Jesus Didn’t Die So You Could Just “Do Whatever Makes You Happy”

“Freedom is an extremely precious value, for which a high price must be paid. It requires generosity and readiness for sacrifice; it requires vigilance and courage in the face of internal and external forces that threaten it. … There is no freedom without sacrifice.”  St. Pope John Paul II

You remember those first few days after your parents left you standing alone in your dorm with nothing but a hammer and a long hug to conquer college. As the newly found freedom begins to set in, the realization dawns on you.

 “Oh wait, I can do whatever I want. I can buy whatever foods I want, sleep in as late as I want on Saturdays, and nobody is over my shoulder asking if my homework is done.” As far as you’re concerned, you’re just a few steps below God.

It doesn’t take long, maybe a month or so before you realize why your parents didn’t keep Nutella in the house (Catholic girl version of drugs haha). And why as a child bedtimes were so important, cause you’re falling asleep in class after the movie ended at 2 am, and now, how are you going to focus on your homework?

Culture equates freedom with no rules. But if that’s the case, why is the world more depressed than ever? Why is obesity at a high? Why are millions of babies losing their freedom before they even step foot outside of the womb? And yet, why are we still being told to “Live your own truth and do whatever makes you happy,” as if that hasn’t already failed our generation?

That version of freedom draws us into ourselves, making us our own Gods as we worship the things of this world and sin. Selfishness never leads to freedom. Thankfully, real freedom looks much different.

The False Freedom That’s Sold to Us

We all fall into false freedom throughout our lives, even if we don’t realize it. False freedom is a failure to choose true good, instead choosing what feels good in the moment. It avoids the truth and falls back on commitments made. In these instances, we are ruled by our feelings, by sin, and by peer pressure.

We, of course, first see this in Genesis. The CCC quotes in 397 and 398:

“Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart and, abusing his freedom, disobeyed God’s command. This is what man’s first sin consisted of. All subsequent sin would be disobedience toward God and lack of trust in his goodness.

In that sin man preferred himself to God and by that very act scorned him. He chose himself over and against God, against the requirements of his creaturely status and therefore against his own good. Constituted in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully “divinized” by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he wanted to “be like God”, but “without God, before God, and not in accordance with God”

As we are human, this false freedom gets us almost every day. Here are examples of things we are free to do, but in doing so, damage ourselves and our relationship with God. These things keep us in chains.

• Our phones- addiction to phones makes it very hard to choose the good. To any of my late-night scrollers, I know it’s hard. It traps you into ruined sleep and sometimes questionable content. You miss the opportunity to connect with others and spend extra time in prayer.
• Eating- how many times have you said you were trying to be healthy, then lacked the self-control to say no to that cookie? Or you got home from work, and you were so tired that you binged an entire box of Cheez-Its. While you’re free to do so, it actually feels like you’re not free to choose another option.
• Hookup culture and need for male attention- This is not meant to shame, as we’ve all made choices we wish we hadn’t. Truely I believe a lot of it comes from not fully knowing our worth and beauty in God’s eyes. When we forget that, it’s easy to look to men for validation, whether that’s through physical affection or just constantly thinking about the next guy. That longing for love is real, but if we’re not careful, it can start to consume our hearts and bodies, pulling us away from peace and trust in the Lord.

What the Church Says Freedom Really Is

The best way to explain this is to let the Church do the talking. This is what the CCC says on freedom:

1731 Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. By free will one shapes one’s own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed toward God, our beatitude.

1732 As long as freedom has not bound itself definitively to its ultimate good which is God, there is the possibility of choosing between good and evil, and thus of growing in perfection or of failing and sinning. This freedom characterizes properly human acts. It is the basis of praise or blame, merit or reproach.

1733 The more one does what is good, the freer one becomes. There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just. The choice to disobey and do evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to “the slavery of sin.”

1734 Freedom makes man responsible for his acts to the extent that they are voluntary. Progress in virtue, knowledge of the good, and ascesis enhance the mastery of the will over its acts.

If there are sins or struggles, we lack the freedom to choose the good in… literally no stress. That’s Jesus’s job. Give that to Him and keep on the path to heaven. You will fall off the horse so many times. dust yourself and get back on it. It’s worth it, I promise. When there is a sin I’m struggling with and I start to get frustrated, I always just remember what Paul says,

And again in 1st Galatians 5,

“For freedom Christ set us free; so stand firm and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.”

We will be completely free once we reach heaven, but as we continue to live, our goal is to get as close as the Lord allows us to having true freedom.