22ND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME Readings: Deut 4:1–2, 6–8; Jas 1:17–18, 21–22, 27; Mk 7:1–8, 14–15, 21–23 The major theme running through all of today’s readings is that of religion and life, of faith and morality. Although it is a distortion to attempt, as some occasionally do, to reduce biblical teaching to an ethical program, concrete moral practice is of the essence of the religion of both the New and the Old Testaments. As much as God’s covenant is an act of grace, the response