“I’m free, to do what I want, any old time!” insisted the Rolling Stones. Their song reflects how many people today understand freedom: It’s about doing whatever we want, whenever we want to.
Jesus, on the other hand, spoke in today’s gospel of a freedom not to do as we please, but the freedom to do what is pleasing to God; a freedom that involves not just the right to make choices, but the freedom to choose what is right; a freedom not from discipline but dependent on discipline; a freedom that doesn’t give us a license to sin, but a freedom that liberates us from sin; a freedom not just to “be you and me,” but a freedom to become all we were meant to be.
This freedom is rooted in a knowledge of the truth- a truth that is not just a body of knowledge, but a truth who is a person, Jesus Christ our Lord. What Jesus is saying to us today, then, is that if we follow him and live as he taught, we will truly be free- free from sin, free from unhappiness, free to love, free from fear, free to be his brothers and sisters, free to be sons and daughters of God.
Readings for today’s Mass: http://www.usccb.org/nab/041311.shtml
Photo Credit: tim geers via Creative Commons