Unexpected guests arrive at your door.  What do you do?  Jump up, Martha Stewart-like, immediately ready to entertain?  Rejoice internally in the prospect of good time spent with friends?  Curse at the re-arrangement of previously-made plans for the day which will now have to be rescheduled into an already too-full week?  Or stay very quiet, and pretend that nobody is home, in the hope that they will go away?

In the letter to the Hebrews, it is written: “Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels.”  (Hb 13:2) Indeed, hospitality is the thread connecting our readings today.  Three unexpected strangers turn up at Abraham and Sarah’s encampment in the desert, in need of a safe refuge, of food and drink.  Jesus, journeying with his disciples, is welcomed into the home of his friends, Martha and Mary.  What welcome will they receive?  More importantly: how will the lives of their hosts be changed forever as a result of this visitation? 

Let us begin with our Gospel text, which introduces us to two great women of faith: Martha and Mary of Bethany, women of the Gospel, intimate friends of Jesus, saints and models of faith for us today.  What do they teach us about the nature of true hospitality?   

This passage has a checkered history of interpretation. For centuries, Jesus’ “Martha, Martha” was interpreted as a sign of exasperated reproof; his praise of Mary “choosing the better part,” an indication of the alleged “superiority” of the contemplative over the active life. (Please note that this interpretation was favoured especially by contemplative monks and nuns!)  The problem with this view is that it reflects an “either-or” logic, separating the world into two categories of people, two radically distinct callings or vocations.  Maybe the point is not to rush too quickly to judge either Martha or Mary, but to ponder what each of them has to teach us about hospitality and about discipleship, about how we are called to live as friends of Jesus and servants of his Gospel in the world today. 

After all, Martha and Mary are both saints – who, in the wonderful phrase of St. Augustine, “lived in the same house.”  This means that there is a “Martha” and a “Mary” inside each of us.  

Martha and Mary live in the same house – within me, within you, within the Church, within the world.  Who takes up more room?  Is my dominant experience of life that of being “burdened, worried, distracted,” overwhelmed by life’s many demands? Or am I more tempted to put aside necessary tasks and duties and escape into a life of leisure and recreation?  How can we strike a balance between these two tendencies, so that our action is rooted in contemplation, our prayer nourished by our involvements in work, family, and social commitment? 

Jesus’ encounter with Martha and Mary reassures me that the tension between the active and the contemplative, the apostle and the mystic within us, can be a tremendously creative force.  Let’s look at three aspects of this:

First, this Gospel story challenges all of us to re-examine our priorities.  Prayer and service are essential dimensions of Christian life.  It’s not “either-or”; it’s “both-and”.  The challenge is integrating them, finding the right balance.  Jesus invites us to bring them together: prayer and service, love of God and care for neighbour, contemplation and action. 

We are all called to serve God, to be actively involved with the work of his Kingdom.  But what kind of service does God expect?  Who is the God I serve?  The danger of "doing" all the time – of being only a "Martha” – is to see myself slaving for a God who is an exacting taskmaster, never satisfied.  I end up constantly trying to impress God – or my family, or my co-workers, or whoever – doing things to win praise or attention, but silently resentful of their demands. 

Jesus reveals the face of a God who is interested in us as people: who loves and accepts us for who we are, and not just because of all the things we do for him.  Jesus praises Mary’s attentive listening as the first and most important form of 'hospitality' to the Lord: welcoming his Word, his teaching, his presence in our hearts.  When our service is not rooted in a prayerful disposition, it easily turns into frenzied activity: worried and distracted, rather than calm and purposeful.

Second, I think we need to give Martha some credit.  As the Genesis account of the hospitality shown to the three strangers by Abraham and Sarah suggests, for the peoples of the Middle East, hospitality was not just a social grace, but a sacred responsibility.  In the desert, to refuse someone food and drink and shelter could mean the difference between life and death. I am sure that Jesus appreciated Martha's hospitality.  When I hear Jesus say, “Martha, Martha”, I hear it not in a scolding or severe tone.  I hear it as the gentlest of reproofs, teasing, but also endearing.  His intent is not to criticize Martha, but to invite her into the circle of love and friendship from which she was excluding herself through her busyness. 

