Hospitality and compassion: the work and ethics of catholic chaplains supporting seafarers

ABSTRACT

This article opens a window on the world of chaplains supporting seafarers, which has largely been neglected by the literature. Shipping happens in ports, which are often far away from urban centres. It is thus removed from everyday experience making seafarers an invisible population and, with them, the chaplains who assist them. The article proposes to view chaplains’ service to seafarers as a form of ‘embodied‘ hospitality. It is an offer of a relationship as well as of assistance. The angle of hospitality sheds light on the dynamics of the relationships between seafarers and chaplains, the tensions and opportunities for exchange. The ethic of chaplains’ hospitality that emerges from the observation and interviews is one of ’compassion’ requiring openness to and acceptance of the other. Compassion, here, is the recognition of the dignity of the other based on a shared humanity.

KEYWORDS:

• hospitality
• chaplaincy
• ethics
• compassion

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. https://www.apostleshipofthesea.org.uk/our-history.

2. http://www.aos-australia.org/history.htm.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Apostleship of the Sea.

Notes on contributors

Francesca E. S. Montemaggi

Francesca E. S. Montemaggi, PhD is a researcher in the field of sociology and anthropology of morality and religion. She has conducted research in Christian communities on authenticity and moral identity. She has lectured in anthropology of religion and sociology at Cardiff University and conducted research at St Mary’s University, London and at the Woodbrooke Centre for Quaker Studies.