John refers to "strangers" who visit the local community to which he writes this very short Letter. However, the fact that he calls them "brothers" shows that they are already Christians. John does not develop the theme, of course, but his words are a reminder to us that in the Church there are no strangers for all of us are brothers and sisters, and there is one God who is Father of us all. In an ideal world we would live in countries without borders, without the need for passports and visas. But we are obviously many thousands of years away from such an earthly paradise. At least in the Church we can begin to live this reality, by contemplating the face of Jesus in each of our brothers and sisters.

One day some years ago, one of our French Jesuit fathers was on a bus in Beijing. He heard a little Chinese boy ask his father: "Is he a foreigner?" With great wisdom, the father answered: "We are all foreigners." On this earth, we are indeed all foreigners, exiled from Paradise, but in Christ Jesus and in his Church we are no longer foreigners or strangers.