Practicing Courageous Hospitality

PRACTICING COURAGEOUS HOSPITALITY
Homily presented at St. Vincent de Paul Church, Albany, NY
Liturgical Year C
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    Don’t be like Martha. Be like Mary. I wonder how a single parent, who is a migrant worker, trying raising two or three children, might feel about the passage we just heard. This gospel (Luke 10:38-42) has always been troubling.
    Some background: In first century Bethany (about 2 miles from Jerusalem, along the busy road to Jericho) women traditionally did all the cooking and house chores. Martha offered hospitality for any traveler and Jesus was no exception. He liked to hang out with his good friends Martha, Mary and Lazarus. He often would show up with no advance notice.
    So, why would Jesus “bite the hand” that would feed him? Why such a display of ingratitude toward Martha? After all, both Martha and Mary were wealthy disciples. They owned property. They financially supported his mission. They were his staunch followers.
    These two women were the itinerant deacons of their day. They bravely preached Jesus’s brand of living while fearing the Roman authorities. Together, not just Mary, the two often sat down at the table with Jesus listening to what he had to say. (“At the feet of Jesus” was a colloquial expression not to be taken literally by us.)
    To further complicate things, about who made the better choice, we read later in the same gospel (Luke 22:24) Jesus being asked by his disciples “who should be the greatest?” His answer was “it is better to serve than to sit.” So why did he contradict himself when speaking to Martha and Mary?    . 
    One obvious answer is that this story is about balancing service with prayer especially in difficult times. Hebrew scholar Robin Gallaher Branch wrote that as Jesus rebukes Martha he “re-organizes traditional biblical hospitality around himself. Hospitality now includes service to [Jesus] by doing and listening.” So, the reason for Christian hospitality is rooted in the teachings of Jesus.
    The Good Samaritan story last week set the stage for today’s scriptures. It raises questions about how we practice hospitality. In her homily last weekend Elizabeth (Simcoe) asked us to identify with the different characters portrayed in the Good Samaritan story and to think about how we would have responded to that man in the ditch burglarized and beaten.
    While alluding to countless injustices today and perhaps our own short comings Elizabeth probed further: “Where does the hardness of heart come from?” Who are we really?” “What justifies the evil we live with?” Then she asked the toughest question: “What justifies the evils we have committed?”
    The sign in front of this church building declares that this faith community practices courageous hospitality. The dictionaries say to be courageous is to be “brave.” Could it also mean taking risks to correct wrongdoings? This past week the General Assembly of the United Church of Christ passed a brave resolution publicly condemning the current federal immigration crackdown. 
    Rev. Clara Sims, a minister in Albuquerque, NM, said “Our faith has always called us into spaces of risk on behalf of the vulnerable especially when people are being made vulnerable by really corrupt systems of power.” This church has set an example of making good trouble. One wonders what could be accomplished to end corrupt governments everywhere if all Christian churches agree to speak truth to power.
    Psalm (15:2-5) today reminds us we had better do something because “whoever does justice will live in the presence of God.” Pope Leo XIV said the same thing recently at the Arena of Peace in Verona Italy: “For the road to peace involves everyone and leads to the fostering of right relationships between all living beings.” Living justly then means to act justly.
    Embarrassed by many unfair government actions how do we transform the spiritual energy we get from the biblical texts at Mass, our music, sermons, one another, into collaborative acts of courageous hospitality? 
    It is wonderful that, as individuals we carry out works of justice. Imagine if entire faith communities did something together. Does not our sharing in the Eucharist bind us closer together in our diversity to carry out those actions?    
    After an earlier liturgy this morning someone said to me: “But what can we do?” So I added this suggestion to the text. Some of you know I had been working with a teenage refugee from Congo, teaching him how to play basketball. He once participated in a program in New York City owned by Maureen Holohan, an All American high school and college player from Troy, NY. 
    Maureen’s program, Mo'Motion, trains kids in the fundamentals of the game. Many come from families with little or no resources. I asked her what to do to help the single mom of the teenager to get more involved. Holohan said: “just do the do-ables.” That’s what we can do together. Do what’s do-able to make a difference in our communities.
    Three women are featured in this weekend’s biblical stories. In the first reading (Genesis 18:1-10a) Sarah’s fear about giving birth in her barren years was a natural reaction to being confronted by a divine message. She took on the challenge with a dose of good humor. When she heard she would be pregnant she laughed at the messengers.
    Theologian Joan Chittister called Martha of Bethany a brave truth-teller: “Women have a truth to tell what is their own. It gives a woman the confidence it takes to claim her own experience….” Martha first believed in herself in order to work for Jesus. Maybe the words of Jesus helped her gain that poise.
    Mary, was an itinerant preacher. She traveled and faced unknown dangers from those who disagreed with her message. Mary put into action the words of Jesus. Each of these women in the Bible like others named and unnamed shows us how to face fear not with vengeance but with hospitality and conviction, putting our prayers into action. 
    Not long ago, the young poet laureate Amanda Gorman offered these words about the power of collective action and of the importance of working together to create change. You may recall her poem, “The Hill We Climb,” given at the inauguration of Joe Biden in 2021. She said: “We lay down our arms so we can reach out our arms to one another.”
    One year later Gorman wrote again about how she almost backed out of delivering that poem out of fear of retaliation and vengeance. (The nation’s Capitol was attacked in an attempted coup just weeks before.) Instead, she chose to be brave and said: “I’m a firm believer that often terror is trying to tell us of a force far greater than despair. In this way, she wrote, I look at fear not as cowardice but as a call forward, a summons to fight for what we hold dear.”
    So what does all of this have to do with us? How does each one of us face the fears that surround us and others today? How do we practice courageous hospitality?
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SOURCES

Rachel Berkebile “United Church of Christ synod denounces ICE raids as ‘domestic terrorism.” Accessed online from the Religion News Service, July 15, 2025. https://religionnews.com/

Robin Gallaher Branch. “Martha: A Remarkable Disciple” in Bible History Daily, April 03, 2025. https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/martha-a-remarkable-disciple/

Joan Chittister. “Martha of Bethany” in Friendship of Women: The Hidden Tradition of the Bible. (New York, NY: Bluebridge, 2006)

Amanda Gorman, Poet Laureate at the 2016 Inauguration of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, January 20, 2021. https://www.poetry.com/poem/60572/the-hill-we-climb

Amanda Gorman: “Why I Almost Didn’t Read My Poem at the Inauguration.” In the New York Times, January 1, 2022. ”https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/20/opinion/amanda-gorman-poem-inauguration.html

Mary Stromer Hanson. “Mary of Bethany: Her Leadership Uncovered.” November 10, 2015. https://www.cbeinternational.org/resource/rediscovering-marys-maria-mariamne-miriam-2/

Pope Leo XIV at the Arena of Peace gathering, Verona, Italy May 30, 2025 <https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/speeches/2025/may/documents/20250530-movimenti-pace.html>

Mark M. Mattison “A New View of Mary and Martha” in Christian Feminism Today (CFT), July 15, 2025. https://eewc.com/new-view-mary-martha

Irene Nowell. “Sarah: Women of Israel’s Beginnings” in Women in the Old Testament. (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press,1997) 11.

Elizabeth Schrader Polczer. “The Mystery of Mary and Martha.” Biblical Archaeology Review, Winter 2024) 68

Mary Ann Getty-Sullivan. “Martha and Mary” in Women in the New Testament. (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press,2001) 192-3.

Jennifer S. Wyant. “Commentary on Luke 10:38-42 online Working Preacher. <https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-16-3/commentary-on-luke-1038-42-6>