Readings for the Day:
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When The Da Vinci Code came out, it quickly became a best seller. It was also featured in the news because it dealt with fringe religious topics and secret societies, like the Free Masons. But it was also like a lot of best sellers, it seems like you heard a lot more people talking about it than actually reading it. For me and my family, it wasn’t a high priority or a big focus.
Then one Sunday, one of our priests got in the pulpit and completely blasted the book and all the ideas in it. Now if his goal was to keep people from wanting to read it, this was a grave mistake. What it did instead was pique my dad’s interest enough to immediately procure a copy of The Da Vinci Code and start the book, even though he had no plans to read it before.
When he finished, I asked my dad what he thought. He said it was a fun triller, a good “beach read” if you will, but that was it. He didn’t go off and become a Mason. It didn’t change his beliefs. It simply offered the entertainment of story.
In the world today, we see so many people who fear that if you read or watch the wrong thing, it will impact you, who you are, and what you believe. We see this on all sides of every major argument. It feeds into a lot of the distrust we see fomenting around the entire globe.
Yet the premise of this notion that being exposed to new ideas will inherently change you is false. We see that in experiences like my dad had with The Da Vinci Code. We see it too in the truth the Gospel presents us with today.
It is there that Jesus tells us “Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”
It is here that Jesus lists various sins, misdeeds that hurt others in this world, deeds that we can all agree are wrong.
It’s not what we consume that defiles us. It is what we do with it that lessens us, that makes us less whole.
We’re called to look at our actions, and this is the place that James takes us to today. The letter reminds us to look at what we are doing. The letter reminds us that our deeds have an impact. The letter tells us that “If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their own tongues but deceive their hearts, their religions is worthless.”
Then James reminds us that “Religion that is pure and undefined before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress.”
In other words, the Epistle of James is pointing us to the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”, as Jesus tells us. Another way to say this is through the Two Great Commandments, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind. And love your neighbor as yourself.” These statement aren’t even original to Jesus but words first received by us in Torah.
Now we will inevitably mess us. Life teaches us this. We struggle to do what is right always. Experience teaches us this. The actions of others visited upon us do have a lasting impact on us. Psychology teaches us. We’ve been learning to through the past month by witnessing the actions of David and Solomon and how they impacted the Nation of Israel in the centuries that followed after them.
Ultimately, we cannot save ourselves. Only the sole perfect person can do that for us: Jesus Christ our Lord.
But we can try. As Paul tells us in Philippians, we can strive forward to the goal to make it our own just as Christ Jesus made us His own.
In other words, we can try to do better. We can try to be better. We can try to do God’s Will in this world. We can try to remember it’s not what comes from the outside that defiles us, but our own actions. We can try to remember that Jesus has changed us through the forgiveness of our sins and live a life that shows others that they can have the hope of that change too. We can try to help others come to know our Lord Jesus Christ through our love and care for them.
Trying to do God’s Will in this world starts with ourselves. Are we ready to accept our responsibility? Even though only Jesus saves us, we can still try make the effort to be better for Him. We can try to remember that our Lord has forgiven us and paved a way to a better life, one that we hope all others can come to share with us. This is our hope and our call: to help people see the light God is shining in this world through our love and our actions so that others might come to our Lord and receive the very same forgiveness we too once received.