July 13, 2025 Fifth Sunday after Pentecost
Luke 10:25-37
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord. Amen.
Please be seated.
This is the year for the Detroit Tigers, Michigan’s Major League Baseball team. The Tigers are currently on top of the Central Division of the American League and have the best record in professional baseball. That makes me happy: I identify with Detroit’s sports teams. Come autumn, I’ll be rooting for the Michigan Wolverines and the Detroit Lions. You see, I’m a Detroit and University of Michigan fan and have been one since I was a child. These are two of my identity groups. I have others: my country, my religion, and even my political positions, although I no longer identify with a political party. I’m not alone: Most people identify with their groups. That can be a good thing: We have something in common with others in the same group. Unfortunately, it can divide us from people in other groups. One of the strongest identity groups for most people is their nationality, their allegiance to their country. Another strong group is their church or religion. There is a danger: If these identity groups become stronger for us than our identity as followers of Christ, we are committing idolatry and are on a slippery slope. The First Commandment tells us to have no other gods before God. If we put our group identities ahead of our allegiance to God, the objects of our identities become our gods.
In today’s Gospel reading, the lawyer asked Jesus what he needed to do to inherit eternal life. Jesus turned the question around and asked, “What is written in the Law?” The lawyer quoted Deuteronomy 6:5, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind.” He then quoted Leviticus 19:18, “love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus answered approvingly: Do this, and you will live.” The lawyer, who was obviously very perceptive, knew he had difficulty doing this and so wanted to restrict the circle of his neighbors. Leviticus seems to restrict it to “anyone among your people,” that is, to Israelites. Jesus responded with the Parable of the Good Samaritan. A man was beaten by robbers who left him half dead. A priest came by but did not help. A Levite then came by but did not help. Finally, a Samaritan came by. He stopped, bound the man’s wounds, placed him on his donkey, and led him to an inn, where he paid the innkeeper to take care of the injured man. Jesus asked the lawyer, who of the three was a neighbor to the victim? The lawyer answered correctly: “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said, “Go and do likewise.”
To appreciate the radical nature of the parable, we should understand that Jews and Samaritans disliked each other. Although both groups traced their lineage back to Moses and Aaron, they diverged in Israel’s later history. Jews believed that Samaritans were brought in by the Assyrians when they conquered Israel, while Samaritans believed they were descended from the tribes of Manasseh and Ephraim. There were also religious differences. The Samaritan bible consisted solely of their version of the Torah, while the Jews revered the entire Hebrew Bible, which Christians call the Old Testament. Moreover, Samaritans offered their sacrifices on Mount Gerizim, while Jews sacrificed in the Jerusalem Temple. Through this parable, Jesus is telling the lawyer, the neighbor he must love as himself also includes this Samaritan, a heretic from an impure ethnic group. Paul echoes this principle in Galatians 3:28 – “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.” The fundamental principle goes back to creation, when God created humankind in His image (Gen. 1-26-27). While this image was sullied in the Fall, it is not lost. All people bear the image of God and hence must be treated as having dignity, even if they have a different religion or are from a different nationality.
The principle that all people bear God’s image has been recognized, in somewhat modified form, by many secular documents. Article 1 of the German Basic Law states: “Human dignity is inviolable.” The Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights begins: “Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world …” The Declaration of Independence, the founding document of the United States of America, says: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Much of the history that followed the Declaration was a struggle to expand these rights to all Americans. It took a civil war before these rights applied to African Americans, and Jim Crow, a form of Apartheid, was not abolished until passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Women could not vote until 1920. And today, the legitimate rights of LGBTQ people, such as the right to marry, are under threat.
Immigration is a complex issue, one on which Christians can legitimately take different positions. Some people argue for open borders: Those people who leave their home countries due to fear of persecution have an internationally recognized right to protection, enshrined in the UN’s 1951 Refugee Convention. And while those who leave their home countries for economic reasons do not qualify for refugee protection, who can blame them for seeking a better life for themselves and their families? Others argue that a state has a duty to protect its citizens, its economy, and its culture from external and internal threats, including those posed by uncontrolled migration. Thinking pragmatically, if large numbers of a country’s citizens believe that immigration is out of control, they will be afraid and call for restrictions, as we are seeing throughout the European Union and, especially, in the United States. Accordingly, a country needs to control immigration, but it must do so humanely. Christians should insist that immigration restrictions comply with the 1951 Refugee Convention. Deportation, when necessary, should be done humanely, with due process of law, honoring the human dignity of those being deported.
I’m a patriotic American who served in the Army for nine years, and so I hate criticizing my country. But what’s happening to immigrants in the United States right now is an affront to human dignity and unworthy of a country that many call Christian. We Americans should remember that all of us, except native Americans, are descendants of immigrants. Stephen Miller, the White House chief of staff for policy and homeland security advisor, has directed ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, to arrest and deport 3000 “illegal” aliens per day. Deportation was supposed to focus on criminals and those posing a threat to public safety. But criminals are harder to find and more dangerous to arrest so, to meet the quotas, ICE has gone after the low-hanging fruit: those immigrants who are easy to find and unlikely to resist. ICE arrests immigrants at building supply stores, such as Home Depot, as they are looking for construction work. It arrests immigrants when they are at work in food processing plants or when they appear at court in compliance with legal requirements. ICE is even allowed to arrest immigrants at schools and churches. Spanish-speaking churches have reported drastic drops in attendance due to members’ fear of arrest. Many of those arrested have young children, who are then left to fend for themselves. Many detainees are in the US legally, as asylum-seekers, under temporary protective status, or on student visas. Many have green cards. Foreign students have been arrested for protesting Israel’s policy in Gaza, which violates their freedom of speech, which is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and applies to all people in the United States, not just citizens.
Many of the deportation stories are heartbreaking. Here are some examples. Kilmar Diego Garcia was deported directly to an El Salvadoran prison without due process of law and in violation of a judge’s ruling. He has since been returned to the United States, but many others remain in that prison. Mandonna Kashanian, an Iranian woman who has been in the U.S. for 47 years and is married to an American, was arrested in New Orleans. She has no criminal record. Sae Joon Park self-deported after ICE targeted him for deportation. He has lived in the US for almost 50 years. Sae Joon Park does have a criminal record: He served time for non-violent drug offenses but has been clean since his release from prison over 10 years ago. His drug abuse was due to post-traumatic stress disorder. Sae Joon Park served in the Army and received a Purple Heart for wounds suffered in combat, which caused his PTSD.
Should Christians react? Yes, loving our neighbor requires action, just as the Samaritan did not ignore the plight of the man who had been robbed and beaten. This church, for example, gave one refugee from Afghanistan shelter and asylum to ensure that he received due process and that his case was properly examined. As Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe wrote on July 3: “We are now being faced with a series of choices between the demands of the federal government and the teachings of Jesus, and that is no choice at all.” You don’t have to support open borders – I don’t – to demand that governments treat immigrants fairly and with dignity.
If you share my concerns, there are things you can do about the plight of immigrants in the United States. Call your Senator or Representative and express your concern. Join a protest march: We’ve had two so far in Frankfurt. Vote! American citizens can vote abroad with an absentee ballot. Whether or not you’re an American citizen, you can help immigrants in the US by contributing to immigrant advocacy organizations, such as the Interfaith Refugee and Immigration Service (IRIS), sponsored by the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. Above all, regardless of our nationality, let’s resolve to treat all people as image-bearers and deserving of fair treatment. Jesus calls on us to love our neighbor as ourselves. As the parable of the Good Samaritan shows, every image bearer is our neighbor, even those who are very different from us. May God grant us the grace to love them as ourselves. Amen.