In that first reading, Prophet Isaiah talks about our free will.
We're reminded that if you choose, you can keep the commandments.
They will save you.
God has set before us fire and water.
To whichever you choose, stretch forth your hand.
Before us are life and death, good and evil.
Whichever we choose shall be given us.
And in the gospel, Jesus Christ raises the bar.
He says, you have heard the commandment, but I say to you.
The Old Testament commandment, but then Jesus raises the bar.
Not only does he raise the bar, though, but he gives us the pole to vault over the bar.
He gives us the grace of the sacraments.
So that idea of that point of free will, sometimes the world denies free will.
In a legal case, there was the Twinkie defense.
Some fellow had committed a crime.
He blamed it on having too much sugar in his blood.
He ate too many Twinkies.
People say caffeine made me do it.
They talk today about a gay gene.
Well, our heredity can predispose us towards certain sins, alcohol.
But we all have inclinations to one sin or the other.
But it doesn't deny our free will.
It doesn't take away.
There's many different acts of contrition we can make.
Lord, have mercy.
Oh, my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee.
I confess to Almighty God.
But there's one act of contrition that doesn't work.
And it's, hi, God, I have sinned, but I couldn't help it.
I had no choice.
That's not a good act of contrition.
It's a good act of contrition.
A contrition presupposes free will and responsibility.
If you choose to keep the commandments, you can keep them.
That's the message of the first reading.
Not only that, with the grace of the sacrament, you can go beyond the minimum.
You can reach the standard that Christ invites us to or leads us to in that gospel.
And the idea of free will sometimes is explained.
That if you have a bird in a cage, it's yours.
But if you open the cage and set it free, and it returns to you, then it's really yours.
If it doesn't, it really never was yours in the first place.
Animals don't have free will.
They can't transcend their instincts, their natural desires.
But human beings do.
We have this gift of charity that enables us to transcend.
Our natural desires, our natural inclinations.
And what is the nature of freedom?
Well, there's that story of the Lutheran theologian who was arrested by the Nazis.
He was taken into a prison camp, and the gates were locked behind him.
Then he was brought into one of the buildings, and the door was locked behind him.
Next, he was led down a long corridor by the guards and locked in a cell.
And then he put his hand into his pocket, pulled out his Bible, and said,
Now I am free.
Now I am free.
There's physical freedom, and then there's moral freedom.
Physical freedom is freedom of the body from constraint.
But moral freedom is freedom of the soul from sin.
Freedom to become all that God intends me to be.
Let me see.
And so, you know, we are called the land of the free, home of the brave.
But the land of the free cannot be enslaved to sin.
We have great physical freedom, but we need to use our freedom in the service of truth, in the service of God.
Sin is a misuse of freedom.
It's a, like they say, when is it?
When is a train most free?
A train is most free when it's on its tracks.
A train off its tracks is a train wreck.
And when is my will most free?
My will is most free when I'm on the track of truth.
See, my will is meant to be directed by my intellect, and the intellect is illumined by truth.
The object of the intellect is truth.
They say, one theologian says that,
that freedom divorced from truth is an unguided missile.
Freedom apart from truth, not guided by the truth, is dangerous.
You never know where it's going to land.
It's going to hurt somebody.
Okay?
But freedom is meant to be directed by the truth.
When are our wills most free?
Our wills are most free when they're on the track of truth.
That's when we can make the most progress toward God.
Like Saint John of the Cross says,
whether we're tied to the earth by a heavy chain or a tiny thread, we cannot fly to God.
So freedom, holiness, is that ability to fly toward God.
The saints were the most free.
The Blessed Virgin Mary was the most free of all the saints.
She was free from sin.
She was free to become all that God intended her to be.
Okay?
Freedom derailed from truth is a train wreck.
Some people in the world like think truth is the enemy of freedom.
But Saint Augustine's definition of holiness is truth wedded to freedom.
That's holiness.
Truth wedded to freedom.
And so like we say, some people think the church is trying
to destroy people's freedom, take away their freedom.
They think the magisterium is the only way to do that.
They think the church is the only way to do that.
They think the church is the only way to do that.
They think the church is the church's Gestapo, trying to take away freedom.
But the church is trying to make people more free, to become all that God intends them to be.
Free to become saints.
Saint Angela Marici says, God has given everyone liberty, and therefore he compels no one,
but only points the way.
God calls and persuades.
As Jesus Christ says,
The truth shall set you free.
The truth sets us free from our slavery to sin and to error.
In fact, Jesus Christ is the truth incarnate.
Truth is the invitation to heaven.
And the word became flesh, meaning the truth became flesh.
And our Lord gives us this personal invitation to heaven.
He became man to invite us, to lead us to that banquet of heaven.
St. Augustine has a prayer.
He says,
O Lord, you are the light of the minds that know you,
the life of the souls that love you,
the strength of the wills that serve you.
Help us so to know you that we may truly love you,
so to love you that we may fully serve you,
whose service is perfect freedom.
When we read the gospel, we make that little cross on our forehead, our lips, and our hearts.
And we make that little cross on our forehead, our lips, and our hearts.
And the truth of the gospel, we ask that it might be in our minds,
that we might know the truth.
More than that, we ask that we might speak the truth.
We might be prophets in the world.
But most of all, we ask that we might live the truth, love the truth, practice the truth.
When we know the truth, we become theologians.
When we speak the truth, we become prophets.
But when we live the truth, we become saints.
That's true.
That's true freedom.