On hospitality

Fr Mario Attard's lovely article Unusual Kindness To St Paul (February 3) sparked off an unforgettable memory of 40 years ago at our home in Dublin.

A Catholic since birth, at the age of 36 I had been a widow for two years with three young children and had just remarried. Wandering into my husband's study, I found him reading the Bible which he snapped shut and handed to me saying: "Why don't you open this and find out what the Good Lord wants to say to you!"

It was the first time I had ever opened the Bible and my eye fell on the following which changed my life: "Let hope keep you joyful; in trouble stand firm; persist in prayer. Contribute to the needs of God's people and practise hospitality." (Romans 12:12).

The word "hospitality" hit me like a ton of bricks. I may have heard or read this injunction before, couched in other terms, but if I had, it did not register with me. It was the word itself which stuck. For days it tormented me and took away my peace. Eventually, I took action in the form of a concrete table which I had erected on the patio at the front of my house and then I decided to the best of my ability, to try to live the Word which had made such an impact on me, beginning with the Tinkers.

Who were the Tinkers? Today they are called "The Travelling Folk", but back then, they were just plain Tinkers. This name was derived from the fact that, especially in rural areas, they were the nomad people travelling in horse-drawn caravans, who with solder and glue pots, repaired and mended all kinds of tin containers, pots, pans and umbrellas for busy housewives. Living in comfort in a leafy suburb of Dublin, they would knock on our doors once or twice a week when it was customary to get rid of them by offering a small sum of money and that as quickly as possible. In fact, they might have been aliens from another planet so little did people concentrate on them or indulge them in any way. Except for my own father, I never saw anyone show much kindness or recognition or ever involve them in conversation during my childhood in rural Ireland.

These thoughts were running through my mind when my doorbell rang and sure enough there were three tinkers on the doorstep. With the words of that Bible - now my most treasured possession - ringing in my ears. I posed the question: "Would they like a cup of tea?" Had I pointed a gun at them they could not have shown more surprise and it was the first time I saw a smiling tinker. The following week saw the erection of that stone table on our patio along with a huge brown earthenware teapot - the contents of which would have slaked the thirst of an army of soldiers - purchased in the bargain basement of Clerys in O'Connell street. It was tea-time for the tinkers from now on at the Joneses - to the horror of Mrs Wormwood next door, who accused us of "lowering the tone of the neighbourhood" - and the word spread like wildfire among the tinker faction. In fact they marked our house for their pals by putting small pebbles on our surrounding wall.

The family which made the greatest impact on us was definitely the Cash Clan of which the father, Mickie of the Silver Tongue, was rarely in a sober state, while long-suffering Bridget with the remains of a black eye and a hacking cough, preceded an extended family up the path. When the old grey mare was pulled up at our gate with a "Whoa there!" a kindle of kids packed into that cart like a packet of figs would tumble forward in a riot of colour and dash towards the stone table to take up their rightful places.

When the Clery teapot was heaved onto the table they would proceed to "doctor" it, making it so thick and sweet that a full-grown mouse could safely trot on it.

A great time was had by all. A really marvellous time. Since we had constantly been explaining, simplifying and trying to inculcate the meaning of the Bible reflection - "Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my people, you did it to Me" (Matthew 25:40) - in the minds of our children, they were fully alert to the needs of these poor, marginalised, lovable people and went all out to be of help to them. On a summer evening, my daughter, a precocious seven-year-old, shouted down the garden to me: "Hurry up Mum, you are wanted at the door!". "Who is it Tara?" I called.

"This Jesus Christ and His family and they are simply gasping for a cuppa tea!".