The Open Door: Hospitality in a Lonely World

The front door kept opening and shutting while the soup steamed up the kitchen windows. Someone had left two tiny shoes sideways in the hallway, one of the boys was explaining the rules of a game nobody else understood, and a teenager I did not know very well was standing near the island pretending she did not need a place to land. I handed her a bowl and pointed to the sourdough on the cutting board. Her shoulders dropped an inch right there.

I have been thinking about that inch all week. Sometimes welcome begins in very small ways, with a chair pulled out, a paper napkin set by a bowl, and a voice that says, "Stay a while."

Difference between entertaining and hospitality LDS

Many of us learned to think of hospitality as a performance. The house should sparkle and dinner should impress, while the children somehow turn into polished little ambassadors of family life. That version wears a good dress and never quite relaxes.

Actual welcome feels different. It lets people exhale. It makes room for the guest who arrives quiet, the child who comes in loud, the friend who apologizes for coming empty-handed, and the neighbor who has not been invited anywhere in a long time.

Scripture pushes us in that direction. Paul wrote that the Saints should be "given to hospitality" (Romans 12:13). The old Greek word behind that verse, philoxenia, means love of strangers. That is a sturdier thing than entertaining. It asks for openheartedness before polish.

"Distributing to the necessity of saints; given to hospitality."
Romans 12:13

Christ kept choosing people over social comfort, going where need was and sitting at tables that respectable people avoided. When I remember that, I stop worrying so much about whether my house looks ready and start asking whether my heart does.

LDS family ideas for welcoming others into the home

A family culture of hospitality rarely begins with fancy plans. It begins with regular habits that tell people, "You are not in the way here."

Some of the best invitations at our house have sounded like this:

• Come for pancakes on Saturday if you want company
• We have soup and too much bread, so join us
• Your kids can come jump on the trampoline for an hour
• We are weeding the garden and making lemonade after

Low-pressure invitations are often the ones people can actually say yes to, especially if they are worn out, short on money, new in town, carrying loneliness, or still unsure whether they belong.

This is part of why I loved writing about the ministry of casseroles in LDS culture. A simple offering made in love usually lands deeper than a polished gesture made to impress.

There is also wisdom in keeping one or two rituals ready. Ours are soup, pancakes, and a freezer cookie dough situation that has saved my good intentions more than once. Hospitality gets easier when your family knows what "come over" usually looks like.

Creating a culture of belonging in a LDS home

Belonging asks more of us than friendliness because it requires us to notice people, especially the family on the edge of the ward, the widower who leaves right after meetings, the single mom who always says she is fine too quickly, or the teenager who keeps coming over with your son and mostly wants to sit near a normal dinner table for a little while.

I think home can become a kind of third place for people now, though I would never have used that phrase twenty years ago. There are fewer places to linger without spending money. Fewer places where nobody is selling you something. A lived-in family home can answer that lack in a quiet, stubborn way.

That does require some surrender. If people are welcome, the cushions will be crooked. Someone will leave a cup in the wrong room. The counter may collect crumbs and half a science project. I do not love that part. I also do not think the crumbs are the problem. They are often the proof that people felt safe enough to stay.

This sits close to what I wrote in finding grace in ordinary family life. Holiness often shows up in ordinary rooms, with ordinary food, while somebody is still looking for the missing lid to the sour cream.

Simple ways to be more hospitable with children

Children can learn welcome the same way they learn prayer or table manners: by living inside it often enough that it starts to feel natural. You do not have to turn them into tiny event staff. You just let them practice seeing other people.

A few things we work on at our house:

1. Greet people at the door, or at least look up and smile when they come in.
2. Offer something small: water, a blanket, a cookie, a place to put a backpack.
3. Pull others into the room. Introduce the child no one knows yet. Make space in the game.
4. Learn to notice who is left out.

That last one matters most to me, because manners are useful but attention is holier.

If you want children to grow up with this instinct, let them watch you practice it. Let them hear you say, "Text her and tell her dinner is casual, and she can come exactly as she is." Let them see you set aside the good anxiety that whispers the house is not ready enough.

There is a family discipleship piece here too. Articles like family scripture study for tired LDS families remind me that faith is usually taught in repeatable, imperfect moments. Hospitality works the same way.

How to teach kids to be hospitable LDS without burning out your family

An open door does not mean a door that never closes. Families need privacy. Children need rest. Some weeks you are barely getting everyone fed and to mutual with both shoes on. Wisdom matters here.

For our family, it helps to decide ahead of time what we can offer gladly: one Saturday breakfast a month, last-minute soup when the pot is already going, or an extra child after school on Tuesdays. A few rhythms like that protect the welcome from turning into resentment.

I almost did not write this part because it feels tender, and it matters anyway. A family can stay soft enough for the Lord to interrupt the schedule now and then without trying to carry every need in the neighborhood. There is a difference. One leaves you drained and proud. The other keeps you available in a human-sized way.

Matthew 22:39 still reaches right into the kitchen: "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Love takes shape in the practical life of a house, in grocery lists and extra chairs, in patient listening at the table, and in the quiet choice to make room again.

Frequently Asked Questions

I want to be more hospitable, but my house is always a mess. How do I get past the shame?

Start by remembering what people feel in your home matters more than what they inspect. Most guests relax faster in a house that looks lived in than in one that feels staged. Straighten what will help you breathe, then open the door anyway.

What is the difference between entertaining and hospitality?

Entertaining usually centers the host's presentation, while hospitality centers the guest's comfort and belonging. One is preoccupied with how the evening looked, and the other cares whether people felt wanted when they left.

How can I teach my children to be welcoming without making it feel like one more chore?

Give them small jobs that feel human, not ceremonial. Ask them to get a glass of water, make room on the couch, or include the new child in the game. Over time they start to connect hospitality with love, not pressure.

How do I balance being an open home with protecting family rest?

Choose a few open times on purpose. It is better to welcome people with a full heart once a week than with thin patience every day. Boundaries do not cancel hospitality. They make it more honest.

What are some easy ways to invite people over when life is already busy?

Keep it simple and specific. Pancakes on Saturday morning, pizza after the game, soup on a cold night, lemonade after yard work. People often say yes to the invitation that does not ask them to perform.

The homes I remember most from childhood were not the fanciest ones. They were the ones where nobody seemed surprised to see me, where a plate appeared, where the room made space. I want my children to know how to build that kind of place, and I want to keep becoming the sort of woman who opens the door before she has perfected the house.

with love, Rachel