Monday, October 15, 2018

Freedom is not free!

Celebrating St. Teresa of Avila 

The Word and the Saint - October 15, 2018
Gal 4: 22-24,26,27,31 -5:1; Lk 11: 29-32


There is so much of craving for freedom in today's world but freedom understood in terms of doing what one likes. One is so attached to one's own wish and desire that it amounts actually to a slavery rather than freedom. The over dependence on the need of being affirmed and being recognised,  on the need to be respected and praised,  the need for the personal desires to be fulfilled make the generation today not only weak but also enslaved. 

Freedom, is not an all sweet gift. It was Jean Paul Sartre who made that provocative but profound statement, "we are condemned to be free". Freedom comes with the duty attached. We are free, free to choose and the responsibility of the choice is laid entirely upon us. It would be childish to clamour for freedom but shy away from responsibility. We are free children of God, declares Paul. With that comes the condition that we are to be held responsible for all the choices we make. Often speaking to the young, I raise a question: who decides I should be happy or not? And they, invariably all,refuse to answer, with a knotty smile on their faces! Yes, it is our choice, or rather our choices. The free choices we make amount to the consequence we face. 

St. Teresa has been a great inspiration down the centuries for many a girl or young woman, choosing God willingly and with all her heart! This choice made her different from the rest of the world. It is said she was a great reformer of Consecrated Life - in that time when the society hardly recognised women, there were no social networks like today and she was just a simple consecrated religious! She was able to achieve what she did, merely because of the absolute choice that she made for God and a life totally dedicated to God. That was her freedom at play! 

The Lord grants us the greatest gift of freedom, and leaves us with the responsibility for our choices. That is why, when we choose not to see the presence of God, when we choose not to find the moments of grace, when we choose not to realise the opportunities to do good, when we choose not to identify our brother or sister in the person next to us, we are choosing to rush towards a state that is so sad and so inhuman. We are free children of the promise (cf. Gal 4:22-24); yes we are given the great gift of freedom. But Freedom is not free; we have to pay for it with our personal responsibility!

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