{"id":1542,"date":"2015-09-30T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-09-30T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/mission-and-identity\/?p=1542"},"modified":"2019-09-18T16:49:15","modified_gmt":"2019-09-18T20:49:15","slug":"sept-30-the-pope-in-the-western-hemisphere-who-welcomed-whom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/2015\/09\/30\/sept-30-the-pope-in-the-western-hemisphere-who-welcomed-whom\/","title":{"rendered":"Sept 30 – The Pope in the Western Hemisphere\t– Who Welcomed Whom?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wednesday, September 30 \u00a0 – \u00a0“<\/strong>I needed welcome and wasn\u2019t good at being welcomed.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

Some years ago George Herbert\u2019s \u201cLove Bade me Welcome\u201d (1633) reminded me of Marion Sweetser. Marian lived in Minneapolis, a widow with 6 or 7 children and loads of grandkids. One day in summer 1965 I and 3 other young Jesuits showed up at her door. We were driving from Wisconsin to Pine Ridge South Dakota to begin the year\u2019s teaching at Red Cloud Indian School and she cooked lunch for us. The 25 year old she saw at her doorstep was a wreck \u2014 underweight, on the verge of colitis, intense. Marian recognized instantly that I needed welcome and wasn\u2019t good at being welcomed. She was a master at both and that day began a magical friendship. For 25 years I stopped by any chance I could to spend time with Marion. Until she died, in her nineties, in 1994.<\/p>\n

Over and over these days of Cuba and the US welcomed Francis in any way its peoples could: \u00a0elected officials in Havana and Washington, homeless women and men, \u00a0children, prisoners and refugees, \u00a0huge crowds who seemed to love waiting . . . . \u00a0welcoming Francis. \u00a0\u00a0Or was Francis welcoming all these people so that these crowds of people learned a bit more about how to be welcomed by someone with the soul of welcome in his bones? \u00a0Or was the Pope stepping up our welcome by reminding us that perhaps the bravest\u00a0form of hospitality ito allow ourselves to be welcomed into other people\u2019s places, to be received with the resources of the people of those places == “elected officials in Havana and Washington, homeless women and men, \u00a0children, prisoners and refugees.\u201d \u00a0 \u00a0Who welcomes whom? \u00a0 That might be the most important take-home from the Pope\u2019s days on this side of \u00a0The Atlantic.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s Post: \u00a0\u00a0\u201clove bade me welcome\u201d \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Love bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,
\nGuilty of dust and sin.
\nBut quick-ey\u2019d Love, observing me grow slack
\nFrom my first entrance in,
\nDrew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,
\nIf I lacked anything.
\n\u2018A guest,\u2019 I answer\u2019d,\u2019 worthy to be here\u2019:
\nLove said, \u2018You shall be he.\u2019
\n\u2018I, the unkind, ungrateful?\u00a0 Ah, my dear
\nI cannot look on Thee.\u2019
\nLove took my hand, and smiling did reply,
\n\u2018Who made the eyes but I?\u2019
\n\u201cTruth, Lord, but I have marr\u2019d them; let my shame
\nGo where it doth deserve.\u2019
\n\u2018And know you not,\u2019 says Love, \u2018who bore the blame?\u2019
\n\u2018My dear, then I will serve.\u2019
\n\u2018You must sit down,\u2019 says Love, \u2018and taste My meat.\u2019
\nSo I did sit and eat.<\/p>\n

George Herbert\u00a0 1633<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wednesday, September 30 \u00a0 – \u00a0“I needed welcome and wasn\u2019t good at being welcomed.” Some years ago George Herbert\u2019s \u201cLove Bade me Welcome\u201d (1633) reminded me of Marion Sweetser. Marian lived in Minneapolis, a widow with 6 or 7 children … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11641],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/139"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1542"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1543,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542\/revisions\/1543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.udmercy.edu\/poetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}