Mid-week Message
from our Developmental Lead Minister
December 1, 2022
“This being human is a guesthouse. Every morning a new arrival. Welcome and entertain them all.” Jalaluddin Rumi, as translated by Coleman Barks
Friends,
The season of hospitality and welcome is upon us, a season that calls us to open our doors and our hearts to friends, neighbors, and family. Radical hospitality calls for something more: welcoming the stranger.
Hospitality is about receiving guests and visitors in a warm, friendly, and generous way. Welcome is about being made to feel included.
I think we all know the feeling of being truly welcome, the feeling of warmth and care, of being seen, heard, and accepted. There’s great power in being noticed, being listened to, having needs attended to, being made to feel comfortable, being included in conversations and activities. Welcoming is about being fully present to another person.
There’s a human tendency to gravitate to people we know or people who are most like us. There’s comfort in familiarity. Radical hospitality is a spiritual practice that asks something more of us. It asks us to welcome people we do not know, people who are not like us – to welcome and entertain them all.
The winter holiday season tends to amplify whatever it is we’re feeling. Joyful feelings tend to be brighter and feelings of sadness or sorrow tend to be deeper. Many people struggle during this season, especially any who have recently lost a loved one or those for whom the season is marked by the anniversary of a death. Issues of separation or estrangement from family or friends can be felt more profoundly at this time of the year.
A spirit of welcome acknowledges the whole array of human experience. A spirit of welcome meets people where they are.
The theme for December is Hospitality and Inclusion which is also the topic of this month’s Widening the Circle session. You can learn more about Widening the Circle here.
Throughout the month we will be exploring Hospitality and Inclusion from many perspectives.
Christmas Eve this year will be celebrated with one multigenerational service at 5:00 – a service filled with music, story, song, and the traditional candle-lighting ritual, a service that welcomes people of all ages.
Christmas Day is on Sunday this year. Come and join with others for a hymn and carol singing service.
Wherever you find yourself this holiday season, however it is you celebrate – or not – may you experience a spirit of welcome and radical hospitality.
Yours in shared ministry,
Rev. Diane