1. The Gospel about the Good Samaritan has two parts.
The first part was about the lawyer who asked Christ ‘What must I do to inherit everlasting life?’ Christ gave the answer; ‘Love God and love your neighbour.’ But both commands were from the Old Testament. Being so it was an imperfect obedience to God’s commands. Though imperfect, the two commands were obedience to God’s commands. And we saw how even Pope Francis could not do that shown by his disobedience to two commands of God as he proposed in ‘Amoris Laetitia.’
The lawyer, knowing better than Pope Francis, answered correctly. But his knowledge was Old Testament and, therefore, imperfect. So Christ showed him the perfected version of love of God and neighbour. Since both commands are identical He gave only one example. This one example shows both love of God and neighbour. It is the parable of the Good Samaritan.
The Good Samaritan is the figure of Christ who came to save the wounded human race. He is, also, the figure of the Catholic Church sent by Christ as His Mystical Body to save the rest of the wounded human race. He is, also, the figure of each Catholic to whom Christ addressed the words; ‘Then go and do the same.’ What did the Good Samaritan do?
2. The wounded man.
The man was the type of the human race having just come from Paradise (Jerusalem). And being punished for his disobedience is on his way down to the world (Jericho) to live out his punishment.
Due to his disobedience he is wounded by the devil; this wound is his lost of virtues and the lost of the power of his free will. By lost of virtue he cannot naturally do good things. By the lost of the power of the free will, he is not free to chose what is good.
The Gospel described him as half dead; the intellect is alive, the free will is dead. Since salvation is an act of the intellect and free will, man is half unable to save his soul.
The Samaritan is moved with compassion towards the wounded man. Like Christ, the Church and every Catholic should similarly be moved with compassion. Compassion must move us to show love to our neighbour. These are the acts of compassion that shows love of neighbour;
a. The Samaritan dressed his wounds pouring in oil and water. St. Thomas of Aquinas writes; this bandaging of the wounds is to apply limitations to movements to check the sins. This binding or constraint on the wounds will give hope that the sin will heal. This means to impose stricter commandments. This will be painful, like wine, to the pride but it will heal corrupt portions of the sinful heart.
Thus in monasticism, if the wounds of the soul are mild, the easy Rule of St. Benedict is enough. If the wounds are serious the Rule of St. Pachomius is more apt. But if the wounds are very serious then the Rule of John Climacus must be applied. Like in every day life, if the wound is insignificant, a clinic is enough. But if the illness is very serious an ICU might be needed.
Today, Pope Francis and the Church bureaucracy is doing the opposite. All the bindings of the wounds of souls are loosen and all medicinal wine and oil are adulterated. All the teachings of Jesus Christ that are meant to heal the sinful soul are rendered ineffective due to a bad moral theology and non-existent ascetical theology.
b. He then hoisted him on his own beast. The Samaritan preached to the wounded man to believe in the Incarnation of Christ, one of the first dogmas he must believe in initiating the cure of his soul. Christ and the way to salvation must be taught exactly the way Christ explained it to the lawyer; explaining both the imperfect and perfect way of loving God and neighbour.
Today, Pope Francis and the church bureaucracy is not teaching the imperfect and perfect way of loving God and neighbours. The provision on Chapter 8 in ‘Amoris Laetitia’ goes against the imperfect way of loving God and neighbour. The inability to have imperfect love will lead to the impossibility of having perfect love of God and neighbour. The result is total absence of compassion and mercy for oneself and for one another.
c. And brought him to an Inn. The Inn is the Catholic Church.
To be able to put someone into the Church, one should know the four visible signs of the Church mentioned in the Nicene Creed; and know how to enter the Church which precisely is what Christ is teaching the young rich man and the lawyer, i.e. through obedience to the commands of the Old Testament (imperfect love of God and neighbour.)
As we have repeatedly discussed in past posts, our biggest problem is no one seems to know what are the visible signs of the true Catholic Church as mentioned in the Nicene Creed, which are One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic. Or the expanded 15 Mark version according to St. Robert Bellarmine. These signs are the only way the true Church can be recognised. These are all visible signs available to all men. Made precisely visible by God so all men can know which is the true Church. But no one seems to know them and no one seems to know now to use them for analysis.
Knowledge of these signs can, at least, intellectually resolve all the problems of the Church today. But no one is using them. Let us take an example; can remarried Catholics receive Holy Communion or not? Just ask; what is the Catholic teaching. Go to the Catholic Church and check her teaching. And there you have the answer! The problem is that we do not know where is the Catholic Church. Because we do not know the visible signs. If we take the four visible signs of the Nicene Creed or (which is the same) the 15 Marks of the true Church by St. Robert Bellarmine, it is very evident that the Vatican church under the Jesuit Pope does not have a single sign of the true Church.
The first among the 15 signs mentioned by St. Robert Bellarmine is ‘it is Catholic.’ But Pope Francis said ‘there is no Catholic God.’ So who is the god of the Vatican? How can anyone bring anyone into the Inn when they do not know where the Inn is.
