Love Thy Neighbor

I've been thinking about a concept for a long time, and it all began during a Sunday School lesson over a year ago, when we were discussing Samaritans and how the Jews wanted nothing to do with them. My sweet neighbor, Kathy, posited that members of the LGBTQ community could be our present-day "Samaritans," the people we as an LDS community often want nothing to do with. This struck me with such force at the time, it really resonated with me.

You all know the parable of the Good Samaritan, right? A man travels from Jerusalem to Jericho, and on the way falls among thieves and is beaten and left for dead. A priest comes along and crosses to the other side of the road rather than helping the man, and then a Levite (one who works with the priests, or under the priests) does the same thing. Only when a Samaritan, one of the race of people that the Jews reviled and thought of as dirty or less-than, travels that way does the man receive any help. That Samaritan man goes out of his way to bind up wounds, take him to a safe place to rest, and take care of him, paying for his care .

What is interesting to me is that in the parable of Good Samaritan, the Samaritan is not the receiver of service but the giver. I have felt quite frequently lately that it is not our responsibility to serve and "save" our LGBTQ friends and loved ones, but our privilege to be taught by them, and to learn to love completely by knowing them. Can we see them as Christ does? Can we humble ourselves to be like the man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, receiving compassion and having our wounds bound up? Or will we continue to only play the parts of the priest and the Levite and assume that we are good people and need not dirty our hands with serving someone we don't know or coming into any contact with the Samaritans we could learn and grow from?

I hate politics. I don't like the way people turn ugly as they assert their opinions, as if the best way to prove their point is by discrediting their opponent, tearing down others to build themselves up. So I try to stay out of it as much as possible. But I feel the need to break my silence, to differentiate myself from the priests and Levites of the world to say this: I feel the LDS Church's amicus brief for the Supreme Court case regarding transgender bathroom rights was unnecessary. Religious freedom and human rights do not have to be pitted against each other. We can worship as we choose and be respectful of one another's needs. In fact, as disciples of Christ, we should already be doing that.