True freedom
Part 6: Three-fold harmony
What might this freedom entail?
I think the essence of it is finding harmony between desires, actions and conscience.
If I have desires to do actions but I don’t do them, I have tension and unfulfillment, and so am not free. This is so on both the negative and positive. Perhaps I have a desire to do something that is wrong, but manage to overcome this temptation. I have done the right thing, but am not truly free because I won’t allow myself to do something that I would like to do. If I give in to the temptation, I have now done what I want to do, but at the same time I didn’t want to do it because I disapprove of that action, and so I am not free because I was not able to live up to the values I believe in. Similarly, if there is some good thing I would like to do, but don’t do, because I am afraid or lazy, then I have failed to find true freedom. If I could find complete correlation between my desires and my actions, then I would be truly free – provided, of course, that both desires and actions are in harmony with my conscience. For one (false but tempting) solution to the human dilemma of temptation – and which I suggested is one which atheist society can easily fall into – is to “solve” the tension between desires and actions by making compromises and giving yourself permission to do things even though you feel they are not really right. However, if you could eliminate the tension between desires and actions by only ever doing what you truly desire to do – and IF you could match those to what your conscience tells you is good and right and proper to do, then you would have true freedom, because you would always be doing what you want to do, and what you want to do would always be what you approve of. We must truly desire the good, and act accordingly.
Now, we should note, that the atheist could do this too. If the atheist could attain harmony between all three elements, and IF their conscience could be completely attuned to what is completely good, then they would also have true freedom. And they would have simply demonstrated that they don’t need God, and it is fully possible for humanity to attain perfect goodness by themselves. All I would say, is that we have noted the difficulties in this that arise through human frailty and corruption. And, even if it was possible for humanity to achieve perfect goodness independently of God, the atheist is still missing out on the relationship with God that the believer discovers as a reality. I think that – theoretically – it must be possible for humanity to know – and perhaps do – the perfect good without God, but in practice this is not going to happen. Of course, believers do not attain to perfect goodness either, but they, at least, acknowledge their failure and constantly aspire to follow God’s way, whereas the atheist was desiring complete freedom from God precisely in order to do what they want rather than what God wants, and to do so while still claiming a clear conscience, or by ignoring their conscience – which implies a difference between God’s moral code and humanity’s moral code – in which case, experience suggests to me that we should go with God.
On reflection, it seems an impossibly simple solution to suggest that true freedom lies in the harmony between desires, actions and conscience. Yet we instantly recognise that this is the agenda for an entire spiritual life, to continually work and battle and strive to tune your own will to God’s will, to direct your actions always in tune with love and justice, to train your mind and heart to desire what is good and pure and lovely. And more than simply train your mind, but to grow and develop your heart and mind and body until you dwell gently and peacefully in the love, truth and grace of God. So, the whole life of faith for the individual, and the mission of the society of God’s people, is all encompassed within this three-fold harmony of desires, actions and conscience.
Spiritual Devotion 