The Stranger in the Tent

I really love this story of Abraham and Sara in Genesis 18:1-15. There are so many rich themes in it- trust, obedience, hospitality, faith, laughter…

The hospitality theme hooks the Benedictine experience I have had through Women Touched by Grace (WTBG). If you want to know how it feels to be welcomed as a stranger, go visit a Benedictine Monastery. The Sisters at Our Lady of Grace took in 30 clergy women five years ago. We were loved, cared for, welcomed, fed, housed, entertained, taught, prayed for and prayed with for four years. The experience changed my life and changed the life and ministry of each one of the thirty women. Now there is a second group of Women Touched by Grace, being changed and formed by Benedictine Sisters practicing a ministry of hospitality that is centuries old.

Hospitality for us is an option. A welcoming spirit seems to be a matter of manners. In the days of Abraham and Sara and the days of St. Benedict this was not the case. Hospitality could be a matter of life and death in their societies and circumstances. We don’t worry so much about turning the stranger away because we know they have other places to go- the police, another church, a hotel, a social service agency. But in the desert of the Middle East that was not the case. If a stranger was turned away it could be days before they would find another place to rest, to eat, to have water or to be out of the burning sun and blowing sand. They could die before they found another camp. So hospitality really mattered in a different way.

When Jesus talked about welcoming strangers he would have know about the desert customs. But he did not limit his teaching to those in the desert. He applied it to those in cities, and towns, and villages as well.

So what does hospitality mean for us?