At one extreme, like with the laptop, it is a function of a business relationship – the equivalent of saying, ‘thank you for buying our product. Come again!’ But it is the other extreme that we can explore.
When does saying ‘welcome’ pass from being a pleasant thing to being one which is extremely demanding? In holiday time, it is a joy to welcome family and friends to our home. We prepare a nice room, design pleasant meals and plan some entertainment for our visitor. We enjoy their enjoyment of our efforts.
There are, inevitably, some visitors we would rather not receive as they are prickly or difficult in some way and demand huge patience from us. But still, we rouse ourselves to make the best of it and hope they do not notice our irritation. But let us get to the point; there are people who come into our lives who are going to upset us, not just for a few days, but permanently.
Immigrants in the past have often been welcomed as they provided labour and initiative. The United States of America was built on welcoming people fleeing hardship and persecution in their own countries. Britain’s railways and bridges were often built by Irish people fleeing hunger and poverty in their own land. It is a sensitive thing to say, but Zimbabwe too benefited economically for a while from the ‘know-how’ of people from Europe.
But all these examples carried a downside where the immigrant could be oppressed – or become an oppressor – in their new country. That was the past. Now we have a new situation where immigrants the world over are by and large unwelcome. Countries claim they cannot absorb them and some go to extraordinary lengths to discourage them. Britain wants to export ‘illegal’ immigrants to Rwanda.
The crisis points to the huge disparity between rich countries and poor. It also calls for a leap in imagination and an open heart; a recognition that to welcome another may change my whole life AND the recognition that this change will benefit ALL of us in the end. How? It is not obvious. The gospels do not go into details. They simply say, ‘anyone who looses his life for my sake will find it.’
The rest is up to us. My own little experience was when I was led to understand that people living with mental disabilities had desires just like all of us and had their own gifts to share with any one who would welcome them.
Sunday 14 A Zech 9:9-10 Rom 8:9-13 Mt 11: 25-30
Post published in: Faith