Doulos Meditation for July 12

Scripture: James 1:27 (#4 of 6)—Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Reflection: Today I am in a country that has many homeless and abused children. Some of them are on the streets begging rice from door to door. Childhood disease kills many of these children. Many of them do adult labor in rice fields or factories where they are paid barely enough to eat a meal for that day. Some of these children were thrown out by their families—others have had one or more parents to die. Some have left home because of alcoholism or drug abuse by parents.

UNICEF estimates there are 100 Million homeless children worldwide, most of them boys from age 10 to 14. Both boys and girls are exploited sexually, forced to do adult labor as slaves, deprived of education, religious training, and more than anything else—the love that only can be supplied by people who care. James, writing in our passage, thinks that caring is what Christians are about. He calls it "pure religion."