In the first reading. Abraham and his wife, Sara, extend wonderful hospitality to three total strangers. They wash their tired and dirty feet. They feed them and make them feel totally welcome. As a result, of their gracious hospitality, the elderly couple will soon be blessed with a child. In actual fact, the three strangers turned out to be angels in human form. Hence, the saying, “When you welcome strangers, angels are present.”
In the second reading, Paul reminds us that those who offer hospitality to the mystery of Christ will welcome into their lives not only a share of his suffering, but also a share of his glory.
In the Gospel, Martha and Mary extend hospitality to their special friend, Jesus. Tradition has it that Jesus often stopped and probably stayed overnight with Martha, Mary and Lazarus. Their home was one place where he could relax and get himself ready for whatever lay ahead. All of us should be very grateful to those who extend hospitality to us. Over the years, I have been the recipient of other peoples’ hospitality. The Sisters of Mercy, who lived next door to me, were known far and wide for their ministry of hospitality. It was many a cup of tea and slice of bread and spud and hot-toddy that they shared with hundreds of people.
Is the Gospel a Put-down on Martha, the Busybody?
Scripture scholars like to point out the placement of this story in Luke’s Gospel. It comes immediately on the heels of the Parable of the Good Samaritan which highlighted the “action-dimension” of the Christian life. This story is intended to balance that by highlighting the “contemplative-dimension.” The story is not intended to be a put-down on Martha and her attention to the practical details of hospitality. Without the Martha’s of this world, Jesus may not have gotten something to eat and the dirty dishes would have all piled up in the kitchen. Having said that, Martha needed to learn that even more important than the practical details of hospitality, was the action of sitting at the feet of Jesus in order to listen to his words. In the Christian life, we are called to balance and integrate the active and contemplative dimension. We go from prayer to action and from action to prayer and hope that our action will also be a prayer. We need to keep in balance the Martha and Mary dimensions of our Christian life.
In this story, Luke is certainly warning us of the dangers of being a compulsive doer. In our busyness we may neglect our relationship with Jesus. There is indeed a “time-to-do”, but there is also a “time-to-refrain from doing” so that we can sit at the feet of the Master. The Martha/Mary story is not a lot unlike that married couple who are busy about many things and, in the process, lose touch both with their children and with each other. How sad, and yet this happens all the time.
Playing Host or Hostess to the Lord in Prayer
In prayer we are called at least during some of our prayer time, to play host to our Lord. This demands that we put our Martha or doing tendencies on hold and allow our Mary side to move into gear. This may not be easy if our tendency over the year has been to be a “spiritual jogger,” i.e., someone who must always be busy during a prayer period with the Lord, a definite tendency in most Christians, including myself. In a given prayer time with the Lord, how much time is spent just being there sitting, like Mary, at his feet hoping to hear whatever he may wish to say to us. Perhaps, we do not believe that just “being there’ is indeed real prayer, even if we are frequently distracted. We who are “doers” in prayer must often remember the words of the Medieval Monk, Peter Celles:
God spoke the above words as he sadly watched the Israelites close their hearts to him on their journey through the desert. Because of Israel’s refusal to listen to God, they took years to travel a journey that should have taken them a much shorter time. One wonders how many detours we have taken in life because of our refusal to listen to God’s directive voice. We usually do not want to hear his voice because we are too attached to going our way. We are not free to let go and let God.
In his book, Opening to God, Fr. Thomas Green S.J. writes:
“Listening is a real art which some people never learn. We all have experienced people who cannot or do not listen. They hear but they do not understand; their bodily ears pick up sound, but their hearts are not attentive to its meaning...The good prayer is above all a good listener.”
In the same book, Fr. Green titles chapter 2. “The Irrelevance of Prayer.” and chapter 3, “The Relevance of Prayer.” When I read the title of chapter 2, The Irrelevance of Prayer,” I was taken aback. I wondered how could anyone (especially a priest) speak about “the irrelevance of prayer”. After all, isn’t any type of prayer always relevant? So, I couldn’t wait to read the chapters to see what Father Green meant. When I finished reading both chapters, I discovered his point.
Father Green explains that prayer is irrelevant it is merely our attempt to get God to do what we want—to get God to do our will. On the other hand, prayer is very relevant if our primary intention is to discover God’s Will and to seek the strength to follow it.
If our primary goal in prayer is to let God know our needs and to ask him to take care of them, we run the risk of developing a kind of utilitarian relationship with God, not a personal one. We will see God simply as someone who is useful to us, who can take care of some of our needs. When we go to see a professional person—let’s say our doctor—we are primarily interested in the services that he/she can render to us. We are not there to develop a personal relationship with the doctor. It is different with people we call friends. We do not visit them primarily to take care of some business. Rather, we visit with them so that we can stay connected with them. We may listen to them, they may listen to us, or we may simple enjoy each other’s presence. In other words, the primary focus is not to obtain a service but to deepen a friendship.
The Lord wants us to see him as a friend with whom we would want to “waste time,” someone to whom we willingly desire to listen (see John 15:15 and Matthew 11:28-30). It would be sad if we treated God as a “divine Do-gooder,” someone whom we called on only in time of need. If we are to develop a personal relationship with the Lord, we must be willing not only to open our hearts to God about our needs but also, like Mary in today’s Gospel, we must learn to sit quietly at the feet of the Master so that he can speak to us.
Two Ears, One Mouth
We need to avoid dominating the time we spend with God. In the Scriptures, we read where the young boy Samuel says to God, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening” (1 Samuel 3:10). It seems many of us misread that text, thinking it says, “Listen, Lord, your servant is speaking.” So often in prayer we speak too much and listen too little. In theory, we may believe that what God has to say to us is much more important than what we have to say to God, but in practice we act as if what we have to say is the more important of the two. We rush into our place of prayer, say our prayers, do our reading, and then rush away without ever giving God any chance to speak to us. If we treated our friends like this, we would lose them. God created us with two ears and one mouth, hoping perhaps that we would listen twice as much as we speak. If that were God’s intention, I wonder how many of us got the message.
How Does God Speak to Us?
God can and does speak to us in many ways: through Scripture, and other spiritual books, through others, through nature, music, a movie and through reflection on the events and encounters of our everyday lives.
When we take time to sit and look back over the events and encounters of our everyday lives, we may be surprised at the “messages” God is sending us. The lack of “reflective living” is a real sadness in today’s world.
How Do We Distinguish God’s Voice from Other Voices?
There is, unfortunately, no easy way to distinguish the voice of God from the voice of the devil (whom St. Paul tells us dresses up as an “angel of the light”) or from the voice of our own desires or the strong “cultural voices” coming to us through the media and our worldly friends. We should be especially vigilant to the latter, because they are very powerful. Just think of their impact on young people today. Even though they may have been raised in a good Christian home and spent several years in a Catholic School, by “sweet sixteen” or before, they are having sex, taking drugs and drinking. Why? Because the cultural pulsations in their midst are yelling: “you must do this to be accepted.” In a similar way, we who should know better can also be seduced and fooled by the false voices that whisper to the broken and needy parts of us.
How can we shield ourselves from the “lying voices” of the world, the flesh and the devil? By keeping our eyes on Jesus and by constantly seeking his protection. A simple prayer that I frequently pray as I bless myself and leave my house in the morning is: