Category: Personal

freedom and me

I have been thinking a lot about the idea of freedom. It is a difficult topic within our current religious context. But I wonder if people are not free where is responsibility for their actions?

Anyway, I read this today:

So freedom for the Christian is to choose Jesus Christ and to follow His ways. That is what freedom is. It is freedom for, it is not freedom from. It is freedom for God, freedom for good, freedom for choosing the right. And yes, we as Christians are free; we are free to choose the way of God.

via Freedom is to choose Jesus Christ and to follow His ways :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

I find the “for vs from” distinction helpful.

from the Journals

From the entry for August 1, 1835

Of what use would it be to me for truth to stand before me, cold and naked, not caring whether or not I acknowledged it, making me uneasy rather than trustingly receptive. I certainly do not deny that I still accept an imperative of knowledge and that through it men may be influenced, but then it must come alive in me, and this is what I now recognize as the most important of all.

…

Of what use would it be to me to discover a so-called objective truth, to work through the philosophical systems so that I could, if asked, make critical judgments about them, could point out the fallacies in each system; of what use would it be to me to be able to develop a theory of the state, getting details from various sources and combining them into a whole, and constructing a world I did not live in but merely held up for others to see; of what use would it be to me to be able to formulate the meaning of Christianity, to be able to explain many specific points — if it had no deeper meaning for me and for my life?

…

I shall now calmly attempt to look at myself and begin to initiate inner action; for only thus will I be able, like a child calling itself “I” in its first consciously undertaken act, be able to call myself “I” in a profounder sense.

via SAK Journals: I A