"every foreign country is their fatherland, and every fatherland is a foreign country"

on the theme of christian cosmopolitanism, my friend sean sent me the following passage. it is from a work known as the letter to diognetus. it probably dates from the second century, and the author is unknown. it is quite beautiful, and expresses almost exactly what i was trying to capture in speaking of an ethos of christian cosmopolitanism:

For the distinction between Christians and other men is neither in country nor language nor customs. For they do not dwell in cities in some place of their own, nor do they use any strange variety of dialect, nor practice an extraordinary kind of life. This teaching of theirs has not been discovered by the intellect or thought of busy men, nor are they the advocates of any human doctrine as some men are… They dwell in their own fatherlands, but as if sojourners in them; they share all things as citizens, and suffer all things as strangers. Every foreign country is their fatherland, and every fatherland is a foreign country. They marry as all men, they bear children, but they do not expose their offspring. They offer free hospitality, but guard their purity. Their lot is cast “in the flesh,” but they do not live “after the flesh” (2 Cor. 10.3). They pass their time on earth, but they have their citizenship in heaven (Phil. 3.20). They obey the appointed laws, and they surpass the laws in their own lives. They love all men and are persecuted by all men. They are unknown and they are condemned. They are put to death and they gain life. “They are poor and make many rich” (2 Cor. 6.10); they lack all thing and have all things in abundance. They are dishonoured, and are glorified in their dishonour; they are spoken evil of and are justified. “They are abused and give blessing” (1 Cor. 4.12), they are insulted and render honour. When they do good they are buffeted as evildoers, when they are buffeted they rejoice as men who receive life. They are warred upon by the Jews and persecuted by the Greeks, and those who hate them cannot state the cause of their enmity… what the soul is to the body, that the Christians are to the world. The soul is spread through all members of the body, and Christians throughout the cities of the world. The soul dwells in the body, but is not of the body, and Christians dwell in the world but are not of the world.