How can our parishes be places where the stranger feels at home?
An evangelising community begins with listening. The Catholic Church in this country has recently been trying to listen to families in a process called “Listening 2004,” one of the main findings of which is that before we ask how to pass on faith in families we must recognise that “Home is a Holy Place,” by recognising and valuing the presence of God in cooking meals, changing nappies and all the other activities of family life.
Inter-religious dialogue is another place where listening and proclaiming are seen to be two sides of the same coin, but the same is true for any kind of evangelisation: without genuine listening and interest in the other evangelisation lacks its necessary foundation in love. We must ask what it means to be a genuine friend of the poor, or of a refugee, not in a professional sense, but to make them welcome in our homes, for example. And what does that mean for our parishes? How can they be places where the stranger feels at home, not patronised or put up with for a while because we’re Christians, or treated as an exotic animal? That’s where a superficial multiculturalism and a genuine welcoming of the other part company.
This may take a long time and a lot of patience. If someone has been held in a transit camp, abused, raped, or exploited, you can’t just smile and say “So, tell me your story” and expect it all to come out immediately.
Image from: www.tesl.iastate.edu
