Homily: 14th Sunday in OT 2016 - Freedom

This 14^th Sunday in Ordinary Time coincides this year with our great National Holiday, the celebration of our Independence.  This gives us a chance to reflect a little bit on the fascinating theme of being American and being Catholic: being Catholic in the land of the free and home of the brave. And I’d like to focus particularly today on perhaps the most highly valued of American principles: freedom, liberty.

What is freedom?  In this country right now, there seems to be at least two understandings of freedom. The first, let’s call the “modern American notion of freedom” and the other let’s call the “Catholic understanding of freedom.” How do they differ? Can they be reconciled?

The modern American notion of freedom usually means the freedom of self-expression. American freedom is summed up in motto like “I gotta be free, I gotta be me” and “I do what I want”, "My body, my choice". American Freedom doesn’t want to be restrained by the past, past traditions, past moralities. Religious authorities are suspect of trying to control the masses with outdated morality.  

If this seems abstract, look at the famous Supreme Court decision of 1992, Casey vs. Planned Parenthood.  Trying to bolster the earlier judgment of Row vs. Wade, the justices, in their great hubris, claimed that “freedom” allows us to determine the meaning of one’s own life, existence, and the universe. In other words, according to the majority decision, a mother has the power to determine if the life inside her womb is human or not. This same line of thinking would allow a Nazi officer to redefine the life of his Jewish prisoner as sub-human. This flies in the face of 1000s of years of moral tradition. But even Dr. Seuss knows, “A life is a life, no matter how small.”

The idea that we have the freedom to make up our own truth, that self-expression trumps objective truth, is foreign to western civilization and our Judeo-Christian moral tradition.  No doubt, decisions like Row v. Wade and Casey vs. Planned Parenthood, have led to the unravelling of the moral fabric of our nation. 

Contrast the Supreme Court decisions with how St. Paul presents the notion of freedom. Last week, weheard: “It is for freedom, that Christ has set us free.” Freedom isn’t over against Christ, nor does Christ hinder, obstruct, or violate or freedom. Christ is the foundation for freedom.  Paul is saying, Christ has set us free from the slavery of sin and error.

On the other hand, consider what he says in his letter to the Romans. He introduces himself this way in the letter, he says, “I am Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus”.  A slave is someone, in the ordinary sense, whose freedom has been taken away.  But Paul is saying, that when we have surrendered all to Christ, then we are truly free. 

Freedom is not opposed to truth, true freedom is grounded in truth—and Christ is the Truth.  We become free when we live according to Christ.  A person who believes it is morally licit to murder his fellow man, a mother who believes it is right to murder her unborn child, a father who abandons his children and family, isn’t free: that’s the old slavery to error, slavery to the rule of death, which Christ died to liberate us from.  Rather, as Christians, we say, that you are truly free to the measure that you submit yourself to objective moral truth, to the teachings of Christ. In that submission to truth and true goodness, you find your true freedom.

And here is the point of congruence between American Freedom and Biblical or Catholic Freedom. The biblical notion of freedom is the foundation on which this country is built.  As the biblical notion of freedom is undermined in our great land, our nations’ foundation cracks, and the whole edifice is threatened.

Come back with me to a stuffy, Philadelphia boarding house in the sweltering summer of 1776, where a young Virginia lawyer is composing a rather important document.  In the opening paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights”.  Familiar words, hopefully, powerful words, moving words. 

Freedom comes from where? The government, the courts, the individual mind? No! Freedom comes from the Creator.  And our fundamental human equality comes from the fact that we are each created by God.  We may not be equal in intelligence, skill, courage, morality, or excellence, but our fundamental equality is deeper, and so our freedom comes from a deeper place.  The freedom to choose the good, to seek out the truth, this freedom comes from God.  Jefferson may not have been a Catholic, but in this instance, his notion of freedom is totally congruent to our Catholic understanding.

 Contrast that to the totalitarianism of the last century.  Nazism, communism, in denying that all men have the right to life and liberty were able to run rough-shod over millions of people.  When freedom is divorced from morality, destruction follows.  Saint John Paul II, who championed the defeat of Communism wrote: “freedom negates and destroys itself, and becomes a factor leading to the destruction of others, when it no longer recognizes and respects its essential link with the truth.”

So how do we protect and defend freedom? First we must conform our minds and hearts to the truth of Christ in all things.  He must be the foundation of our lives.  We must read his Word, study his teaching, put his way of life into practice.  Every home should have a Bible and a Catholic Catechism, and both books should be worn out by our constant use of them.  Truth is not an obstacle to personal fulfillment, but it’s greatest servant. We must spend more time with God’s word than Netflix.

When the Bill of Rights was ratified, religious freedom had the distinction of being the First Amendment. Religious liberty is indeed the first liberty. The First Amendment guarantees that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Yet over and over again, this first right is undermined.

So, we must demand that our civil leaders and legislators are men and women who share our Catholic values.  Politicians and laws which ignore the principles of natural ethics and yield to ephemeral cultural and moral trends work against our national survival.  Politicians who stand with organizations opposing religious freedom need to be voted out of office.

Honestly, I think the constant stream of Netflix and video games and professional sports and all of this entertainment, with which we are bombarded, can be so dangerous because if we are busy binging on Netflix, we aren’t worried that our fundamental freedoms our being violated and taken away, we aren’t keeping our politicians honest. 

So as our nation celebrates our independence, let us each commit to being stewards of that freedom, committing to the work and prayer that is needed to protect our freedom from its enemies, that we may all work together for the building up of the kingdom of God for the glory of God and salvation of souls.