Freedom

Freedom. This word is so loosely used today and we see so many people being misguided to believe that freedom is about oneself. You probably are wondering how can this word be misused, it’s pretty straightforward? Freedom has been watered down to be understood as having the complete right to do what you want without being restricted by any other factor or individual. Today, freedom is seen as having complete liberty to do as you wish whenever you wish to do it, and more often than not, with complete disregard for the consequences of our actions. However, freedom is not a right, it is a choice. True freedom, the freedom which we were given when God created each of us, is the ability to choose to do what is right and seek to do it out of love.

Dissecting this word requires we understand first how society views freedom to better understand the difference between the concept of freedom and what it really means. As a basic definition, and what most people view freedom as, freedom is “ the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.” The keywords here are “as one wants.” This implies that how we speak, act, live, and believe must be done out of self-gratification. But self-gratification does not create a virtuous individual. Self-gratification does not create loving individuals that put others before themselves. Self-gratification does not bring true happiness and joy to one's life. Self-gratification does not foster love towards our neighbors, family, friends, and God. Self-gratification only brings short-term pleasure and a lifetime of uncertainty and emptiness. So if this is the concept of what society views freedom as, then what is true freedom? True freedom, “ refers to the capacity to affirm and love the good, which is the object of one’s free will, without being enslaved by disordered passions or by sin.” Now that is deep, but let us dive further into this meaning to understand just how true freedom works.

First, it is important to note that God created us to be completely free. He wanted humanity to love him, but he wanted a pure and honest love, not one that is forced. To do so, he gave man the power to choose, he gave man free will. Only by allowing mankind to use his free will would mankind be able to love God completely free and out of one's own desire. Ask yourself this, would you rather be loved by someone who desires to love you because they want to or to be loved by someone who you are forcing to love you? We would all want authentic love. This is what God wants too, he wants to have an authentic love with us, which is why he gave us our free will. When he created Adam and Eve, he gave them total freedom to love and obey him. But they chose not to love him just for a moment because they put themselves first and ate from the forbidden fruit. That small act, those few short minutes of choosing their own desires and wants over God’s command and love was enough to condemn the race of humanity to inherit original sin. Our free will is the solid foundation for freedom, because without the freedom to choose using your own free will to make a decision and act on it, then there would be no true freedom at all.

Now, how does someone know how to choose to do what is right? God has gifted us with reasoning and understanding so that we may be able to discern between what is right and wrong. God gave us a conscience so that we may be able to understand the true meaning of a situation and have the ability to think through and choose what is right, healthy, safe, and just. But that does not mean God gave us the ability to know the answer to everything and know exactly what is right and wrong. He gave us reasoning and understanding so that guided by our free will we would seek to learn and form our own conscience to understand what is morally right. There are other tools he gave us to help us understand right from wrong, like the ten commandments. However, we should be above the level of the ten commandments and should be able to reason situations with the help of our virtues. It is not only critical that we form our conscience correctly but our responsibility. We need a properly formed conscience and a proper understanding of right vs wrong. This takes a lifetime of learning and one thing we need to seek is to educate our knowledge of truth. Going back to what Christ said, “Seek the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” If we teach ourselves to always find the truth behind anything, we will find good, and also we will be doing good. God gave us the tools, but it is up to us to actually use them.

This isn’t always easy because we are human and because we have our own desires and passions that tempt us to seek things that we like but are not always good for us, and that are also not morally right. If we choose to just believe, act, and think a certain way out of preference or desire, we miss the opportunity to understand the truth. The truth being what is God’s will, what is morally right, what is good, and what is filled with an authentic love for others. When we choose to not understand the truth about others and the truth about a situation or problem, we are choosing to only see what we want to see and what we want to hear. We are choosing to ignore the truth and what is good. This mentality will only enslave us to our passions and addictions which will bring loneliness and emptiness into our lives. Only listening and believing what we like will bring about a life that is filled with bad things and habits, it will not allow us to become virtuous. But when we choose to understand the true meaning behind something we allow ourselves to become wiser, prudent, just, and humble. When we choose to understand others we allow ourselves to become individuals who are sympathetic, understanding, patient, respectful, and kind. When we seek to understand and reason we grow wiser in making decisions that are good and are therefore capable of freedom of choice.

So God gave us our free will, reasoning, and understanding, all of which make us human. But he gave us this so that we may choose to love him and choose to do what is good. But with the freedom of choice comes the ability to choose incorrectly. We live in a world that is full of choices and sometimes too many choices. Society wants to give you as many choices as possible to make you feel free. But having more choices isn’t always a good thing. Having more choices doesn’t make you free. In fact, having more choices can put pressure on you to choose something that isn’t good. Those numerous choices can also be misrepresented or “watered down” to seem like a choice isn’t that bad or even warped to be seen as something that is good when in fact it’s bad. We see this so much today as freedom is being tied to so many different social and political issues. It’s funny how so many agendas claim they are only promoting freedom, when in fact they are applying so much pressure for others to follow and have justified something that is wrong to be seen as right. So many of the choices that are promoted are actually wrong mentalities, ways of living, and ideologies, but because they are wrapped in a pretty bow and are “in the name of freedom,” many fall victim to the lies and end up making mistakes in their lives.

The great thing about making mistakes is that we can learn from them and can grow. God knows we are human and that we make mistakes. That doesn’t change the fact he loves us and that doesn’t change the fact that we are still free even when we do something wrong. The great thing about our freedom is we can choose to right our wrongs. We can choose to change our way of living and thinking. We can choose to leave addictions, unhealthy passions, and bad habits behind us. We can choose to do better and to mature as individuals. We can choose to ignore the lies others want us to believe and choose to not follow those who claim they are right when in fact they are wrong. We can choose to not succumb to pressure and follow the trends. We can choose to be good and do good, and to go against the current. We are free to choose.

Freedom doesn’t mean you can do whatever you want. Freedom is being at liberty to understand the truth and what is good, while being able to act in a manner that is good, pure, and just, and seeks to only bring good into the world. If more people understood the true meaning and power that comes with true freedom, then we would have a world that is filled with virtuous people who spread authentic love towards others, themselves, and God. If as a society we could choose this freedom and put aside our selfishness, passions, and misunderstanding, then we would be capable of creating the society we were once destined to inherit. The fall of man was due to choosing to do something that was wrong, willingly using their freedom to do what was wrong. But God threw us a rope, he gave us his son Jesus Christ to save us. But he still left us with much work to do on our own. Yes, Jesus came to save us, but he did so by teaching us how we must live our lives and earn our eternal life. He taught us how to use our freedom to choose what is right and good. The salvation of man is not just Christ’s sacrifice, it is also man choosing to do what Jesus taught us to do; to love God and do his will. Our salvation lies in choosing to love God and to love God we must choose to do what is good. Only then will we be truly free. As St. John Paul II once said so perfectly, “ Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” When we choose to do what we are supposed to do, we allow ourselves to be entirely free allowing our lives to be filled with authentic peace, joy, and love.