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17 U. Md. L.J. Race, Religion, Gender & Class 15 (2017)
Faith and Hospitality

handle is hein.journals/margin17 and id is 19 raw text is: 


FAITH AND HOSPITALITY


                         Nina Beth Cardin*

       Law, at its core, is a matter of heart. It is a way that any two or
more people determine how to live together, how to share the time and
space and stuff of life. It is an expression of what a society deems fair
and good, or wrong and out-of-bounds, and the structures put in place
to codify, enforce and adjudicate such beliefs.

       Law, in short, is values made manifest, which is why it is right
and proper, even essential, for faith communities to enter the
conversation about law.

       Especially now. It is precisely when difficult circumstances of
global population displacement strain our social graces, when
extraordinary times try our better angels, that we may turn fearful
and inward, and seek refuge in law as a tool of protectionism and
exclusion.

       So it may seem banal in a time of such upheaval and
dislocation, when millions of refugees fleeing for their lives are
disrupting national and international stability, to call upon faith
communities to speak to us about their traditions of hospitality. But
that is what we must do. It is precisely now that the traditions, the
attitude and the practice of hospitality are needed most.

       Hospitality is first and foremost an act of selflessness triggered
by the need, the call, of the traveler, the stranger, the exiled, the ones
far from home. The Hebrew Bible speaks no less than ninety-two
times of ger, which translates to stranger or immigrant and what we
must do to care for them.' When a stranger resides with you in your
land, you shall not wrong him. The stranger who resides with you shall
enjoy the same protections as your citizens. You shall love him as
yourself for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.2



* Nina Beth Cardin is a rabbi in Baltimore who works at the intersection of faith and
sustainability.
1Scripture and Immigration, WELCOMING THE STRANGER WORLD RELIEF,
http://welcomingthestranger.com/wpwelcoming/learn-and-discern/scripture-and-
immigration (last visited Apr. 19, 2017) (stating that ger is used 92 times in the
Torah and roughly translates to immigrant).
2 Leviticus 19:33-34.

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