Inner freedom is to de-clutch the mind and abide in the stillness. God desires inner freedom for us to grow in self-knowledge and to live out of that, which means, to let go of what does not help us and to love God and love others.
Inner freedom is more about learning to develop a healthy and harmonious relationship with the variety of emotional states one is likely to occupy over the course of one’s lifetime and to respond open-heartedly to God’s invitation to be joyful and to live each moment to the fullest.
Isaiah 43 1:7 says, “You are precious to me.”
God gave us life because He loves us and wants us to experience peace and freedom. The goal of our life is to live in communion with God forever. Today, man is so much involved with the materialistic world. As a result, he experiences anxiety, restlessness, troubles, stress and confusion and tries to seek solutions to his problems in the external world, i.e. in the circumstances, situations, events or people that he/she encounters that may not come from God.
Choices we make:
The Lord has given us the gift of freedom and the ability to make choices but many a times we have chosen wrongly and selfishly. The choices we have made have not helped to further our growth personally. We are often found wasting our time thus hampering our growth because we are not free internally. Our choices have been influenced by external agents like the media and our environment.
1 Peter 2:16 says: “Live as people who are free, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but live as servants of God.”
At times we have not been true to our inner freedom and convictions but have succumbed to worldly values and goals. We get worried about what others would think of us. In this way, we have shown that we are not internally free but saddled by external pressures. This is not how we as Catholics must be.
It is necessary to make ourselves free and liberate ourselves with God’s grace. We have to ask the Lord to fill us with the gift of the Holy Spirit in order to experience calmness and peace within ourselves. One should have the courage to respond with an open heart to God’s invitation to follow Him more closely and dearly. Our minds should be enlightened so we can choose virtue and reject evil. We should respond generously to the distressed and downtrodden with whom we come in contact with
We have to ask the Lord to embolden us, to be His true disciples – truly free and bring about peace, justice and compassion to all those who are in need.
The Son sets you free:
John 8:36 says: “So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
When we are free, we then experience freedom to love, freedom for service and freedom to be in an intimate relationship and dialogue with God who leads each of us towards LIFE. God desires inner freedom for us. The main key for inner freedom is forgiveness which can free oneself from the shackles of one’s past, from pain, hurt and resentment. Forgiveness is the road to inner freedom.
During this month of October, let us ask Mother Mary to help us strive hard to experience freedom in mind by following the promptings of the Holy Spirit; to actively work for peace, justice and compassion and to respond generously to those in need thereby discovering what God is asking of us.
We need to ask God for the grace to experience real freedom as we journey on to face difficult moments and thereby give glory to the Creator. True freedom is something that happens in the core of our being, in our heart or soul, and when we reach this level, we need to recognize God’s hand in our lives and give Him the victory that is His due.
By Francisca F. da Costa