My Lord and my God. I firmly believe that you are here that you see me that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask pardon for my sins and the grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, St. Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel intercede for me.
These days, freedom is very much in the air. In part because of this time of summer that we are celebrating, whether it be Canada Day North of the border, or the Fourth of July in the United States. As you may recall, the current prelate of Opus Dei, Msgr. Fernando Ocáriz, wrote at length about freedom in a letter dated January 9, 2018, in which he reminds us of important insights from the writings of St. Josemaria.
During this meditation, we will weave a number of considerations from that letter into our conversation with the Lord. St. Josemaria once said to us, “I will never tire of repeating that one of the clearest characteristics of the spirit of Opus Dei is its love for freedom and for the need to understand others.” And considering our freedom, it is of the utmost importance to get the starting point, right. Freedom rightly understood is a gift from God, Our Creator.
Opus Dei prelate writes, “Unfortunately, in many circles, there is great ignorance about what freedom really is. Often an illusory freedom, without limits is aspired to, as though it were the ultimate goal of progress. This form of freedom sooner or later, reveals its emptiness.” Pope Francis wrote, “Some people think they are free, if they can avoid God. They fail to see that they remain existentially orphaned, helpless, and homeless. They cease being pilgrims, and they become Drifters.”
Those words of the Holy Father get right to the root of the problem. When he says, existentially orphaned, homeless, he is pointing to the fact that freedom does come from Our Father, God. That if we do not recognize that fact, we do become existentially orphaned, and homeless.
Some time ago, Pope Benedict XVI in his work, Jesus of Nazareth, said the following, “Man's real sin, his deepest temptation, is hubris. That is, the arrogant presumption of autonomy that leads man to put on the airs of divinity, to claim to be his own God, in order to possess life totally, and to draw from it, every last drop of what it has to offer. Man's true peril consists in the temptation to ostentatious self sufficiency.”
We shudder to think of the possible power of this presumption of autonomy. Interestingly, a well-known jurist in the United States referred to this vision of autonomy and in fact articulated this vision of personal autonomy and radical individualism back in 1992, when he wrote the following, “At the heart of liberty is the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.”
Those are strong words. Those are really defiant words. on the part of a creature, the right to define one's own concept of existence, of meaning of the universe of the mystery of human life.
Someone commentating on those words, recently came to the conclusion that what it comes down to is, with that vision, we are all nomads, who walk around with our own individual opinions about existence, meaning, and the universe. Each person is a self-created, choosing individual, pursuing individual desires. As we said earlier, it is crucial to get the starting point, right.
The fact of the matter is that we are not self-created, but rather, we are creatures of a loving Creator. We do not dare to attribute to ourselves, the so called right to define our own concept of existence. Because God has given that to us. Going back to that very beautiful letter of Monsignor Ocáriz, he says, “To discover the deepest meaning of freedom, we have to contemplate Jesus. He shows us that freedom is essentially exercised by giving of ourselves.”
He quotes St. Josemaria who said, “We are amazed to see the freedom of a God who, out of pure love, decides to abase himself by taking on flesh like ours. This is the path for us to grow in freedom, by embracing the reality, that we are children of God.”
Again, St. Josemaria, “Anyone who does not realize that he or she is a child of God, is unaware of the deepest truth about themselves. Such a person is unaware of who he is, and lives in conflict with himself. How liberating it is, then, to know that God loves us. How liberating is God's pardon that allows us to return to ourselves and to our true home.”
When we pardon others, we also experience this liberation. It can help us to identify the enemy. That is the chief obstacles that hinder us from achieving this ultimate freedom. We need to have a clearer idea of the bonds that we have to break in order to attain that freedom, that glorious freedom of the children of God.
We have to be on the lookout for what someone referred to as spasms of egotism that can tie us up in knots. Self-centeredness takes us in the wrong direction. If freedom is ultimately giving of ourselves, egotism, is ultimately collapsing in on ourselves. And in the final analysis, is a kind of slavery. Egotism is shown in being overly susceptible.
You may have come across that great book by Dietrich von Hildebrand, The Transformation in Christ. Talking about over susceptibility, he says, referring to someone like that, “Every now and then they feel slighted, offended, treated with disregard or at any rate unkindly.” People who are stuck with that, over sensitivity are always on the lookout for slights inflicted upon them. They are crushed under a heavy burden. They are continually moving in a circle around their own ego.
A major chapter in pursuing freedom and avoiding the enemy of freedom has to do with forgiveness, dissolving any grudges that we may have. Grudges make us unfree. There is a very short very powerful book by Jacques Philippe called Interior Freedom. At one point in that book, he explains that when we have a grudge we are actually bonded to the other person, we're not free, and there's nothing worse than being unfree, which is why we have to take whatever steps are necessary to dissolve that grudge; to forgive.
A long time ago at the end of the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln was meeting with his cabinet to talk about how they should deal with the southern leaders, leaders of the Southern Army. And, in the midst of those debates, Abraham Lincoln, very characteristically said to his cabinet, That reminds me of a story. By then they were used to this, so they rolled their eyes and sat back to listen to his story.
Lincoln said, A man had a few days to live, he was told he should make his peace with his enemies. The man he hated the most was a fellow named Brown in the next village. So Brown was sent for, and the sick man began to say in a voice as meek as Moses, that he wanted to die at peace with all his fellow creatures, and he hoped that he and brown could shake hands, and bury all their enmity.
The scene was becoming too pathetic for Brown, who had to wipe the gathering tears from his eyes. After a parting that would have softened the heart of a grindstone, Brown reached the door, when suddenly the sick man rose up on his elbow, and called out to him. But see here Brown, if I should happen to get well, that old grudge stands.
