We continue the series of articles for women. These are taken from a very old but beautiful book, written by Monsignor Bernard O'Reilly in 1877. Some examples may indeed be "outdated", but we firmly believe that the principles laid out in this book are not only good, but give a truly Catholic perspective of what the woman is and how she stands before God and in society. We pray that it might benefit you greatly. (Editor)
Chapter Three
The Home Virtues (Continued)-Hospitality,
Holiness, And Innocence Of Conversation.
Let each one inquire in the Church for the poor and the stranger; and
when he meets them, let him invite them to his house; for with the poor
man Christ will enter it. He who entertains a stranger, entertains Christ.
The glory of a Christian is to receive strangers and pilgrims, and to
have at his table the poor, the widow and the orphan. ST. EPHREM, De Amore
Pauperurn.
Hospitality
The Christian religion, beside inheriting all the divine legislation of
preceding ages, and consecrating all that was ennobling and purifying
in public and private life, perfected every virtue practiced by Jew and
Gentile by assigning to each a supernatural motive and by assisting the
weakness of nature with most powerful graces.
Doubtless in the most ancient times, men, wherever they chanced to live,
were not altogether unmindful of their being sprung from the same parents,
and the first impulse of nature urged them to open their house to the
stranger as to a brother, one who was their own flesh and blood. In the
patriarchal ages we find a higher motive superadded to that of common
brotherhood: that to receive the stranger, was to discharge a debt due
to God himself that to shut him out was, possibly, to close one's door
against the Deity hi disguise. Abraham and his nephew Lot gave hospitality
to angels disguised in human form, and were rewarded, the former by the
birth of Isaac, the latter by being saved with his family from the terrible
destruction in which Sodom and the neighboring cities were involved.
Not dissimilar was the reward divinely granted to the poor pagan widow
of Sarephta who harbored and fed the famished and fugitive prophet Elias,
and to the wealthy lady of Sunam who sheltered Elisaeus. Their generous
hospitality was rewarded by the restoring to life of the only son of each.
But in the gospel, Martha and Mary made their home the resting-place of
the Incarnate God, and their hospitality was accompanied by a public and
unhesitating confession of their Guest's divinity, and that, too, at a
time when he was most opposed and persecuted by the leading men of the
nation. Not only were they, also, rewarded by the restoration to life
of their dead brother, but they had the further recompense of becoming
the apostles of the Divine Master.
This was, moreover, the return made by Him to his Mother's cousin, Mary
Salome, mother of St. James the Elder and St. John the Apostle, for the
hospitality so generously bestowed on Mary, after the breaking up of her
own home at Nazareth. The same may be said of that other Mary, the sister
of the apostle St. Barnabas, and the mother of another apostle, John-Mark.
It is the common tradition that her house was that hi which our Lord celebrated
the last Supper, hi which the Blessed Virgin found a refuge during the
interval between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, and in which the
apostles and disciples were wont to assemble till the Holy Ghost came
down on them.
Certain it is that there the faithful were wont to meet with Peter and
the other apostles till after the martyrdom of St. Stephen and St. James,
the imprisonment and miraculous liberation of St. Peter, and the visit
made to him by St. Paul after the latter's conversion. Her home was the
common home of the infant church of Jerusalem, and, as tradition affirms,
the first Christian church in that city. This generous mother's hospitality
was rewarded by seeing both her brother and her son called to the glorious
labors and perils of the apostleship.
Thenceforward, the bestowing hospitality was for the mistress of a Christian
household to receive Christ himself, the God of Charity, in the person
of every guest who crossed her threshold, be he rich or poor, kinsman
or stranger, friend or foe, sick or loathsome, the holiest of men or the
most abandoned of sinners.
But we must reserve for another place the rules of hospitality to be observed
by the mistress of the home and all her dependents. We are at present
only pointing, out the distinctive character and the ideal of Christian
hospitality.
Holiness
A holy house is one in which God is truly King; in which he reigns supreme
over the minds and hearts of the inmates; in which every word and act
honors his name. One feels on entering such a house, nay, even on approaching
it, that the very atmosphere within and without is laden with holy and
heavenly influences. Modern authors have written elegantly and eloquently
about the home life which was the source of all domestic virtues and all
public greatness in the powerful nations of antiquity. They describe,
in every household, in the poor man's cabin as well as in the palace,
that altar set apart for family worship, on which the sacred fire was
scrupulously watched and kept alive night and day. No one ever went forth
from the house without first kneeling at that altar and paying reverence
to the divinity of the place, and no one, on returning, ever saluted his
dearest ones before doing homage there. There, too, at night the household
met for prayer and adoration, and there again with the dawn they knelt
together to beg on the labors of the day before them the blessing of the
deity worshiped by their fathers.
This altar and this undying fire were regarded as a something so holy
that only the most precious wood and the purest material was employed
to feed the flame. Nothing filthy or defiled was permitted to approach
the spot; and every indecent word uttered or act committed near it was
deemed a sacrilege. This hearth-altar, or hearth-fire, as it was called,
was symbolical of the fate of the family. If it was neglected and allowed
to die out, this was deemed an irreparable calamity foreboding the ruin
of the home and the extinction of the race.
In the Christian home it is the flame of piety, ardent love for God, and
charity toward the neighbor, which constitutes the hearth-fire that should
ever bum bright. Old Catholic homeshow many of our readers will remember
it? were wont to have the cross placed outside as a symbol of the love
for the Crucified which ruled all hearts within; and in the interior his
name, as well as his image could be seen on almost every wall, informing
the stranger-guest that he was in the house of the common Parent, and
in the midst of dear brethren.
And how many of us may also remember the poor but cleanly cottage of the
laborer, or the narrow room of city families, on whose bare but white
walls there was no ornament but the crucifix, and no glory but that of
the Holy Name written there as a seal of predestination?
Where the fire of divine love is fed as carefully, and the mother and
her daughters watch as jealously as the Roman matrons and maidens of old
that its flame shall never be extinguished, there is little fear that
any conversation but what is "innocent" shall prevail. Purity
and charity are the twin-lights of every home deserving of God's best
blessing and man's heartfelt veneration.
What The Home Ought Not To Be
The Spaniards say, "Shut the door and the Devil passes by;"
the true woman who has read the preceding pages and understood the teaching
conveyed therein, will know how to preserve her home-sanctuary from evil.
It is, comparatively, an easy task to cultivate and cherish in one's own
life and hi the souls of those nearest and dearest to one, all the sweet
virtues and holy habits indicated above, or connected with true piety.
But how hard it is, when once evil habits have been formed, to resist
or reform them! There are certain horrible skin diseases to which persons
of the purest blood and most refined nature are most liable. And the terrible
poison, sometimes caught by a breath or a touch of the hand, once deposited
in blood hitherto untainted, will spread instantaneously, and commit the
most fearful ravages.
So is it with souls highly privileged: a single voluntary act of sin may
be followed by such a state of spiritual leprosy, that all their former
beauty and glory appear changed into hideous deformity and seemingly incurable
corruption.
Be careful to keep evil far away from the hearts of your dear ones; and
close and bar the door of your home at all times, when you know that wickedness
is abroad in the street or on the highway. Keep out the fatal influences
which might weaken or destroy the precious boon of Christian faith in
your household; bar and bolt your door against uncharitableness, immodesty,
and that odious spirit of irreverence toward age, authority, and all that
our fathers have taught us to respect and love.
And, 0 women who read this, learn here how to make your home, though never
so poor and bare, lovely to your dear ones and an object of respect and
envy to all who know you. This you shall be taught in the next chapter.
