Big things and little

Abortion is a horrible sin. Bishops are right to emphasize it and to hold people to account on that issue.

Yet those who are on the right side on the abortion issue dare not consider themselves automatically righteous, just as those who share the Church’s “preferential option for the poor” cannot automatically consider themselves saintly.

Moreover, while political judgments are important, it is too easy to focus on matters of politics and public policy, especially in this political season, and neglect the ever-deeper examination of conscience we must make in our personal lives.

The words of our Lord in today’s Gospel (Matthew 23:23-26) warn us about neglecting any of our moral duties:

(You) have neglected the weightier things of the law:
judgment and mercy and fidelity.
But these you should have done,
without neglecting the others.

May we always ask the Lord for his grace, so that we may see the truth ever more clearly and live according to it ever more perfectly.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, be merciful to me – a sinner.