Sunday, 21st February
At the post-pantomime party held at one of the local pubs following the last night, I got talking to a young professional couple who live in the Greater Manchester area. They’d seen the article in the previous week’s Telegraph about Wooler and decided to have a weekend away in a County they’d never been to before. The experience blew them away. Arriving late on the Friday night at their pub accommodation, they realised that they were too late for either restaurant or pub food. They sat in the bar only to be welcomed by the locals and within minutes were placing their order for the Indian takeaway with people who moments before were strangers who were becoming friends. They were advised where to walk and visit the following day and the landlady managed to fix them a couple of tickets for the last night of the pantomime, (which might explain why there was standing room only). They enjoyed their walk, they were aching with laughter from the pantomime, but more especially talked about an experience of being welcomed in a way that had alluded them in the virtual reality of their network culture and Face book contacts. They will be back because something about the place and the people touched their lives so when they asked me what I did I came clean and told them. You could sense both the intrigue and disbelief. Clearly they’d neither experienced hospitality like this before nor had they any real encounters with people who love God and are trying to follow Christ. I bade them farewell and returned to the main panto group for the speeches. I was so proud to belong to this place and the people, the vast majority of whom don’t share the same faith that I possess. It was only a pantomime but the process of putting it on evidenced commitment, friendship, support, helpfulness, co-operation, laughter and encouragement and the atmosphere in the pub that evening was welcoming, inclusive and a taste of community. How I long that the church might reflect such for that night in the pub I think I saw a sign of the kingdom of God that I haven’t always seen in a church building or worship service context.
Of course, I have witnessed good examples of hospitality in churches and our own Northumbria Community at its best does hospitality brilliantly. Strangers have become friends amongst us and long may it continue.
The architects who are working on the plans for our new Mother House are working on the brief that it is to be a place of hospitality. My prayer for the Community is that wherever we are, alone and together, at the Mother House or in Other Houses, in our own homes or on the road, we express that hospitality of the heart, that welcomes, honours and blesses all whom God sends.
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