Rector's Note: Welcoming as Receiving-4.30.26

I spent the first part of last week at the annual diocesan Clergy Conference in the Poconos. It was a great chance to get refreshed and meet up with my clergy colleagues from throughout the diocese. My rector’s note took the rest of the week off, in fact. So, this week I’m catching up.

I especially wanted to tell you about a conversation that several of the clergy had on the subject of welcome last week. Two clergy, the Rev. Suzanne Clune and the Rev. Ben Capps, are doing doctoral work that explores the themes of hospitality and welcome, and they shared some of their tips and insights with us.

This is an area that St. Peter’s takes quite seriously, and I was pleased to see that we have a variety of practices that fall within their suggestions for offering extended welcome and ongoing hospitality.

One idea that really struck me is that welcome is an act of receiving. They pointed out that the word in Greek is dechomai. According to the translation resources on Bible Hub, it means “to receive in a welcoming (receptive) way” and “is used of people welcoming God (His offers), like receiving and sharing in His salvation (1 Thes 2:13) and thoughts (Eph 6:17).”

This sort of welcoming is warmly receptive, and it has a sense of readiness to it.

Suzanne pointed out the lengths we go through to make sure that packages that we order are received properly – we order them, we track them, we sign for them, we don’t let them stay on our porches too long for fear they will be stolen. And then we open them, appreciate them, and make room in our lives for them.

That got me imagining the people who come through our doors to worship, to attend programs or visit the food cupboard being delivered there by God, dispatched directly to our care. If we receive them in the spirit of dechomai, then we are expecting them, making a place for them, ensuring they are not left on the porch or in the pew, and cherishing them as ongoing gifts from the divine.

It’s not too far off the spirit of welcome that’s already here at St. Peter’s, but it does put a spin on it that I hadn’t thought of before.

People find their way to us in so many ways. They see the welcome banner on the front of the church and come in to see if that rainbow means all we say it does. The word gets around that food is available without an interview, and you can stop by after work or in the privacy of the late evening. Families bring their children through our doors for preschool or theater programs. Folks linger at our bulletin boards, add prayers to our outdoor prayer list, and join the livestream to view our services.

What does it mean to receive all of these people, from those settling in to those passing through, as people whom God has sent us to be received with warmth and readiness?

This type of receiving is actually a hallmark of Benedictine monastic hospitality, following the Rule of St. Benedict, who gave the instruction to "Let all guests who arrive be received as Christ."

This takes the idea a little further, to receive people not as though they were sent by Christ, but as though they themselves were Christ himself. And given what we know about God’s incarnation as Jesus, who is to say that they are not?

As we savor the joy of Easter and get ready for the fire of Pentecost, this is a good image for us all to reflect upon, because we are all doorkeepers in some way to the life of this parish. How do we greet those who we encounter here? How equipped are we to escort them to the places they are seeking to go or the people they need to see? How willing are we to learn their stories and what brought them to us? How well do we remember them when they return?

Receiving others as Christ is a spiritual skill that we can always be honing – I know that it is something that I always need to work on. Luckily Christ gives us so many opportunities to receive him in the ones who find their way to us, as well as on the road and deep into the lives we live away from these doors.