James 1:26 If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is vain.
27 Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
“The word religion is extremely rare in the New Testament or the writings of the mystics. The reason is simple. Those attitudes and practices to which we give the collective name religion are themselves concerned with religion hardly at all. To be religious is to have one’s attention fixed on God and one’s neighbor in relation to God. Therefore, almost by definition, a religious man, or a man when he is being religious, is not thinking about religion; he hasn’t the time.