Let us ask the Lord right now, to bring to our mind any kind of grudge that still may be inhabiting our heart, to ask him to dissolve it with the warmth of His grace, so that we can really and truly be free.
Resentment inhibits freedom. Someone wrote recently, that resentment is part of an evil triad, arrogance, deceit, and resentment. And nothing causes more harm than this underworld. This underworld triad: arrogance, deceit, and resentment. Our freedom can be inhibited by being overly concerned about the opinion of others.
For example, we could end up saying things just to please others, rather than to convey what we really think. We could end up thinking that we need to conform with the way others think, speak, and the way others dress; and that could inhibit our freedom.
As one observer of the human condition put it, that anxiety for the new which by the afternoon has made decrepit that which was invented in the morning. It is good for us to recognize that fashion, whether it be clothing, or customs or whatever, they can be fun, but we cannot let them rule us.
Another form of slavery, of a lack of freedom is comparing ourselves to others. So much of our freedom comes from the knowledge, the conviction, that we are God's beloved children. And with that comes this conviction that God has given to each one of us very specific, unique qualities. Along with those qualities, come our own limitations, our own foibles but that God loves each one of us as we are, and he loves to see us struggling to become better.
It is especially important for us to help the younger ones to recognize the trap of comparing themselves. How many teenagers and young adults can tie themselves up in knots by looking at their friends on Instagram or other means of social communication and think that they, the onlookers, these friends of ours are inferior. We have to show them how to burst that bubble.
Then there is that very obvious source of a lack of freedom known as self-indulgence. You probably know that the style of Dietrich von Hildebrand can at times be difficult, but it is rewarding. In his book, Transformation in Christ, he says the following, which is tough but important:
“Another mainspring of unfreedom lies in the various forms of self-indulgence and inordinate attachment to this or that pleasure or urge gratification. In one case, food and drink are the object of that excessive and tyrannical attachment. In another it is sleep, and a further one smoking. Again, it may be certain kinds of entertainment, or certain comforts. Any one of these pleasures made by becoming so indispensable, that missing it makes us preoccupied and restless that it names our inner freedom with this form of unfreedom, we are all familiar indeed, to free us from these inordinate attachments is an elementary task of the ascetical struggle.”
I apologize for such a long quote from von Hildebrand. But it is helpful let's face it. We could be unfree if we allow ourselves to be bullied by public opinion. It's important to regard public opinion with a healthy distrust. As we look at world events, consider different opinions, we have to have this determination to form our own opinion based on careful study, careful reflection, rather than being told what to think.
During these final minutes of our meditation, let us shift our attention back to the goal. That is, how to turbocharge this glorious freedom of the children of God. Once again, we call upon the prelate of Opus Dei, his letter of January 9, 2018. He says, “Giving love to God and to others is the most proper act of freedom. Giving love to God and to others. Love fulfills freedom. Love redeems freedom. Love enables freedom to discover its origin and goal in God's love.”
As Saint Josemaria wrote in Friends of God, “Freedom finds its true meaning when it is put to the service of the truth that redeems; when it is spent in seeking God's infinite love which liberates us from all forms of slavery.”
At the end of St. John's Gospel, we read these words of Jesus to St. Peter, “Do you love me?” We hear the Lord looking at each one of us and asking the same thing. The Christian life is a free response, imbued with initiative and availability to this question of the Lord. Therefore, as Monsignor Ocáriz writes, “It is utterly false to oppose freedom and self-surrender. Because self-surrender is a consequence of freedom.”
When a mother sacrifices herself, for love of her children, she has made a choice. And the more she loves, the greater will be her freedom. If her love is great, her freedom will bear much fruit. Her children's good derives from her blessed freedom which presupposes self-surrender and from her blessed self-surrender, which is precisely freedom.
Obviously, these are very dense thoughts. Kinds of thoughts that require us to go back to that letter of January 2018 and go over and over that, that reasoning process in order to make it our own.
A fitting way for us to finish this time of prayer will be to consider an episode that took place at the very dawn of the United States of America. As you probably know, one of the architects of the American form of government was John Adams, a lawyer from Braintree, Massachusetts. Well, after independence, the Continental Congress appointed John Adams to be the first ambassador of the United States to Paris.
But it is easy to imagine John Adams being airlifted, so to speak, from Braintree, Massachusetts or from Philadelphia, to 18th century France. John Adams was overwhelmed by the experience. And as a result of that, he wrote back home to his son, 17-year-old John Quincy Adams. He said, “Son, you have to come over. The experience here will be fantastic for you. It will open your horizons; it will be very important for your development.”
Well, John Quincy Adams was not at all charmed by the thought of spending three weeks on a boat. He much preferred to get things ready to go off to the university. And so, he was ready to miss an extraordinary opportunity. Fortunately, John Quincy Adams had a very special mother, a woman by the name of Abigail. Abigail watched her son getting ready to miss this fantastic opportunity. So, Abigail sat down and she wrote the following extraordinary letter.
“These are the times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still come of life, or the repose of a specific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities, called out great virtues. When a mind is raised and animated by scenes that engaged the heart, then those qualities that would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life, and form the character of the hero and the statesman.” She then turned to her son and said, Get over there, right now.
Well, John Quincy Adams, went on to be the President of the United States, as did his father. We ask the Lord to give us that very same greatness of heart, the same spirit of freedom, the same love for our country, and to keep very much in our mind, these heroes of ours.
We conclude by turning to Our Lady, speaking of our heroes, our heroines. We ask our mother, Mary, to obtain from her Son, from her Spouse, from her father God, many, many graces for our country.
I thank you my God for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me in this meditation. I ask your help in putting them into effect. My Immaculate Mother, St. Joseph my father and lord, my guardian angel intercede for me