Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time - Cycle B

Dt 4:1-2, 6-8
Jas 1:17-18, 21b-22, 27
Mk 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

The Culture of Life will come about when we practice the “true religion” of which James speaks in the second reading. “Looking after orphans and widows in their distress” is what the pro-life movement does. The unborn child is the most orphaned of all when he or she is scheduled for an abortion. “Though father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me” – and the Lord receives them precisely through his people practicing “true religion.” The mothers of these children may not be widowed in the sense that their husbands died, but they experience very often the absence of the father of the child, who may in fact be the one pressuring them to abort.

The Gospel passage makes it clear that the building of the Culture of Life comes “from within,” just as do the death-producing ways of thinking that lead to the Culture of Death. The culture must be shaped by external factors, including law, and these factors can powerfully shape the heart. Yet from within the depth of the heart will spring our readiness to give life, welcome life, and defend life.