a step further and suggest that when we learn the lesson of being a good neighbour with those who are different from us in terms of religion, it will open the doors and windows of our hearts and minds to being a good neighbour with those who were formerly regarded as undesirable, or less than ourselves, or even enemies. In Matthew’s gospel Jesus startles listeners when he tells them that when they show practical love and compassion to the homeless and the hungry and the imprisoned they are showing love and compassion to him.

So, we can let Jesus “rattle the latchkey of our hearts” as a poet has put it and open ourselves to radical neighbourliness and love.

Some of you may know the name of Karen Armstrong, a former nun who gave up on organized religion for a time, but has returned in recent years to invite people of faith – all faiths – to discover their common ground even though their religious traditions may be quite different. She has developed what she calls a Charter for Compassion which has been endorsed by many religious leaders including former archbishop Desmond Tutu. Here are a few thoughts from the Charter:

The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the centre of our world and put another there, and to honour the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect...

We therefore call upon all men and women ~ to restore compassion to the centre of morality and religion ~ to return to the ancient principle that any interpretation of scripture that breeds violence, hatred or disdain is illegitimate... We urgently need to make compassion a clear, luminous and dynamic force in our polarized world...

I’m almost done! I should tell you that at the time of the tragedy which took his family members, Dr. Abuelaish was awaiting permission to leave Gaza for a position in a Toronto hospital. He had the full support of his children who were looking forward to a new life. He continued with his plans and moved to Canada with the rest of his family. He reports that this move is all he could have hoped for, and his other children are able to live with the security and opportunities he desired for them. He delights in having good neighbours, and we can believe he will be a good neighbour.

When Jesus finished telling his parable he asked the lawyer which of the three was the best neighbour to the man who had been attacked, and the answer was, and still is, the one who demonstrated mercy.

All of us can live mercy and compassion and demonstrate the power of Christ’s practical love.