II. Human Freedom in the
Economy of Salvation
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Freedom and sin. Man's freedom is limited and fallible. In fact, man failed. He
freely sinned. By refusing God's plan of love, he deceived himself and became a
slave to sin. This first alienation engendered a multitude of others. From its
outset, human history attests the wretchedness and oppression born of the human
heart in consequence of the abuse of freedom.
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Threats to freedom. the exercise of freedom does not imply a right to say or do
everything. It is false to maintain that man, "the subject of this
freedom," is "an individual who is fully self-sufficient and whose
finality is the satisfaction of his own interests in the enjoyment of earthly
goods."33 Moreover, the economic, social, political, and cultural
conditions that are needed for a just exercise of freedom are too often
disregarded or violated. Such situations of blindness and injustice injure the
moral life and involve the strong as well as the weak in the temptation to sin
against charity. By deviating from the moral law man violates his own freedom,
becomes imprisoned within himself, disrupts neighborly fellowship, and rebels
against divine truth.
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Liberation and salvation. By his glorious Cross Christ has won salvation for
all men. He redeemed them from the sin that held them in bondage. "For
freedom Christ has set us free."34 In him we have communion with
the "truth that makes us free."35 The Holy Spirit has been
given to us and, as the Apostle teaches, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is,
there is freedom."36 Already we glory in the "liberty of the
children of God."37
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Freedom and grace. the grace of Christ is not in the slightest way a rival of
our freedom when this freedom accords with the sense of the true and the good
that God has put in the human heart. On the contrary, as Christian experience
attests especially in prayer, the more docile we are to the promptings of
grace, the more we grow in inner freedom and confidence during trials, such as
those we face in the pressures and constraints of the outer world. By the working
of grace the Holy Spirit educates us in spiritual freedom in order to make us
free collaborators in his work in the Church and in the world:
Almighty and merciful God,
in your goodness take away
from us all that is harmful,
so that, made ready both in
mind and body,
we may freely accomplish your
will.38
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