Readings:
Isaiah 66:10-14c
Psalm 66:1-3, 4-5, 6-7, 16, 20
Galatians 6:14-18
Luke 10:1-12, 17-20 

Drawing on the gospel reading from Luke, the focus of this reflection is hospitality, and it is not only for those (disciples) who are entering the house of another, but also for those who are receiving them. We can talk about this in the general terms of guests and hosts.  First of all, a guest should enter the home or life of another with respect.  Let us recall the famous phrase of Max Warren: “Our first task is approaching another people, another culture, another religion is to take off our shoes, for the place we are approaching is holy.”[1] When I visited a Vietnamese family in St. Louis, I saw the shoes outside the door and I knew what to do.  I didn’t want to bring my dirt or the dirt of the street into their home out of respect. We do the same when entering a Muslim Mosque because the place and the people inside are holy.  Symbolically and spiritually, we don’t want to trample upon where God is already present. Moses removed his sandals before the burning bush (Exodus 3:5) out of respect. And so, it is when we enter someone’s home or “world”, because they are a child of God and loved by God “as a mother comforts her child” (Isaiah 66:13), which we heard in the first reading.  The first words of the disciples when entering a home was to be “Peace to this household” (Lk 10:5b). This should be the mindset of a guest.

Now let’s turn to other side of Luke’s passage, that is being a host. Offering hospitality to others was an important virtue for the early church. Paul exhorted Christians “to extend hospitality to strangers” (Rom 12:13); the Letter to the Hebrews reminded them about not neglecting “to show hospitality to strangers…. [and to] remember those in prison” (Heb 13:2-3); the writer of the First Letter of Peter encouraged them to “[b]e hospitable to one another without complaining” (I Pet 4:9). The early Christians offered hospitality, particularly in cities like Antioch, to those who were suffering due to fires, earthquakes, diseases, and homelessness, whether they were Christians or not. Some have speculated that these Christian homes were precursors of hospitals or health clinics. Furthermore, offering hospitality to strangers “distinguished the early church from its surrounding environment…. [and it] became one of the distinguishing marks of the authenticity of the Christian gospel and of the church.”[2]

Finally, it is important to note that Christian hospitality is ideally meant to be mutually beneficial.  We recall the encounter of Abraham and Sarah with the strangers (Gen 18:1-10), the Visitation of Mary and Elizabeth (Lk 1:39-45), and the moment of transformation/conversion of both Peter and Cornelius (Acts 10). While Jesus in Luke’s pericope is warning the disciples that he was sending them “like lambs among wolves” (Lk 10:3), he was hoping that the disciples would be bearers of peace as guests and that their host would also be enriched and blessed through their openness and hospitality. In this way, both would witness to “’The kingdom of God is at hand for you!’” (Lk 10:9).  May we do the same as guests and hosts!

Roger Schroeder, SVD
Louis J. Luzbetak, SVD Professor of Mission and Culture

[1] Max Warren, Preface to John V. Taylor, The Primal Vision (London:  SCM Press, 1963), 10.
[2] Christine D. Pohl, Making Room: Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Williams Publishing Co., 1999), 33.