HOSPITALITY | PART 2
As much as hospitality is about sharing food, time, and home, it is also about opening the heart and connecting at that level. This is evident in the Japanese tea ceremony:
The practice of sharing tea with others is the essence of the Japanese tea ceremony, chanoyu. The ceremony is an enactment of "right relationship" to another in a social setting. In the role of the host or hostess, we learn a way of being that celebrates care, precision, and regard toward the well-being of others, the particular situation, and the environment. We bring mindful attention to every person, place, and thing we encounter. As we consider another's needs, our attitude shifts from self to other. As we whisk the tea and present the bowl, our body follows suit, and the peacefulness of serving tea to others infuses our being.
Sen Soshitsu, fifteenth Grand Master of the Urasenke School of Tea, knew that it was "the free and magnanimous heart that counts" in the serving and drinking of tea. It is this caring and considerate, yet tempered and moderated way of being that constitutes the demeanor of the host or hostess at a tea gathering. We serve others without servicing; we offer, without artifice; and we regulate, without controlling.
When we as hosts intentionally shift our focus from self to other with no pretense, control, and hidden agenda, our guests see “the free and magnanimous heart” of the host and, as a result, hearts open up and connect in ways that are well beyond superficiality. When hearts open and connect this deeply, hospitality brings out restoration on both the hosts as well as the guests.
That leads to an observation that hospitality creates freedom. One expression and application of this freedom in hospitality is letting our guests to discover and to remain as who they are. They don’t have to be like us. In light of this, modern missions movement generally has not fared well, from overt expectation on others to be like us to subtle pressures to accept our ways of believing and doing things. To help us unpack this idea, here is Nouwen again:
The German word of hospitality is Gastfreundschaft which means, friendship for the guest. The Dutch use the word gastvrijheid which means, the freedom of the guest. Although this might reflect that the Dutch people find freedom more important than friendship, it definitively shows that hospitality wants to offer friendship without binding the guest and freedom without leaving him alone.
Hospitality, therefore, means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer the space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines. It is not to lead our neighbor into a corner where there are no alternatives left, but to open a wide spectrum of options for choice and commitment. . . . It is not a method of making our God and our way into the criteria of happiness, but the opening of an opportunity to others to find their God and their way. The paradox of hospitality is that it wants to create emptiness, not a fearful emptiness, but a friendly emptiness where strangers can enter and discover themselves as created free; free to sing their own songs, speak their own languages, dance their own dances; free also to leave and follow their own vocations. Hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adopt the life style of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find his own. [Italicized mine] (1975:72–73)
Nouwen’s observation above drips with missiological insights. For one, listen to him when he says, “it is not a method of making our God and our way into the criteria of happiness, but the opening of an opportunity to others to find their God and their way.” This resembles what Jesus said as in the Great Commandment, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.” We all have tried to force, either subtly or overtly, our God and our way to others, thinking and believing that our way is the right way. If we can realize that “hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adopt the life style of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find his own” whoever the “host” may be, I believe we can go a long way in developing and maintaining a biblical expression of what global cooperation may look like as it relates to hospitality. Hospitality is not to change people or to woo them to our “camp.” It is simply to offer space and room where change may take place. Furthermore, it may be that we may not like the change, if that takes place at all. Will we be patient enough to allow our guests to discover their own?
Let me stretch a bit further. I believe hospitality is a strong basis for creating and cultivating unity in community and in global cooperation. Nouwen says,
When hostility is converted into hospitality then fearful strangers can become guests revealing to their hosts the promise they are carrying with them. Then, in fact, the distinction between host and guest proves to be artificial and evaporates in the recognition of the new found unity. . . Maybe the concept of hospitality can offer a new dimension to our understanding of a healing relationship and the formation of a re-creative community in a world so visibly suffering from alienation and estrangement. (1975:67)
Realizing the fact that we are all hosts and guests is a good place to start as we all seek “the formation of a re-creative community.” One is not host all the time. And one is not guest all the time. Hospitality is an antidote for “a world so visibly suffering for alienation and estrangement.” We all need to embrace the fact that God welcomed us first and it is our duty to welcome others and provide hospitality that imitates and honors Jesus.