Weekly Bulletin

Jesus' original audience would have been shocked by his choice of a Samaritan as the hero of this parable—not because it simply illustrated enmity between groups, but because it cut directly across the expected roles and social norms. In the cultural setting of Jesus’ time, a Samaritan would have been the least likely person to be cast as the one who fulfills God's law of love. The priest and Levite—figures associated with religious duty and social standing—fail to act. Their actions are shaped by ritual purity codes and social expectations. The Samaritan, however, acts not out of duty or conformity, but from compassion.

And that is the heart of the story. Compassion.

In Luke’s Gospel, compassion is not a sentimental feeling—it’s a call to action that overrides cultural, religious, and social boundaries. The Samaritan sees the wounded man, is moved with pity, and draws near. He acts concretely, generously, and at personal cost. His care is detailed and sustained, extending beyond the initial moment of rescue. Jesus lifts up this compassionate response as the model for how we are to love our neighbour—not in theory, but in the grit and complexity of real life.

When the lawyer asks, “Who is my neighbour?” he is looking for boundaries—trying to define who deserves his love. Jesus turns the question on its head by instead asking, “Who was neighbour to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?” It is not about defining others, but about becoming a neighbour through compassionate action.

The commandment at the end is simple and confronting: “Go and do the same yourself.” This is not a story we are meant to admire from a distance. It is a story we are meant to enter. Jesus does not just tell us to think differently; he calls us to act differently—to allow compassion to interrupt our routines, challenge our prejudices, and guide our responses.

This Gospel invites us to a deeper, more courageous discipleship—one where compassion has the final word

Based on: Have you thought, Contemporary context, by Greg Sunter

 May the Sacred Heart of Jesus be everywhere loved……….forever!  
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Our love of neighbour should be tenderhearted and compassionate. The Samaritan should be our model. Along the road he meets a wounded man, half dead, stripped, dying of hunger. He is stirred at the sight, and his heart touched with compassion (Lk. 10:33). Let us not close our heart to pity, when along life’s road we come across a person wounded by sorrow, bruised by ingratitude, calumny, prostrate in the mud of a disorderly life, or a poor person lacking everything, or a needy family. Like the Samaritan, let us draw near to these unfortunate people, and do everything in our power to comfort them. Do we conduct ourselves in this way? De we not on the contrary imitate the hardness of heat of the men in the gospel towards the wounded man?

Jules Chevalier msc

Méditations II, p.259., Issoudun 1891

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The Sacred Heart is the unifying principle of all reality, since “Christ is the heart of the world, and the paschal mystery of his death and resurrection is the centre of history, which because of him, is a history of salvation”. All creatures “are moving forward with us and through us towards a common point of arrival, which is God, in that transcendent fullness where the risen Christ embraces and illumines all things”. In the presence of the heart of Christ, I once more ask the Lord to have mercy on this suffering world in which he chose to dwell as one of us. May he pour out the treasures of his light and love, so that our world, which presses forward despite wars, socio-economic disparities and uses of technology that that threaten our humanity, may regain the most important and necessary thing of all: its heart.

 Pope Francis. Dilexit Nos: He Loved us, #31

On the Human and Divine love of the Heart of Jesus Christ

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