SAN DIEGO — Cardinal Robert W. McElroy presided over a special Mass for Catholics in the health care field.
The liturgy was celebrated Oct. 15 at St. Gregory the Great Parish in Scripps Ranch. A reception followed in the parish hall.
Physicians, nurses, pharmacists, hospital personnel and others, along with their families and friends were invited to attend. Some wore their white lab coats as a mark of their profession.
The Gospel reading recounted the famous parable of the Good Samaritan, who took care of a wounded robbery victim left at the side of the road, after more prominent members of the community had simply ignored him.
In his homily, the cardinal noted that the passersby could have reasonably suspected that the wounded man wasn’t wounded at all, but was part of a trap set my robbers. It was, after all, a dangerous area. The Good Samaritan recognized the risk, but took it anyway.
Cardinal McElroy said that health care professionals were “Good Samaritans” during the COVID-19 pandemic. He thanked them, not only for their medical skills and for the successes they had in restoring patients to good health, “but also for the heroic witness of being Good Samaritans, and not thinking of yourself but thinking of those who lie by the side of the road, terrified, and isolated, and in need of help.”
