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ENTERTAINING ANGELS UNAWARES
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This title actually comes from the Letter to the Hebrews (13:2)— “Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels” (Revised New American Bible translation). And the allusion is to Genesis 18, the story of the 3 Visitors welcomed by Abraham. He gave them rest, bathed their feet, and gave them a banquet feast. It was, the Scripture tells us, the LORD and divine companions who were so regaled. It was on this occasion that God promised that a son would be born to him and Sarah, and although Sarah laughed at the idea, she did indeed bear a son—Isaac (whose name, in popular etymology, means “to laugh”).
This story has a dark side: it is at least in part because of the lack of hospitality (and in fact the desire to violate the guests of Lot) that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed. Abraham bargained with the LORD for the safety of those cities since his relative Lot was there with his family, but in those cities all that could be found were self-indulgent, self-centered, and cruel people. How serious was the “sanctuary” of hospitality considered in those days? Lot actually offered his two daughters to the men of Sodom to have their way with the girls, rather than surrender his guests! It all came to naught, as did Sodom and Gomorrah that night.
Simon the Pharisee welcomed Jesus into his home for a Sabbath meal and discussion; Martha and Mary (in today’s Gospel) also invited Him in. Jesus invited Himself to the home of Zacchaeus; Matthew hosted a party for Jesus with varying tax collectors and prostitutes. In every case, someone experienced acceptance, love, mercy, and healing. Of course, Jesus was quite the “angel entertained”!
Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin founded the Catholic Worker houses of hospitality on the basis of the passage I began with. Who was welcome there? Everyone! When they began publishing their newspaper, some of the woodcuts became famous, most especially “Christ of the Breadlines,” the work of Fritz Eichenberg. It captured perfectly the sense of the quote from Hebrews. Might our own welcomes to displaced persons, the homeless, the migrants, equally be welcoming of Christ? Sadly, might our refusal to welcome also be refusal to Christ?
What went on in the minds and hearts of Martha and Mary, or Matthew the tax collector, or Zacchaeus, or Simon the Pharisee? Perhaps it was nothing more than recognizing a charismatic preacher and teacher they wanted to get to know better. Once upon a time (not now, sadly) I might have wanted to get to be around great preachers, too: Jesuit Walter Burghardt, or Billy Graham, or Bishop Sheen. But to meet them without a collar, without a coat and tie, without a pectoral cross and cape—to meet them as they were. I would have loved it! But would I have thought I might be entertaining angels unawares?
The better question (since wanting to hang out with famous people is, at bottom, a form of egotism) is who else I might be willing to hang out with, to entertain, to spend time with: perhaps a needy parishioner, or a person at our food pantry, or a person on the phone convinced he’s possessed by or tormented by demons. Might these also be “angels unawares”? “What you do (or do not do!) for the least of these…”