‘And who is my neighbor?.’ (Luke 10:29)
"Jesus had just finished telling his parable of the good Samaritan. In the story, a desperately wounded man was left by religious leaders to perish. He was saved by someone another man, who happened to be a religious outcast. The lawyer who asked the question, "Who is my neighbor," understood well why the priest and Levite would not help the wounded man. To do so would have meant defilement for them. It was their religion, that prevented them from being compassionate."
"As for the Samaritan, he was one of a breed of people whom Jews in the southern part of the country, counted impure. They were considered unclean, in the same way that the priest and Levite saw the blood stained man as unclean. For the most part, Samaritans were not thought of as neighbors. It is all too easy for any of us, to make love for a neighbor less arduous, by classifying large tracts of the human race, as non-neighbors. Jesus refused answer the question: "Who is my neighbor?" Instead, showed that it was a wrong question."
"The person who asks that question only wants to know what the limits of his duty are? He wants his maximum obligation spelt out so he can leave off being neighborly as soon as possible. Rather than ask, "Who is my neighbor?" Jesus would have us ask, "Am I a genuine neighbor?"
"May God help . . . me to be (( link )) - - - a neighbor."