FROM THE DESK OF THE PASTOR

Dear Friends in Christ,



While I am away until July 25, I am leaving you with a number of writings from Pope Leo. This week I am presenting excerpts from a powerful homily given by Pope Leo in Lampedusa, in southern Italy where many immigrants come ashore after a perilous sea crossing. Given on July 4, Pope Leo preached on the parable of the Good Samaritan:

God always loves us first. The beauty of the sea, this island and your faces is a reflection of his gratuitous initiative: love precedes us, surrounds us and brings us together. I am grateful to the Lord for the opportunity to visit you, following in the footsteps of Pope Francis, who chose to travel to Lampedusa on 8 July 2013 for his first trip as the Successor of Peter. The Apostles, as you know, sailed the Mediterranean and experienced the hospitality of the inhabitants of its islands and coasts, which have been a crossroads of civilizations for millennia. The Gospel resounds where peoples meet, people welcome one another, their lives intertwine and different cultures engage in dialogue. It falls silent, however, when each person makes him or herself an island, avoiding contact and cutting off exchange. In this sense, the parable of the Good Samaritan, which we just heard, describes a story that continues to speak to us (cf. Lk 10:25–37), and the Encyclical Fratelli Tutti has helped us re-examine it in light of the challenging historical circumstances in which we find ourselves. The word of God is always relevant for today and draws us into a conversation from which we emerge transformed. How, then, will we respond to the love of the One who loved us first?

Dear friends, today Lampedusa and Linosa lie along a path as dangerous as the one that led down from Jerusalem to Jericho (cf. v. 30). Here you have seen not just one, but thousands of human beings fallen into the hands of robbers who have taken everything from them, beat them brutally and walked away, leaving them half-dead (cf. ibid.). The sea has claimed the lives of others — those who did not manage to reach their hoped-for destination. Yet we feel their presence, which challenges us no less than that of those who have landed in need of attention and aid. Indeed, before any intellectual consideration or ideological conviction, the encounter with those who lie before us, stripped of everything, calls us to be close to them. The Letter to the Hebrews tells us: “Remember […] those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering” (13:3). This is the heart of the Gospel parable: we become neighbors by acting as neighbors (cf. Lk 10:36–37)!

I have come to thank you, brothers and sisters of Lampedusa, for the solidarity that so many of you have shown. Once again, the miracle of compassion has taken place: “he saw them and had compassion on them” (v. 33). It is an inner revolution that brings forth within us God’s “heart” and broadens our thoughts, hearts and lives. I thank the volunteers, the organizations united in the “Forum Lampedusa Solidale,” the civil institutions, the Coast Guard, the mayors and local administrations that have served over the years. I also thank the deacons, priests, religious sisters, doctors, psychologists and educators, as well as the security forces and all those who, with or without the gift of faith, have chosen to love one another. Yes, it is love that has taken shape among you. Compassion, which recognizes a brother or sister in peril at sea, is its first stirring: a profound call to do what you might never have imagined possible. I greet the migrants who are here. They themselves have not only received solidarity but have often shown it on their journey, as the poor helping the poorest. Thank you, brothers and sisters, because there is nothing to be taken for granted in you reaching out to others; nothing happens automatically…

In the parable, a priest happens to be there “by chance” (v. 31), followed by a Levite. Both see what is happening, but they continue on their way. Unfortunately, in every age there are those who fear being “contaminated” by contact with others, thus denying — even in the face of suffering and death — our common origin in God, the infinite dignity of every human being and the call to boundless love. It is time to recognize and affirm that religious affiliation must never become a reason for discrimination, as if faith had boundaries rather than being a universal call to salvation. Where there were walls of separation, Christ broke them down (cf. Eph 2:14). There is no love of God without love of neighbor, and there is no neighbor if I do not draw near. To pause, to be moved, to bend down, to weep before another’s pain — as Jesus did — means entering into the dynamic of love, the very movement in which God has revealed himself.

My dear friends, those who allow themselves to be drawn into this dynamic of compassion and mercy begin to live differently, to be citizens in a different way and to work differently. Then the civilization of love — the one envisioned by my holy predecessors John XXIII, Paul VI and John Paul II — can truly emerge…Like the Good Samaritan, we can always change our plans and direction. More than the Good Samaritan, we have the resources and opportunities to give hope a concrete, historical reality. He “went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine; then he set him on his own beast and brought him to an inn, and took care of him” (Lk 10:34). We, too, must recognize that “the civilization of love will not arise from a single or spectacular gesture, but from the sum total of small and steadfast acts of fidelity that serve as a bulwark against dehumanization” (Encyclical Letter Magnifica Humanitas, 213)…Perhaps you know that Saint Augustine liked to describe human life as a voyage across a stormy sea and one’s destiny as a safe and secure harbor. Let us not be overcome by fear, but rather look upon daily hardships as a time of opportunity and witness….In God we all have a safe haven, and every Christian community is called to be a reflection of it on earth.

Many thanks to Fr Raphael and Fr Williams who are covering for me while I am away. Blessings on your week!

Fr. Johnson