Loving God = True Freedom



The freedom to do evil.
“Liberty, in the eyes of the world, is freedom to disobey as well as to obey, freedom to do evil as well as to do good… Liberty in the eyes of the world is the power to choose between good and evil, between duty and selfish whims, between obedience and revolt. It is the power to say with Satan: “I will not obey.” One might as well claim that reason is the faculty for knowing what is false as well as what is true.
What is Godly Liberty?
The freedom to do good.
“True liberty, according to the saints, is not freedom to disobey but only to obey; it is not freedom to do evil, but only freedom to do good. Now this liberty of goodness is supreme in Jesus.”
– Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange (p. 174, ‘Our Saviour and His Love for Us’)
How Do We Gain True Freedom?
Charity.
‘He that loveth not, knoweth not God: for God is charity.’ (1 Jn. 4:8) ‘And you shall know the truth [if you love], and the truth shall make you free.’ (Jn. 8:32)
“This doctrine also teaches us that the more we love God, as Our Lord and the saints do, the freer we shall be with respect to all created goods to dominate the attraction of worldly goods and not to fear the threats of the impious. The martyrs have demonstrated the power of Christian liberty, which endures all kinds of torture rather than be unfaithful to God, and which is more concerned with union to God than with union to the body.”
– Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange (p. 181, ‘Our Saviour and His Love for Us’)
“Mercy is, accordingly, pronounced to anyone who repents of his sins and resolves to sin no more, for My Spirit shall inspire him to perform good works. Whoever freely desires to be separated from the vanities of this world is made more fervent by my Spirit. The person who is even ready to die for me will be so inflamed by my Spirit thathe will be wholly in me and I in him.”
– Jesus to St. Bridget of Sweden
What is the Greatest Slavery?
Sin.
Sin, in the words of St. Alphonsus, is the “chain of Hell.” Need more be said?
What is the Price of Our Freedom?
Jesus.
“I willed to be captured so that the captive might be set free; I willed to be bound so that the sinner might be unchained; by My constancy in remaining on the Cross, I made all inconstancy constant, and all weakness strong.”
– Jesus to St. Bridget of Sweden
How Can We Best Use Our Freedom?
Charity.
“To serve God is to reign.” We created by Love and for Love. Nothing else can truly satisfy. Created things are for us, not we for them. Let us use them wisely, remembering that “… spiritual goods can belong at the same time and in plenitude to all and to each; and they unite us the more in the measure that we seek them. Thus, each one of us can live by the same truth, by the same virtue, by the same God, by the same Christ our Saviour.
Every Christian should ultimately be able to say, as did St. Paul: “To me, to live is Christ.”
– Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange (p. 9, ‘Our Saviour and His Love for Us’)
‘For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus in good works, which God hath prepared that we should walk in them.’
– Ephesians 2:10

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