Welcoming the stranger

Rather late in the day, here's my response to today's BigRead14 poem, entitled 'Hospitality'. You can listen to it read by Merry Evans and read the words. It's about meeting new people, taking a "keen interest" in the person as yet unknown, an interest that can move to respect then reverence. It ends with these words,

"O Christ! many found you to be strange, 

and yet the most vulnerable found healing and 

peace in your presence. 

Make friends of us 

that we might be ready friends to strangers 

as strange as ourselves."

 It reminds me of these words from Hebrews 13: 2,

"Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it." (NRSV)

Now there's a challenge for Lent!

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons