Monday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time
(Galatians 4:22-24.26-27.32-5:1; Luke 11:29-32)
What is the freedom that St. Paul writes of in today’s first
reading? Is it merely the absence of
shackles? Paul has something greater in
mind than that since he says that Christ has freed us. The freedom here is to be the ability to
fulfill the Christian destiny of eternal life.
Christ won the possibility of achieving it by his incarnation and
paschal experience. Nevertheless, humans
must choose to run the course of freedom -- which is to say living justly -- every
day.
Some say that Christians are not free if out of necessity
they live justly. These people, however,
miss the point. When Christians live justly,
they know that they will achieve what is most valuable in life. They are at least as free as the super
gymnast who willingly trains six hours a day so that she can win a medal at the
Olympics.
Paul mentions the possibility of slipping back into
slavery. We could do this by abandoning
the challenge of righteous living. If we
slack off on our efforts to follow Christ, we will not fulfill our
destiny. We will lose the possibility of
eternal life like the athlete who suspends training forfeits her chance for a
medal. But the task is not as hard as it
sometimes feels. Christ remains with us
to help.
