Hospitality

On the road to Emmaus, two disciples welcomed a stranger in conversation and invited him to stay with them. That stranger was Jesus. In Hebrews 13:2, St. Paul reminds us to “show hospitality to strangers, for…some have entertained angels without knowing it.” What if those disciples had not welcomed the stranger? What if we are ignoring the angels in our midst? To love as Jesus calls us to love is to put others first and that requires hospitality. In this discipleship series, we look at the virtue of hospitality through the lens of our parish mission, CHRIST (community, holiness, retreat, invest, share, and tithe). “Servant”, our topic this week, reminds us that we were built to serve others and that by investing ourselves in service we become more our true self. Essential to hospitality is “Invitation”, our fifth topic, reminding us that just as Jesus invites us to share new life with Him, we are empowered to invite others. Finally, we discuss how to “Trust” in the Lord that our hearts may be truly open to receiving and giving to others.

In this weekend's Gospel we hear, "At that time, John said to Jesus, "Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we tried to prevent him because he does not follow us." Jesus replied, "Do not prevent him. There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name who can at the same time speak ill of me. For whoever is not against us is for us. Anyone who gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ, amen, I say to you, will surely not lose his reward". They are people we know who are not against Jesus Christ but might be reluctant to come to church. They are not against us and we have to remember that just because they are not yet coming to our church they are not against us. In fact, if they have an openness to Christ then they are for us and there is an opening for us to share about St. Albert the Great..