Freedom

 

In the year 1916, the New York City harbor was busy with boats and ships arriving and departing, carrying cargo and passengers from many lands and places, both near and far. One of those steamships sailing into the harbor brought a young woman named Ellen Burke; to most people was known as Nellie, but to me, she was Nan. Nan stood on the deck of the boat and saw for the first time in person the colossus known as lady liberty with her torch, offering a beacon of light and light to guide people to their destination. Nan knew she was home. Nan was a single woman aged 20, barely literate. Nan's skills included; harvesting peat from the bogs, slopping the hogs, along with sowing and growing vegetables. Nan was traveling alone, and her only relation in this new country was a distant cousin, whom Nan had never met (remember, by Irish standards, anyone less than 5th cousins is considered close family). Like so many other people from around the world, Nan came seeking a better chance; people came seeking something they could not find elsewhere; they came seeking the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

The rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is a familiar phrase penned by Thomas Jefferson in 1776 as part of the preamble to the Declaration of Independence, which we celebrate the signing of today. In 1883 an author named Emma Lazarus, who had been born in New York, wrote a poem "The New Colossus" about the statue of liberty, and in 1903 the last lines of the poem were engraved on a plaque and mounted on the pedestal of Lady Liberty. They read, "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me; I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" This seems like a discrepancy, a contradiction, a paradox, the great American experiment offering people a new life of liberty, and who gets invited but the tired, the poor, and the wretched. It seems a little extreme but let us remember it was Christ who offered a new life, a life of freedom in fulfillment of the Old Testament. Who did Jesus call but sinners, those in need of a doctor, the outcasts, and the tax collectors, he called the poor in spirit, and he called those who morn and the meek. Christ called those who have been persecuted. It is life in Christ that gives us true freedom.

In the Gospel of John, we hear, "If you remain in my word and are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free" also, "if a son frees you, then you will truly be free." What is this freedom Jesus Christ gives us? Freedom from death, sin, and death came into this world because of one man; Christ has defeated death and is himself the redemption for our sins; freedom to be close to God, freedom to be children of God, freedom to enjoy every spiritual blessing and grace, the freedom to have a better life, the freedom to choose the right. We have indeed been given much.

In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve plucked and ate a piece of fruit from the forbidden tree, after they had eaten the fruit their eyes were opened and they knew good and evil. You cannot know good without knowing evil, you cannot know light unless you know the darkness. You cannot be free without restrictions; as Christians, we have the freedom to choose the right path, and we have the freedom to choose the good and avoid what is evil. As in baseball, that great American pass time, the teams can't play if there is no foul line, and in the case of our hometown Red Sox, the big green monster, the players need to know where they should and should not hit the baseball too. The general idea is to choose the good and hit the baseball into the right place, run the baseline and make it home safely, and isn't that the goal not only of everyone here but of every Christian; follow the light of Christ and make it home safely. 

Photograph by Brother Brian. Meditation by Brother Stephen.