One parish I used to be a
part of would serve a meal one Saturday each month for those who were homeless
or who otherwise knew food insecurity. It was normally kind of an assembly line
type set up, which is a very efficient way of feeding a lot of hungry people in
a reasonably short period of time with limited volunteer resources. But, for
the meal that fell during the Christmas season, they got a lot more people
involved, and did two sittings of a family-style table service meal. Each table
would be hosted by parishioner. That host would bring trays of food from the
kitchen, would make sure each bowl or plate or jug of goodies circulated around
the table. They’d also be responsible for making conversation, for welcoming
the people they were dining with, and listening to them. They would also
explain why Christmas means so much to us, why when the stores are packing
their supplies away, we keep on celebrating, and why we want to celebrate with
them. More than one type of hunger was fed at those meals.
True
hospitality means finding out what kind of hunger your guest has. I remember
once talking to some people who lived in a Catholic worker community. A big
part of their common life involved sharing things in common, but when they
welcomed into their community someone who was severely germ-phobic for whom it
was really important to have and wash his own plate and silverware, they discerned
that it was right for them to renounce their practice of sharing these things
in common. That phobia was a hunger that needed to be fed.
In our
gospel, Martha and Mary both want to be hospitable towards Jesus. And that’s a
good thing. In light of all the other responses Jesus receives, in scripture,
in our world today, let’s not lose sight of how good a thing that is. But
Martha doesn’t really figure out what Jesus is hungry for. What Martha does isn’t
wrong. By picking that Genesis reading as our first reading, the Church reminds
us that what Martha does is exactly what Abraham and Sarah had done, what is
called right. And we don’t really need a scriptural precedent to know that nine
times out of ten, when someone comes to your house on a long journey, they
probably want food. But “probably” isn’t personal. And Jesus is, after all,
kind of odd.
Jesus is hungry.
He may well be hungry for food; he had a normal human body that hungered at
times. But food isn’t his primary hunger. His primary hunger is to be heard. He
has a word to speak, and he’s hungry for it to be heard. He was hungry for Mary
to hear it, he was hungry for Martha to hear it, he’s hungry for us to hear it.
And that’s what Mary somehow knows. Maybe she just got lucky, or maybe on a
deep level she welcomed him in a way that allowed her to find out what it was
he was hungry for, and that was for her to hear the good news.
Friends,
Jesus’ deepest desire, Jesus’ sharpest hunger, is for us, for us to hear the
word, to share the word, to follow him. To be hospitable to Jesus is to take
the time to sit at his feet, to listen, to pray, to worship, honor and adore, and
be so transformed that we can be hospitable to those we meet. That we can know one
another enough to know what someone’s really hungry for, and help them eat.
And Jesus
teaches us that kind of hospitality in part by showing us wonderful examples
like this Mary, but also by offering it to us himself. Here in this place, Christ
sets the table, and Christ offers us his very self, under form of bread and
wine, to feed our deepest hunger. Today, God welcomes new guests to this
banquet. In their baptism, as in Christ’s, God’s voice will proclaim, this my
beloved daughter, this is my beloved son, you are welcome, you are home.
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