Everyone is presuming they are Catholics without a single proof. Even you who are reading this post. What proof or visible sign do you have that shows you are a Catholic? Check it out using the four visible signs of the Creed or the 15 Marks of St. Bellarmine (which fortunately had just been translated into English) and available in Amaz….. And it is cheap.
d. he had the wounded man cared for in the Inn. The inn keeper are holy priests and bishops who, within the Church, cure the spiritually sick person.
The Inn is the Catholic Church. The Inn keeper are priests and bishops who have all the visible signs of the true Church of Christ. They also have the moral and theological virtues. They are very competent doctors of the wounded soul.
See how important it is to know the true visible signs of the Church which the Fathers of the Church, like St. Augustine, had very well described. We should know for certain which is the right Inn. Everybody is entering five stars hotel and they are not the Inn. They are the wide road that leads somewhere else. Most sects are advertised as five star hotels. One of this new hotel is the church of compassion and mercy of the Argentine bishop where adulterers have nice accommodations. Beware of the field hospitals.
e. he took out two silver pieces. These are the two commands; love God and neighbour, first, as taught in an imperfect way in the Old Testament and secondly, as taught perfectly in the New Testament.
The imperfect love of God and neighbour can be taught outside the Inn. But the perfect love of God and neighbour can only be taught inside the Inn by the innkeeper.
The perfect knowledge can only be taught by Christ, Himself. And Christ only teaches within the Church and to those who are inside the Church. This perfect knowledge cannot be learned outside the Church. So the great necessity to know which is the true Church and to know how to enter that Church.
The perfect love of God and the perfect love of neighbour, which is the way to show compassion and mercy towards neighbour, can only be taught by Christ, Himself, within the Catholic Church.
Because most do not know the visible signs of the true Church, most are outside the Church. And being outside they do not know the perfect love of God and neighbour. And the reason they do not know it is because they are not interested in knowing the imperfect knowledge. The world is ignorant of both imperfect and perfect knowledge on the love of God and neighbour.
Take note of Pope Francis first public speech on love, which we cannot miss because it was much publicised. It was headline in all our newspapers. It was entitled ‘Love without need for dogmas.’ Charity without dogma is impossible. Charity tells us to love God. Dogma tells us who is the God that we should love. How can we love someone we do not know. So dogmas on who is God must come first before we can love God. In effect Pope Francis was referring to the ‘Id’ of Sigmund Freud and calling it the Charity of Christ. The difference is as wide as the difference between an angel and a pig.
In the church today there is no love of God and love of neighbour. Christ had indeed prophesied describing this age; the decay of Faith and the waxing cold of Charity. The Jesuit author Coleridge had well described our present era in his ‘The Return of the King.’ Don’t Jesuits read their own good authors?
f. he told the Inn keeper to look after him and if there is any further expense he will repay him when He returns.
If the holy priests and bishops teaches the wounded soul more than the two commands in its perfection, they shall be rewarded greatly by the Lord.
Since it is Christ, Himself, who teaches within the Church, it can happen that Christ, using human teachers, can teach more than what His instrument can teach. Just like St. John of the Cross. He learned too much. Thanks to the Inn Keeper St. Teresa of Avila. St. Thomas of Aquinas learned so much. Thanks to St. Albert the Great.
Bishops are supposed to have perfect knowledge of the teachings of Christ. That is inherent in their state as bishops, St. Thomas of Aquinas reminds them. But what we see today is that ordinary laymen are teaching and correcting the priests, the bishops and even the Pope. This is funny but we are not laughing because, in truth, it is tragic; the state of the hierarchy. Though there are always exemplary priests and bishops they seem to be hidden or better still, suppressed by Pope Francis like Bishop Livieres when he was still alive and the Franciscans of the Immaculate.
3. The inability to be like the Good Samaritan has made the world devoid of love of God and neighbour. Without love, hatred will arise. And the world is filled with hatred. The blacks hate the whites and vice versa. Some hate the Jews. Others hate the rich. St. Augustine wrote that to hate one means you hate all men. To love one perfectly is to love all man.
The black who hate one white necessarily hate all men, white, yellow, brown and grey. The arab who hate a Jew hate all Jews, all arabs, all non-arabs, and all whatever. The communist who hate the rich hates all rich, all poor, all middle class, all men and women and all young and old. And the man who hates himself hates all men, all women, all babies and all old people. There you have the reason for abortion and euthanasia…..hatred of self which is the beginning of all hatreds.
We cannot escape that; if we love one perfectly we love all men. If we hate just one, we hate everybody. Now, can we see why there is so much hatred? The world is drowning with hatred expressed in a thousand different ways. People even hate the Pope and would want to drown the Vatican in blood. Why? Because the Pope who is the head of the Catholic Religion, the religion of Love, who is supposed to teach TRUE LOVE is not imitating the Good Samaritan…..have neither love of God nor love of neighbour. And many bishops, priests, nuns and laymen had followed his doubtful teaching that God is so compassionate and merciful that hardly anyone goes to hell. If that is so, why work so hard in loving God and neighbour perfectly? Why follow the example of the Good Samaritan? Why follow Christ who said; ‘then go and do the same.’ As many suggest; ‘do it the Bergoglian way. Which leads to…… we do not know where.