Martha and Mary (and their brother Lazarus, who is not mentioned in this story) were among Jesus’ closest and dearest friends.  Their home was a place of refuge for him, a place he felt free to be himself.  Jesus was genuinely concerned about Martha; he knew her, knew that if she would only let go of her fretting and worrying, she would be much happier.  Instead of attending to the most important interruption that had ever affected her daily routine, she busied herself with what were, in comparison, inconsequential details.  Jesus was present in her home; but she was unable to be present to him. 

As a woman in a patriarchal society, Martha was used to a subservient role.  Jesus tells her what he would later tell the Twelve: "I no longer call you my servant, but my friend."  In calling Martha and Mary to this kind of friendship, Jesus is reversing an age-old prejudice, reflective of the traditional confines of women’s roles in first-century Judaism: that a woman’s only purpose in life is to serve men.  According to the traditions of the time, Martha is right: Mary should be helping in the kitchen.  There is even a verse in the Talmud that suggests “it is better to burn the Torah than to teach it to a woman.” 

In sitting at Jesus' feet and listening to his teaching, Mary assumes a privilege reserved to men in that time and place.  She assumes the position of a disciple: something Martha probably secretly wanted to do, but didn't dare.  In his gentle rebuke, Jesus invites Martha to reconsider her decision. He encourages her to break free from her socially-imposed, religiously-imposed, and self-imposed servitude, to more fully embrace her call to discipleship and intimate friendship with Jesus.  Her person, her presence are more important to him than all the “things” she does for him.  Jesus comes not to be served by, but to be with, his good friends. 

I have always taken comfort in my theory that after this exchange, Martha took off her apron, sat down with Mary, and joined the conversation.  Then after supper, Jesus helped with the dishes!

Third, Jesus says the same to us today.  True hospitality is not ultimately about how big or immaculately clean my house is, how elegantly it is furnished, how elaborate a party I can throw, how much food and drink I stuff my guests with.  A house becomes a home when those who enter it feel welcomed and affirmed as people.  Although we all appreciate a delicious meal, what we hunger and thirst for most is friendship, love, and community.  That’s true hospitality.

Jesus’ words also remind us of the importance of placing the many activities that fill our daily lives within a set of priorities.  There is a real difference between action that is focused and productive, and those activities which distract us and lead us to worry and fret, to distraction and dissipation. Jesus invites us to “seek first the Kingdom”: to make our first priority cultivating depth of relationship with God and with others.  We then need to trust that the other things will fall into place, as long as we have our priorities straight.

What God wants for us most deeply is the capacity to act purposefully and freely.  This requires that we ask God daily for the grace and courage to choose wisely, to do what needs to be done, and to let go of what I cannot do, of what I am not meant to be doing.  It means accepting my limitations, asking myself what it is that God requires of me, rather than letting social pressure, a demanding boss, parent or spouse, or even my own overactive superego and need to achieve, dictate to me.

Summer is a good time to do this.  As we have borne the heat wave of the past two weeks, many of us have been forced to slow down and relax a little more.  Summer is also a season for hospitality: for barbecues and pool parties, picnics and ball games, reunions of families and friends.  Maybe this summer, we can find a little bit of time to accept Jesus' invitation to lay down our worries, take off our aprons and workclothes, and find some time just to be.  A quiet church, an easy chair, a walk under the trees ... a time in which, like Mary, we can just have the pleasure of being with the Lord, whose only desire is to be with us. 

Then maybe, just maybe, we will hear a voice of friendship, gently calling us by our name: “Martha, Martha” ... “Raymond, Raymond” ... “Anna, Anna” ... “John, John” ... saying to us: "Don't just do something.  Sit there!”