Word to the Wise
Sunday, September 1, 2024 - 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time - B
[Deut 4:1-2, 6-8; Jas 1:17-18, 21b-22, 27; Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23]Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in your and is able to save your souls. Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world. [James] "You disregard God's commandment but cling to human tradition." [Mark]
Catholic faith, east and west, is a rich tapestry of Tradition (capital T) and traditions (small "t"). Tradition (capital T) includes the scriptures and teachings of the "Fathers (and Mothers)of the Church" closely connected with the apostolic preaching. Tradition with a small "t" would include liturgical piety (incense, vestments, crucifixes, stained glass windows, liturgical seasons like Lent, Christmas, Easter, etc) and popular devotions such as the rosary, stations of the cross, novenas, processions, Marian devotions connected with various apparitions as well as physical gestures like the Sign of the Cross, genuflections, hands held together as a sign of prayer, etc.. It is an amazing constellation that appeals to the "Catholic imagination" and assists in prayer and love of God.
What can happen in all of this is a concentration on devotional life - love of God - and a loss of concentration on love of neighbor - the care of "widows and orphans" i.e. the most vulnerable people in the world. The liturgical life can create a kind of "bubble" that screens out the day to day struggle of so many to just live humanly. Yes, there are large-scale efforts like Catholic Charities on local, national and international levels, but the very existence of these can lead one to distance oneself from those efforts and find refuge in devotion. In that process, the "do good" is overshadowed by the "avoid evil" that the world outside the bubble represents. The challenge from the Letter of James and the Gospel According to Mark today is to be aware that our liturgical/devotional life does not exist for itself alone but rather to enable us to be "doers of the word and not hearers only." The fact that "love of neighbor" follows "love of God" in expression does not mean that love of neighbor is of secondary importance. AMEN