Two of this issue’s feature articles deal with hospitality, and in “Reasons for Hope” Cherie Peacock reflects on how hospitality played a role in the growth of her faith. Let me take a whack at the topic, but from a different angle. I want to write not about giving hospitality but about refraining from inhospitality.
My natural tendency—it may be yours too—is to avoid face-to-face confrontations, especially if I suspect the episodes will be unpleasant. For many years this extended to missionaries at the door. I did what I could to avoid speaking with them. Sometimes I would ignore their knocks and pretend I was not home. At other times I would open the door and tell them I was too busy to talk. When that failed, I tried to scare them away by explaining that I was a “Romanist” who was impervious to non-Catholic ideas.
Although I never slammed the door in missionaries’ faces, neither did I display a notably hospitable attitude. Encounters with proponents of other religions were unpleasant, so I tried not to have such encounters, but sometimes I was unsuccessful in shooing away folks who were trying to “save” me.
One day I found myself speaking on the doorstep with a Seventh-day Adventist. When I tried to discourage him by saying I was a Catholic, he reached into his valise and pulled out several Catholic editions of the Bible. “Which shall we use?” he asked. “Uh, the blue one,” I replied. And then we had at it.
For several minutes I was especially unhappy. I knew his charges against the Church and his interpretations of Scripture were wrong, but I found myself unable to formulate satisfying rejoinders. Then he cited a verse I knew, Matthew 16:18: “You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church.” Fortuitously, only days before I had read up on this passage.
It was my turn to take the offensive. I went into a lengthy discussion of points I later incorporated into Catholicism and Fundamentalism. I had an answer for every claim he made, and I explained the Catholic position in a positive and, I thought, compelling way. I knew I was having the better of the argument, and he knew it too, so at length he excused himself and went to ply his wares down the block.
I cannot say what he came away with from our discussion, but I came away with a newfound sense of confidence. For the first time I had been able to defend the faith successfully. If I did it once, I could do it again. If I could learn to defend the Church on one doctrine, I could learn to defend the Church on ten—or a hundred.
After that I no longer worried about dodging missionaries when they came to my door. Quite the opposite. I became the model of hospitality: “Come in and sit down. What can I get you—a soda, maybe a slice of cake? Here they are. . . . Now, let’s open the Bible, and let me give you the real scoop about the Christian faith.”