Hospitality 101

One of the striking things about visiting the developing world is the consistently overwhelming hospitality. Our arrival here in Uganda has upheld that view. The contrast with the way we practice hospitality in North America is particularly stark.

I tried to imagine the reverse scenario of our arrival. We got to their home around 11pm on a Friday night with two cranky children and stinking from two days’ worth of travel. If we had late-arriving overseas visitors at our home, chances are they would arrive to a house with the children in bed, the kitchen closed, and probably a note from the rest of the household looking forward to seeing them in the morning. By contrast, when we arrived from the airport, everyone (all 7 family members plus a few other relatives and some household help) welcomed us enthusiastically. After we distributed our gifts, everyone partook in a hearty meal. It was very late by the time we all went to bed.

It’s not like we are somehow special or unique. We are not the first overseas visitors to this home – the Odong family frequently hosts visitors - both Ugandans and foreigners. Our host family has averaged half a dozen visitors every single day. That’s more guests than we invite to our home over two months. In fact, in two and a half years living in the Washington DC area, we have been invited into half a dozen homes for dinner. When we made this observation tonight, our smiling hosts responded that they were not even aware of how many visitors they receive.

“Family” is a very open-ended concept here. Family privileges – including free meals and long lingering conversations - extend far beyond the two-child nuclear family that is the North American norm. Neighbours, friends, house help, and more are included in this definition. We haven’t heard a single grumble from our hosts about how many mouths they feed.

You could say this family is on a mission of sorts, to exercise Christian hospitality.

Time

We are half-way through our 24 journey to arrive in Kampala. We lose time as we cross the Atlantic so it is already day, even though our bodies want to be sleeping.

Time - something we often think of in a linear manner - yet something as simple as traveling shows us how limited our understanding of this notion is.

Stephen, our son doesn't think of time as I do. His birthday falls while we are in Uganda and he was saying: "I'll be four in Uganda." For him, time and space are relational not linear. June means no more to him that a place he's never been.

As we get closer to a new place - I hope we'll be able to live into the fullness of time.

Gratitude

Here we are a few hours from our flights out. We are heading off with a great sense of gratitude. When this opportunity first presented itself, I wondered how we would raise the $9600 it would take to make the trip possible. Then about a month ago we got shots and the cost was significantly more than we expected. Yet, the money has come. Even in excess of our projected budget, covering the unexpected health costs.

What is amazing is not that that the money has come, but that I wondered that it might. Somehow money seems to be outside of God's realm. Money is what this world runs by, so I fall into the trap of thinking that finances are secular. If all has been redeemed by the work of Christ on the cross, this includes things monetary.

Thank you to all individuals who generously gave to make this trip possible. I also want to thank the organizations who helped out especially to Virginia Theological Seminary's COIP grant, the Evangelical Episcopal Society, Church of the Spirit, and Little Trinity Church.

A reflection on getting immunized

Last week, in preparation for a trip to Uganda, my family and I went to a travel medical clinic for shots. The well-meaning nurse told me over and over how important it was for me to protect myself and the children. Her chorus sounded like a nagging mother: “Don't drink the water, put on mosquito repellent, stay away from dogs. The animals 'there' are not immunized you know.” She quizzed me about the health status of the host family and their household help. Have 'they' been tested for tuberculosis?

While she was trying to be helpful, the crudeness of the "us-and-them", "here-versus-there" mentality affected me more than the shots themselves.

I trust my host family. James has been to our home and my husband has been to his in Kampala. We broke bread together at a picnic by the Potomac river last spring. James is an engineer from Northern Uganda who got involved in peace work about ten years ago and now works for an international aid agency. He and his wife have five beautiful children ranging in age from 6 months to 19 years. James and my husband have worked and prayed together across the world. We have, in Anglican speak, "bonds of affection" between our families.

As I shadow various female clergy and mother's union leaders while I am in Uganda, I hope to build more bonds of affection. I am going on this immersion with a desire to learn from sisters and brothers in Christ, in a place where the Anglican Church is vibrantly alive, and faith is costly.

I am sad that in our Anglican family there is such brokenness. I am also grieved that many, like this nurse, still look at Africa as a land of danger rather than a place where Christ is powerfully at work building his kingdom.

I hope in my six weeks there, to un-learn cultural hedge of protection that we all too easily erect between ourselves and the unknown. We call people “them,” obsess about our own safety, and de-personalize the other. I go to re-learn what Christian fellowship and what the Anglican Communion can mean.

God, vaccinate me against my self, that my Ugandan brothers and sisters may infect me with patience, kindness and generosity.

This was originally posted here: http://www.vts.edu/cacs/welcome/commentary.asp