hospitality

Oct 2, 2012 ∞

Home and Hospitality

A friend asked me today to explain what I mean by "home" in a sentence or two. This is too tall an order for someone as wordy as me. I think of Du Bellay's "Heureux qui, comme Ulysse," of what Hebrews 11 says about Abraham, who looked forward to leaving his tents for a city with foundations; I think of the mountains of my youth, and my homesickness for their colors, and sounds, and seasonal smells. I think of Odysseus, and his long road home, home to where others patiently waited for his return. It matters that we find our way home, and the whole earth does not count as our home. We incarcerate people in places that are not home-ly; we fight to live in our particular home when we are invaded, even though our species can live almost anywhere. Home matters.

Perhaps home means this: the place where we feel free to show, or to receive hospitality. The measure of our willingness to be hospitable to others, or of our ability to receive hospitality in new places, is the measure of our homes. They are not measured in square feet, but in welcome. What do you think? That feels like a good first try, but perhaps you can say something better, or truer than that.

Nov 28, 2010 ∞

No Room In The South Dakota Inn? An unjust and ironic law.

Manny Steele and two other SD legislators are apparently proposing that we criminalize hospitality. Their proposed law would make it illegal to offer a ride or lodging to illegal immigrants, and it would also make it a crime for an illegal immigrant to ask for work.

Putting aside the fact that this would be a very difficult law to obey and to enforce (Would bus drivers and cab drivers need to verify citizenship before taking on fares? Would it be illegal to offer a ride to a stranger? Would shelters be forced to turn aside illegal immigrants on freezing nights?) this is ironic news to appear on the first Sunday of Advent, the season in which we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus. This is the Jesus who was born to poor immigrants who had no place to live in their hometown. Who was born in a barn. Whose parents were forced to flee their homeland to escape politically motivated violence.

I propose that our legislators take some time this Advent to try to put themselves in the shoes of other poor migrants. Think about it: if you lived in Mexico, would you willingly give up that climate for South Dakota winters if you could avoid it? Would you give up your hometown, your family, your language, your familiar food - in short, everything - to come to South Dakota if you could avoid it?

More to the point: Would you make Mary give birth in your barn or your garage? I understand why you’re concerned about jobs and about enforcing our laws. We have a great country, and we should work to keep it great. But we will not make our country greater by making our hearts harder.

Meanwhile, as for me and my family, we would rather stand with Mary and Joseph. And we will continue to say, as Christians and Jews have said for millennia, that an unjust law is no law at all.

María y José, bienvenidos en nuestro pueblo.

Nov 14, 2009 ∞

Russell Frank and the 4/40 Program

One semester when I was in grad school at Penn State I was assigned to teach a course called "Media Ethics." I had no idea how to teach such a course, so I called up Dr. Russell Frank to ask him for a textbook recommendation.

Frank wrote a weekly column for the Centre Daily Times. At the time, he was an untenured professor in the Department of Communications at Penn State. Even though he did not know me, and surely had many demands on his time, Frank offered to meet me for coffee.

We met for three hours that day, during which I took pages of notes and basically wrote my syllabus for the course. He also gave me a stack of textbooks from his office, offered to guest-lecture in my class (which he later did, several times) and then, to top it all off, he paid for the coffee.

I protested that I was getting all the benefit from this and that I should pay. He replied, "My rule is this: the student never pays." Instead of paying him back, he said, I could "pay it forward" to some of my students.

So I began what I now call The 4/40 program. Whenever I meet students for a meal or coffee, I explain this to them: during their four years of undergraduate study with me (and if they visit me while they're in grad school) I pay. If they want, then they can visit me sometime in the next forty years and take me out for a meal or, better yet, they can use the next forty years to take someone else out for a meal.

I find these meals are always worthwhile. Much of the best learning in college happens outside the classroom, in informal conversations, often while breaking bread together. I teach because I love teaching, and these meals or coffees have provided me with some of my favorite classrooms: coffee shops, restaurants, the dining room table or kitchen in our home.

So to any of my students who may be reading this: don't thank me, thank Russell Frank (you can find his email at the link above or right here if you want). And if you benefited from the coffee, or the meal, pay it forward to someone else.

And come back and visit sometime.