Last Sunday following a tortured and torturing week of unremitting violence, I was relieved to discover that our homily would cover the story of the Good Samaritan. Rev. Mother Lizette Larson-Miller called our attention to several instances today when, as in the biblical text, the religious outsider proved the neighbor to religious insiders: Muslims protecting Coptic Christians, Coptic Christians protecting Muslims, Palestinians coming to the assistance of West Bank Jews, Jewish Israelis coming to the assistance of Palestinians, Hindus assisting Muslims, Muslims assisting Hindus. So you can imagine my surprise when, folding laundry this afternoon, I happened upon a one-month old installment of PBS Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, hosted by Bob Abernethy. One story in particular caught my eye: the ministry of Samaritan Ministries International. Samaritan Ministries coordinates a health insurance practice that allows those who enjoy wealth to pay for the health care of others out of their wealth, just like the Good Samaritan in the Bible.
But, as the story unfolded I realized that this was not at all like the biblical story. In fact, it was the reverse of the biblical story. In the Bible, there is no litmus test for either the person giving or the person receiving assistance. To the contrary, it was precisely because the suffering man did not pass their test that the priest and the levite crossed over to the other side of the road. Samaritan Ministries makes sure that everyone donating or receiving payments is a good Christian — regular church attendance, no drinking, no smoking, and most bizarre of all, no homosexuality. Really? In the Bible, by contrast, the Samaritan is not the least interested in the beliefs or practices of the suffering man; and we can bet that the man suffering was not offended that it had been a Samaritan who bound his wounds and paid for his care.
Indeed, among the features of single-payer national healthcare that makes it a far more accurate copy of the original story is that all pay in and all receive care irrespective of their beliefs or practices. Sadly it is today’s Christians who stand in the position of the biblical priest and levite who wish to deny coverage to those with whom they disagree.