The story we hear this weekend for our Gospel, The Rich Man & Lazarus, is unique to Luke’s Gospel. In this story Jesus is addressing the Pharisees who were fond of money and who thought to find justification in their own punctilious observance of the law. The rich man in this story is similar, in many respects. To the man in the story of the Dishonest Manager. They both seem successful for a time and both are unaware of evil in mishandling money. Similar stories existed in Egypt and among the rabbis. Jesus could easily have adapted this   tradition to his own purpose.

This is the only case where a name is assigned to one of   the characters in the parable. Therefore many scholars feel that the name was later inserted. Was the name borrowed from Lazarus of Bethany who was at a banquet and whose resurrection from the dead failed to convince the Jewish leaders of Jesus’ Messiahship? Because the poor man was given a name, in some manuscripts the rich man is also given a name.

The punch line in the parable not only emphasizes that knowledge of the Law is insufficient for salvation, for the Law must be kept with humble compunction, but also teaches that wondrous events, even resurrection from the dead, do not automatically save men. People are saved through the process of personal transformation.

When you think about this parable you realize that Jesus is teaching about the necessity of having compassion for the poor. Compassion for the poor has the power to promote personal, spiritual transformation. I don’t think it comes as any shock to anyone that Jesus’ ministry was focused on helping the poor. This is one reason why Pope Francis has made that one of the primary foci of his ministry.

One of the major problems that we are confronted with in our modern society is that often we can’t really identify those who are truly poor. There are a lot of things that cause this confusion. And so, since Jesus has revealed that compassion for the poor is vital for our spiritual growth, we have to find a way to be able to develop this compassion without being scammed. This requires a lot of thought and prayer.

Frequently if people don’t work to build compassion for the poor they become like the rich man in the story, oblivious to the plight of others and complacent to only just obey the Law. Personal transformation is not achieved in that manner.