Saturday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time

Lectionary: 478

Now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus
has freed you from the law of sin and death.

In his Letter to the Galatians, Saint Paul famously says, “For freedom Christ set you free!” With that and the above statement from Romans Saint Paul sets freedom as the foundation and goal of our way of life.

In a recent interview, Pope Francis is quoted as saying,

“Everyone has his own idea of good and evil and must choose to follow the good and fight evil as he conceives them. That would be enough to make the world a better place."

In this statement, the Holy Father echoes our traditional respect for the conscience of every person. While all human beings have the duty to form their conscience with the disciplines of prayer and contemplation, and to inform the conscience with study of ethical issues and Church teaching, we don’t believe anyone should be forced to do something contrary to their conscience.

Because divine wisdom is given through human experience in the course of Revelation History, we respect the right of individuals to make critical decisions by their own conscience. But we insist no one should fly off into an orbit of solipsistic self-regard. We are all in this together; we influence and are influenced by one another. As Confucius said, “He who counsels himself counsels a fool.”

The freedom Saint Paul advocates is a heavy burden of responsibility. Adam cannot blame Eve for the decision he made. He must acknowledge his own foolish, ill-advised decision with its consequences of remorse, resentment and shame. Our personal preferences are an excellent guide to knowing right and wrong if they are influenced by the spirit of God.

Our true freedom is obedience to God. This is the paradox at the heart of Saint Paul’s teaching. To choose other than God’s will is to drape a noose around your neck and kick the chair out from under you.

It’s good to remember this teaching as we set out on the road to freedom, “There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” God presents himself to us with enormous benevolence. His smile penetrates the darkest corners of our shaded hearts and suspicious minds. He is not and never was the enemy. He has proven his love for us in the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus, and in the Glad Spirit that fell upon us at Pentecost.