In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

“For freedom Christ set us free.”

 What does to be free mean? Usually, freedom is identified with free will. Freedom is an expression of our autonomy and independence. You are free if you do whatever you want. You are free if no one determines your choices. You are free if you are not under of any kind of authority.

Today’s Gospel shows Jesus deciding resolutely to journey to Jerusalem. He wants to accomplish the Father´s will. He is going to Jerusalem to give his own life as a gesture of love for his Father and for us.

To be free means to choose what is good, which is really the accomplishment of our lives. This means to follow what truly allows us to be ourselves.

Freedom is the tremendous capacity we have of choosing. God respects our freedom. He does not impose his will on us. In today’s Gospel, we see that the Samaritans did not want to receive Jesus in their village. Many man and women reject Jesus’ journey toward Jerusalem, his journey toward glorification. They do not accept that God is a man walking a path with the cross as His destiny. The Samaritans rejected Jesus. Jesus respected their choice. He gave them time to reconsider. Unlike Jesus, John and James immediately wanted to call down fire from heaven to consume them. For us human beings, it is hard to respect the freedom of others. We tend to anticipate the Last Judgment.

Jesus wants us to be free people. When he says “follow me,” He is saying “be free with me.”

Jesus invites three people to follow him. They all say “yes…but.” The first says that he wants to follow Jesus but is attached to what he has. He is a slave of his possessions. Jesus tells him: “Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.” The second one says that he has a relative to bury. He is a slave of death. Fear of death prevents many people from being free: “Let the dead bury their dead.” The third one is attached to his family. Here we can see how affection for people can be a source of slavery: “No one who sets a hand to the plow and looks to what was left behind is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Jesus identifies possessions, death and affections as the main obstacles to our freedom. Jesus reveals himself in the Gospel as the One who wants to deliver us from everything that enslaves us.

If we want to be free, we need to join Jesus on his journey toward Jerusalem, on his path to the Father. We need to imitate him in the giving of his life. Jesus wants to bring everything back to the Father. He wants to connect all of us with the One who gives us freedom.

If we want to be free, we need to follow Jesus, we need to follow him where he is present now. To be free, as Saint Paul says in the second reading, is “to live by the Spirit.” The Church exists to help us to be free. If we follow what the Church teaches us, if we follow the life of the Church, if we follow what the saints followed, each of us can create our own personal experience of freedom. We can find true freedom in the experience of communion. We cannot be free alone, by ourselves.

Jesus shows us that freedom is to follow Him to ultimate happiness. To be free is to live our lives in union with God, to let Him be the center of our lives. Saint Irenaeus, whose memorial we celebrated last Friday, used to say: “God's glory is in living men.” Glory of God is in people who are fully alive, fully free. He completes this thought as follows: “Full life for men is in the vision of God.” The vision of God is the source of our freedom.

“For freedom Christ set us free.”

Let us ask for the gift of being free. Let us ask for the grace of an open heart that is able to see God wherever he wants to show himself to us.