22nd Sunday of Ordinary Time
Reflection: Try to find your deepest desires
By SISTER MARY McGLONE
A cartoon I saw recently depicted a woman saying, “My desire to remain well-informed is currently at odds with my desire to remain sane.”
Her sentiment may be shared by many today who find it hard to deal with all that’s happening in politics, AI, wars, climate, and on and on.
Desire. It can sound like a dangerous word. While our puritanical culture often hears it with sexual connotations, St. Ignatius of Loyola made the discovery of our deepest desires a key part of his Spiritual Exercises. That’s also what Jesus was talking about when he reproached the Pharisees for performing ritual practices that maintained an aloof avoidance of involvement with their hearts.
Today’s readings each touch the theme of the heart.
First, Moses tells the people to hear what he has to say so that they might remain close to God. As they are about to enter into the Promised Land, he reminds them that God alone is the source of all that they have and are. Recognizing that is what will make them a wise people, as Isaiah will say, a light to the nations.
The books of Exodus and Deuteronomy give us diverse renditions of the law of Moses. This indicates that, in spite of what today’s text seems to say about changing nothing, the essence of the law is not in regulations but in the relationships the law fosters among the people and between them and their God.
The people who seek to know and follow God’s will are the ones who will be “wise and intelligent.” As today’s psalm says, they think the truth in their heart, which means that their intellect and emotions will lead them to the reverence that expresses an appreciation of the meaning of law, far beyond the letter.
St. James develops Moses’ idea as he encourages his community to allow God’s word to continually bring them to life.
Their relationship with God begins with God’s initiative, like a seed planted within them. God planted the seed, now they need to cultivate it, rejecting the temptation to delude themselves by thinking that they know God when they don’t live as ambassadors of God’s love.
Interacting with his critics, Jesus dubbed them “hypocrites.” The word comes from Greek theater, where the actors masked themselves, pretending to be the character they were playing. That’s normal in a play. Jesus saw his critics play-acting, masking themselves with legalism and rituals rather than living faith in God.
The word religion connotes a relationship, a binding of one to another. The legalists had bound themselves to ideas, to particular practices rather than to God and neighbor. They put on a very good act, but their hearts were comfortably disengaged.
When Jesus went on to talk about what was truly impure, he mentioned not one single infringement of ritual laws. Instead, he gave his listeners a list of actions that harm others, behaviors that defile the perpetrator even as they denigrate others. He knew that it’s a lot easier to wash one’s hands or follow the rubrics than it is to live in reverence for all of God’s creation. He also demonstrated which of those two options brings joy.
Jesus minces no words in his reproach. He challenges all of us who hear him to stop deluding ourselves by accepting compliance with regulations as a substitute for the kind of relationship with God that frees us to act out of love and nothing else.
What does this say to the woman who sees herself trapped by seemingly mutually exclusive desires? St. Basil the Great taught that love for God cannot be taught any more than people need to be taught to enjoy the light or life. Rather, we are created with an interior longing for love and the source of love. When we are deeply aware, we know that love is our deepest desire.
Jesus didn’t convert many of his adversaries. Although he invited everyone to explore the depths and the meaning of their humanity, most didn’t take him up on it, and those who did were by and large outsiders: social outcasts and disciples rejected for having faith in him.
Finding and following our deepest desires will free us to follow the Lord, who was called insane and a lawbreaker — but was never accused of failing to love.
Reading I
(Deuteronomy 4: 1-2, 6-8)
Moses said to the people:
“Now, Israel, hear the statutes and decrees
which I am teaching you to observe,
that you may live, and may enter in and take possession of the land
which the LORD, the God of your fathers, is giving you.
In your observance of the commandments of the LORD, your God,
which I enjoin upon you,
you shall not add to what I command you nor subtract from it.
Observe them carefully,
for thus will you give evidence
of your wisdom and intelligence to the nations,
who will hear of all these statutes and say,
‘This great nation is truly a wise and intelligent people.’
For what great nation is there
that has gods so close to it as the LORD, our God, is to us
whenever we call upon him?
Or what great nation has statutes and decrees
that are as just as this whole law
which I am setting before you today?”
Responsorial Psalm
(Psalm 15: 2-5)
Reading II
(James 1: 17-18, 21b-22, 27)
Dearest brothers and sisters:
All good giving and every perfect gift is from above,
coming down from the Father of lights,
with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change.
He willed to give us birth by the word of truth
that we may be a kind of first fruits of his creatures.
Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you
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.
Gospel
(Mark 7: 1-8, 14-15, 21-23)
When the Pharisees with some scribes who had come from Jerusalem
gathered around Jesus,
they observed that some of his disciples ate their meals
with unclean, that is, unwashed, hands.
For the Pharisees and, in fact, all Jews,
do not eat without carefully washing their hands,
keeping the tradition of the elders.
And on coming from the marketplace
they do not eat without purifying themselves.
And there are many other things that they have traditionally observed,
the purification of cups and jugs and kettles and beds. —
So, the Pharisees and scribes questioned him,
“Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders
but instead eat a meal with unclean hands?”
He responded,
“Well did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites, as it is written:
This people honors me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me;
in vain do they worship me,
teaching as doctrines human precepts.
You disregard God’s commandment but cling to human tradition.”
He summoned the crowd again and said to them,
“Hear me, all of you, and understand.
Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person;
but the things that come out from within are what defile.
“From within people, from their hearts,
come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder,
adultery, greed, malice, deceit,
licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly.
All these evils come from within, and they defile.”