Today's Gospel

The Beauty of Hospitality

Welcome back to Radical and Relevant where we're exploring the genius of the gospel and learning to apply it to our lives one word, one phrase, one idea at a time. Today's reading is from the Gospel of Matthew chapter 10, verses 7 through 15. "And Jesus said to His disciples, 'Wherever you go, say the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without pay, give without pay. Take no gold, no silver, no copper in your belts, no bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor a staff for the laborer deserves his food. In whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it and stay with him until you depart. As you went to the house, saluted. And if the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it. But if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town. Truly I say to you, it shall be more tolerable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town."

What jumps out at you today? Jesus was sending His disciples out and He was requesting, requiring them an enormous trust in His providence, God's providence, enormous trust in the goodness of people to take care of them along the way. I remember when I first started traveling and speaking, I would travel to a different city every day. I would stay with families. They would feed me. They would drive me from the airport to the talk, wherever I needed to go while I was in town. And they organized these events and just so much effort and time was taken to host me. And I have such great memories of this incredible hospitality.

And really, hospitality was a beautiful part of Christianity that emerged in the early church. And that took real roots in the monastic system and still many monasteries around the world hosting pilgrims every day to this day. And so what jumps out at me today is just this sense of hospitality, this idea of Christian hospitality. And there's so many ways for us to express it to people. They don't have to come and stay with us for us to express hospitality. There are a lot of ways to recognize the needs of the people around us and to tend to those needs. And that is a beautiful Christian hospitality. Have an amazing day. Remember, be bold, be Catholic.