Inspiration: 

May I learn to stretch my heart and soul, learning limberness of spirit as the athlete learns limberness of body.

The Company We Keep

How generous are we to the people we do not know? The people who frighten us? The people who are live in very different circumstances than we do? I’ve found myself seeking others like myself in strange environments. I’ll seek out the hearing impaired and those I know living with chronic illness. I’ll seek out others who have lots of experience of being unwelcomed, of living as strangers in the middle of supposedly wonderful hospitality. It is spiritual work to stretch and be generous in meeting and being with people we do not know, especially if they are people who frighten us or seem very unlike us. Yet, like other challenging activities, this practice of stretching into a mutual and radical hospitality can be enormously rewarding. Some of the relationships and experiences I now value the most are with people I would have missed had I played it safe and not stretched myself — and had not the other people involved risked in the same ways and stretched themselves.

BY REV. NAOMI KING, CITY OF REFUGE MINISTRIES TO READ MORE

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The Daily Compass offers words and images to inspire spiritual reflection and encourage the creation of a more loving, inclusive and just world. Produced by The Church of the Larger Fellowship, the Unitarian Universalist Congregation Without Walls.