HOSPITALITY: A NECESSARY CHRISTIAN VIRTUE

HOMILY FOR 16TH SUNDAY OF THE YEAR IN ORDINARY TIME C
      (1st. Reading Gen 18:1-10, 2nd Reading Col. 1:24, Gospel LK 10:38-42)

One of the values that we were known for as Africans is the value of Hospitality. This cultural value distinguishes us from other people. This is seen in the way Africans visit one another and receive one another. As African you can visit your friend, brother, sister or relation even without prior notice and you will be receive and fed. Strangers are welcome in many families and well taken care of. Whenever women cook food they always cook with extra in case a visitor will come. Today, however with globalization and increase in insecurity, their value is gradually waning. People are becoming individualistic and living in fear. Receiving people, most especially the ones you do not know is becoming difficult because, the innocent looking guest that you let into your house during the day may well return at night holding a machete or a gun to dispossess you of your whole life’s savings, if not of your life itself.
Even though this precious African value is difficult to practice it today; as Christians it is necessary because it is the way of showing that we are sons and daughters of God. It is also one of the things we shall be judged on the last day. “I was stranger you welcomed me (Mt 25:31-41). Showing hospitality to people bring a lot of blessings and reward.  The word of God in 1Peter 4:9 says “show hospitality to one another without grumbling”. Hebrews 13:2 also said “do not neglect to offer hospitality, for by doing it some have entertained angels without knowing it.
In the Old Testament two biblical figures were known to be model of Hospitality in Israel. These were Job and Abraham. Job was said to have built a special house for the poor. Abraham was not just held up as our father of faith, but was also thought of being an example of genuine hospitality. In the first reading of today, we read how Abraham showed hospitality and how he received his blessings.
In the Gospel of today we read today, we heard how Martha and Mary welcomed to their house. During the public ministry of Jesus, Jesus did not only preached the word of God but was also did many things. He feed the people, healed them deliver those who were possessed and visited them. One of the families that he visited according to the Gospels was the family of Martha and Mary the sisters of Lazarus whom he raise from the dead.
When Jesus visited the house of Martha and Mary we were told they welcomed him. While Mary stood at his feet listening to him, Martha was busy doing the service. They did to him what was typical of Nigerian families when you visit them. Here in our culture we know whenever you enter a house they will try and make you comfortable. After welcoming you, you will be given water, after which food will be given to you.
What both Martha and Mary did were important. This is because when one visits a family, he needs to be welcome, given cola and listened to. However Jesus scolded Martha for being distracted by the service and praised Mary for sitting at his feet. He said “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about so many things, but one thing is needful. Mary had chosen the good portion and it will not be taken away from her” The Lord was not reproving Martha for her devoted attention to his material needs. Jesus was telling Martha that there was no need of worrying too much about preparing meal. There is no need of fretting over it. There was no need of giving her entire time to the preparation of an elaborated meal. While she was fretting over her activity, she was missing something very precious which Mary, on the other hand, was enjoying.
Martha was wasting time because she had lost the perspective in which all her activities must be viewed. Having at least for the moment lost the Word of God, she has lost the true reason for her work. Only one thing is ultimately needful. That one thing is the Word of God.
Service is necessary. It is good. But Martha was too much worried and distracted by many things (cf. Lk 10, 41). God want activity but we must not be too worried and distracted by it. Elsewhere the Lord tells us: “Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. It is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these” (Mt 6, 25-29).
Even in our activity we should attend to one thing that is needful (cf. Lk 10, 42), that is, salvation of our soul, union with God. Therefore as soon as a soul perceives that it is beginning to lose its interior calm, it should interrupt its work, if possible, at least for an instant, and retire into its interior self with God. These brief moments of pause, frequently repeated will accustom it, little by little, to keep calm and recollected in God even in the most absorbing activity.
Jesus want to teach us that social service alone is not sufficient. It is possible to be distracted with much serving. It is possible to lose one’s soul in a programme of highly useful activity. “What will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life?” (Mt 16, 26).
What people really need is Christ. Only Christ can fully satisfy us. Material thing alone never satisfy anyone. Time spent in prayer is never waste. “There is need of only one thing” (Lk 10, 42). It is the salvation of our soul.
Mary stands out before us as a symbol and teacher of the contemplative life, particularly inspiring and helpful to a person consecrated to God. Mary is set before us as our guide, example of a simple, intimate relationship with Jesus.
There is this popular saying: “tell me with whom you walk and I shall tell you what sort of a person you are.” Mary walked with Jesus. She listen to Jesus. She accompanied Jesus. Jesus was a guest in Mary’s house. Mary kept company with Jesus. She sat at his feet.
The Gospels do not tell us when it was that Mary first meet Jesus. One thing, however, seems to be certain. Whatever might have been the time, place or occasion, that first meeting was decisive in Mary’s life; it made a lasting and ineffaceable impression on her youthful, sensitive nature.
Dear brothers and sisters, there are many lessons that we can learn from the visit of Jesus to the family of Martha and Mary.
The first lesson my dear brothers and sisters, is that it is good to visit one another. If Jesus who is God visited people in their families, who are we not to visit other people. Today we live in an individualistic world where people find it difficult to visit one another. Some feel they are very busy, some feel they are too big to visit others; some feel there is nothing they can get from visiting people. If Jesus who though is God visited people who are you not to visit? We all need one other. No one is an island. No matter how rich you may be you need others. No matter how poor you are others need you and you need them. You have something to offer. St. Teresa of Calcuta once said that no one is too poor that he has nothing to offer. In addition I can say no one is too rich that he needs nothing from others. We can offer time, listening hear or ideas.
The second lesson that we can learn is that in as much as it is good to make people comfortable when they visit us by giving them food and drink; let us not allow that to preoccupy us that we find little or no time to listen to those who visit us. The most important thing we can give people when they visit us is our time. Often time like Martha when people visit us we spend more time in service than in  discussing with them. Let us always remember that people do not visit us because they want to eat or drink in our house. Many have even more than what we can offer them. Whenever a person visit, let us be there for the person. Let us learn to give him or her our attention.
The third lesson is that it is good to be hospitable. Let us learn to welcome people who visit us for it brings many blessing and it is  a way of showing that we are true Christians. Today Mary and Martha are always remembered because they received Jesus in to their house. Even though we live in a time when insecurity is high, but there are times that we know that some people are truly in need of our assistance. Let us not fail to welcome them into our families. Let us always treat any visitor that come to our house with dignity if not we may be put to shame. (Personal experience)
Dear listener, you and I are challenged to always show hospitality. As we mediate on this, let us ask ourselves: am I like Mary or Martha? How have I been treating strangers and visitors when they visit me?
I pray the lord will grant you the grace to always show hospitality to others. May your life be a shining example of Christian love by the way you treat others through Christ our lord, Amen.

REV FR SOLOMON P. ZAKU
Chaplain, All Saints Catholic Chaplaincy, Unimaid.