The Call to Radical Hospitality
Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost, September 26, 2021
Numbers 11:4-6,10-16,24-29 • James 5:13-20 • Mark 9:38-50
As you may know, the process towards ordination is a slow and somewhat tortuous journey: one that often reminds me of that Monty Python knight seated backwards on his horse, riding through the forest without a full complement of arms and limbs and encountering increasingly difficult challenges.
One of those challenges is to undergo some three months of Clinical Pastoral Education, or CPE as it is more often called. You have a placement, and you are closely supervised. Mine was to serve as a chaplain during the day at the VA in Menlo Park, with many nights as an on-call chaplain at Stanford Hospital. I don’t believe I have ever learned as much in such a short time as I did that summer. There was certainly much I learnt about chaplaincy. But I also learned hugely about myself. It was life-changing. I still remember the shocking moment when I realized I was a Enneagram 1. I’m sure some of you are familiar with the Enneagram: it’s a model of nine interconnected personality types, and is very helpful for not only understanding oneself better but also others.
At their best, Enneagram 1s are reformers, seeing how the world could be, and working to make things better. At their worst, they can be bullying perfectionists, with no-one meeting their impossibly high standards, particularly those close to them, and most especially themselves. There I was, pinned for all to see: an unpleasant judge whom no-one could satisfy. And it was true. While I could be very kind and patient to those at a distance from me, towards those closest to me and myself, I could be horrid.
I now describe myself as a recovering perfectionist. And after nearly twenty years of work, I think I am a much nicer person: I certainly continue to work at it and there is hope.
Today’s passage from Mark’s Gospel is all about judging, or rather, why we shouldn’t judge. Jesus is very clear, if someone’s doing good work in the name of love, let them be! He then goes into what I think has to be an intentionally shocking rant about getting rid of offending body parts if they’re getting in your or anyone else’s way.
If an audience isn’t listening to you, you do have to get their attention.
I always find our Steven Shakespeare Collects of the Day powerful, and the one for this week I found particularly so. It begins:
God of welcome, your people are called to be distinct not by width of separation but depth of hospitality and peace within our lives...
‘Your people are called to be distinct not by width of separation’; in other words: not to identify ourselves or be identified by others from how different we are. But instead to be recognizable by the ‘depth of hospitality and peace within our lives.”
In our pursuit to discover our own challenges around racism, I’m sure many of us have been having conversations about ‘otherness’. How from an evolutionary perspective, we are hard-wired to be suspicious of someone not from our immediate tribe. How as babies, our first job is to separate from our mothers, and we continue that discernment, becoming highly skilled at picking up cues identifying fine degrees of differences between people: and making judgements accordingly.
I used to be very judgmental about anyone who didn’t articulate consonants distinctly. I assumed a whole series of other judgments based on the fact their words were shaped ‘sloppily’ as I judged. Coming to the states was a huge challenge! I could handle the Canadians, they were all right: they had consonants. But Americans? And they thought they were speaking English!
You’ll be glad to know that I have made a lot of progress. While I still really like the crispiness and taste of words, but I can also enjoy hearing the smooth roll of the American tongue over all those mid-word T-s.
The collect uses the word ‘hospitality’, and I love that. Because it is what it is all about isn’t it. It’s about seeing the differences, and welcoming them. Not reacting negatively but having a positive response, and being at peace.
In our own Holy Innocents community, I believe we are very welcoming. There is quite a high degree of homogeneity, but we have proved ourselves welcoming of all who have joined us. Perhaps the degree of homogeneity has more to do with the perception of others who haven’t felt drawn to join us? We look like one sort of people, rather than many. Can we be trusted to be hospitable. How can they know?
We might think about how we might prove ourselves as a non-judgmental community of faith outside these walls. I know in years gone by, Holy Innocents has marched in San Francisco’s Pride Parades with our banner. For years, we volunteered as a congregation at the Julian Pantry at St. Johns. We have had some presence at the Women’s Marches, and at Immigration rallies and vigils. We have been out in the community providing meals for those living on the streets or in shelters. As a congregation, we have plans to work regularly at the Bay View Mission Abundance Community (next time Saturday, October 9). And many of you volunteer as individuals in the city.
All of that is wonderful. But might there be other ways to be out in the community as Holy Innocents, broadcasting our willingness to stand in companionship with our neighbors in the name of love? And in doing so, might we be seen as able to offer the hospitality of acceptance, community, and spiritual nourishment to a wider group of hungry people? I think there are other ways, and we should talk about possibilities.
The bottom line from today’s readings is: let’s not waste time, waste our lives, in judgment and reactivity. Let’s cast off that skin and root out any resentments. Once we have done that, we can allow all the good to be free to do its work in us and around us and be part of that radical hospitality. Radical hospitality not only within these walls but in the world around us.