Today’s readings: Genesis 18, 1-10; Colossians 1, 24-28; Luke 10, 38-42.
In his letter to the Colossians in today’s second reading, Paul writes that there is a message in life that is a mystery hidden for generations waiting to be revealed to us.
As long as it remains hidden, there is something to life we continue missing. Life becomes full and complete insofar as that mystery is uncovered.
In the book The Shape of Living, theologian David Ford writes that many of our life-shaping secrets are ones we are not even conscious of – they are repressed, forgotten, denied and deposited in our unconscious.
Our disciplines of living must take account of these depths too. Otherwise, life becomes too superficial, and in our vulnerability, we would not be able to cope with so much that is overwhelming.
This is a very important theme that is presented to us in today’s readings. In our busyness, we often lose touch with our spiritual nature, as the self is buried in activity and we keep hiding from ourselves.
There are times when we need to sit down and seek to put our life in order. From what we gather in today’s gospel account, this is Martha’s world, which very often is our world. The gospel story of Martha and Mary portrays two different approaches to life which can help in a stock-taking exercise much needed from time to time if we truly want to come to terms with the polarities of our everyday life.
The significance of the visit by Jesus to Martha and Mary at their home in Bethany is precisely here, that it provokes in them two different ways of handling God’s presence in their lives. Martha’s business as usual attitude is in stark contrast with Mary’s choice to stop and be still at the feet of the Master to listen. In the eyes of Martha, and very often in our eyes, Mary’s way is simply a fleeing from her duties.
Jesus instead praises Mary for choosing what in his words was “the better part” and which will not be taken from her.
Mary puts discipleship first, and in the eyes of Jesus, that is the wisdom of prioritising. This is the wisdom we need, since we are all prone to that pattern in daily life that renders us undisciplined in our way of dealing with things, making us, without being aware of it, constantly escape the self, our own selves. This is Martha in today’s gospel.
There is an extraordinary richness and depth in today’s readings, particularly the one from Genesis and the gospel from Luke. At first glance both texts may be taken as speaking to us of hospitality. Actually yes, they speak of hospitality, which is a virtue we all need to train ourselves in. But a deeper reading of both texts can tell us much more than that.
Hospitality is the virtue of welcoming others. In today’s readings the other, the stranger, is God Himself. God who, as Protestant theologian Karl Barth would say, is the totally other. In that sense he is the stranger par excellence, the Lord who constantly comes to us and empowers us to face life with honesty and in truth.
This is the deep meaning underneath today’s stories of Abraham and Sarah, Martha and Mary.
The text from Genesis shows the hospitality of Abraham and Sarah towards the three mystery men, highlighting how their genuine hospitality opened them both to their inner selves, making them more receptive of the message of that visit. The visit ended up being the key for a radical turn they were to make in their lives and which was to mark their entire being for the rest of their lives.
Coupled with the gospel account of Martha and Mary in the presence of Jesus, God’s word makes us ask the question how and to what extent our lives, as we live daily, can remain hospitable and open to the Spirit of God who in turn opens our hearts beyond the mysteries that engulf them.