Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

 Lectionary: 108

They asked Abraham, "Where is your wife Sarah?"
He replied, "There in the tent."
One of them said, "I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah will then have a son."

Sarah, of course, laughed at the mysterious visitor who predicted she'd have a son by this time next year. She was long past child-bearing age and could only laugh at the stranger's apparent bad joke. Ordinarily, politeness dictates that we do not speak of an elderly couple's having no children. A considerate pastor, knowing the couple well and perhaps charmed by their lifelong fidelity, might ask how were they finally reconciled to their misfortune. If they ignore the question or change the subject, he does not pursue it. 

But the Lord had other business to attend -- namely the hell-raising in the cities on the plain -- and he intends to bless the couple with a child. When he abruptly predicts the birth of Isaac, whose name means laughter, they laugh out loud. 

Today's readings concerns the spirit of hospitality in its many facets. There is the welcome Abraham and Sarah offer to the three-personed God. Saint Luke's gospel describes that which the sisters Martha and Mary offered to Jesus. And Saint Paul describes his cheerful manner of receiving the afflictions of Christ in his own body. 

Hospitality welcomes more than the welcomed; it also receives the unexpected, rude, and unpleasant. If Sarah's laughter at  her three guests was discourteous; and Martha's entrance interrupted her Guest's teaching, Paul demonstrated that resilient spirit which receives discomfort with disarming pleasantness. 

Hospitality is an active passivity and a passive activity. It is not simply passive. Nor should it be a silent, impassive aggression. Rather, its receptivity welcomes the whole person, whatever difficulty that person presents, and the opportunity to be gracious. This intentional welcome often transforms the inconvenience to blessing, as when Saint Paul, transformed his jail cell into a chapel.  

We can assume that the Lord's host was mollified by the his gently calling her name. I think of his voice not as tsking, but as calling her from a faraway place back to herself. He loves Martha as dearly as he loves the quieter Mary. If she speaks her mind before she is placated, he loves her all the more for it. 

A nation of immigrants has a particular need to hear today's readings from Genesis, Colossians, and Saint Luke. The scriptures record how the prophets invoked the memory of Israel's escape from Egypt, 

You shall not oppress or afflict a resident alien, for you were once aliens residing in the land of Egypt. Exodus 22:20

Many large nations, both ancient and modern, have long histories of welcoming immigrants with their culture and languages; they are enriched by the transaction. I think of China, India, and Egypt. The United States, still recovering from the Civil War, experienced a rebirth as millions of immigrants -- many of them Catholic -- arrived from Europe. 

Others peoples, like the doomed Vikings in Greenland, despising the native Inuits and their diet, starved when there was food within reach of a fishing pole. 

Clearly, a polarized America needs fresh thinking; our arguments have become platitudes and our reasoning, cliches. Jesus urged his disciples to go and learn the meaning of, "I want mercy and not sacrifice." 

Today he commands us to learn, "Mi casa es su casa."