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“Go and Do Likewise: Love, Justice, and Dialogue in Today’s World”
Introduction
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart… and your neighbour as yourself” (Mt 22:37–39). With these words, Jesus sums up the whole of the moral life. And when asked who, exactly, counts as a neighbour, he answers with the parable of the Samaritan who stops to help a wounded stranger by the roadside, and closes with a charge to “go, and do likewise.”
This relational dimension of the human person is already there in Genesis, where Adam stands for all of humanity, and our bonds with God, with one another, and with the earth itself are woven into what it means to be human. As the Body of Christ, the Church calls us to take an active hand in shaping the life we share — caring for creation, working for the common good, and seeing in every person a brother or sister within one family. It is from this soil that the social doctrine of the Church grows.
This longing for justice, solidarity, and charity is one Christians share with a great many others, and we are called to be “actively, freely, and responsibly present in public life” (St. Josemaría, Letter 3, no. 48). Yet real dialogue — with those who see things differently — is never as easy as it should be, even in a hyperconnected world. Jesus shows us the way here too, going out to meet everyone He encounters, unwilling to let disagreement have the last word.
These texts invite us to live out social friendship, justice, and peace, so that one day Christ may say to us: “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”
Contents
1. You Did It to Me: Love of neighbour as identification with Christ, from the parable of the Good Samaritan to the foundations of the Church’s social doctrine.
2. One Heart and Soul: The communal dimension of faith: what it means to form part of the Body of Christ, beyond individualism and the divisions that pull us apart.
3. At the Forefront of Transforming the World: Justice, solidarity, and charity as concrete virtues for transforming society, and why to begin by seeing the person in front of us, not merely the problem.
4. Called to Listen: On the art of dialogue, freedom of opinion, and respect for others’ dignity, even in disagreement.
5. Grateful Children: Gratitude as a response to the gift of creation and of neighbour, expressed in the care of the common good.
