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A few years ago I had suggested that we invite a former British PM for a public debate at the university. While there was interest among some colleagues, it was quickly decided that he was too much of a risk, and we didn’t want public protests and disruption. Reputation is everything. I remember this as I listen and read some of the discussions around the impending visit of Donald Trump – a visit which has been timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of D Day. As the political criticism intensifies with calls of street protests again, we’ve learnt that the labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn and the Commons speaker, John Bercow, intend to boycott the state banquet at Buckingham Palace being held in the president’s honour. The arguments in defence of the visit and royal welcome invoke the importance of duty, diplomacy and not confusing Donald Trump the man with the high office of the US presidency. After all as a nation we welcome many others whose record of human rights abuses in their own countries, including torture, oppression and executions should cause greater outrage. We shake hands with these leaders and we indulge them because the claim is that this is what grown up politics is all about. Symbolism matters and diplomacy is not a concession of principles. It seems to me that this is as much a question of expectations. Some of the negativity for Donald Trump lies in our hope for different standards in liberal democracies; we want their leaders to look and sound a certain way, strong but empathetic with a public and political rhetoric which embraces inclusion and rejects division. Instead many see his views as racist and misogynistic, not fitting for any leader, least of all the leader of a country with which we share so many values and common interests. A public demonstration can be a release of both anger and disappointment. At a time when so much of our social and political narrative has become one of name calling, polarising language and denigrating the views of others, it’s easy to create and vent even more division. But our true strength as a liberal state doesn’t only lie in the freedom to protest and have our voices heard, but how we use that freedom to strengthen our relationship with one another. This is a moral challenge and for this we need more than diplomacy; we need hospitality, the most powerful personal tool in human relationships and a virtue which lies at the core of the Abrahamic traditions. The prophetic saying `there is no good in the one who is not hospitable’ is not some soft, watered down piety, but an imperative precisely to show welcome and courtesy to everyone, especially those who unsettle us.