It is easy to lament the loss of hospitality in our own time, especially to the stranger. Whether it's the controversial laws in Arizona or the broader anti-immigrant sentiment that always seems to materialize during hard times; or the natural suspicion we all feel when someone different or unknown appears in a place familiar to us. How easily we find the stranger dangerous, threatening, upsetting. As human beings, we must be reminded repeatedly just as our spiritual ancestors were that hospitality to the stranger is not a luxury or a choice when convenient, but a necessity.