Slaves to Righteousness

St. John of Capistrano

Romans 6:12-18: A reminder that freedom does not equal license.  It seems that some of Paul's listeners, having heard that they were "free" from the law, believed that they no longer had to obey the law and could do whatever they wanted.  If Christ's grace alone is what saves, then what does it matter if we behave badly?  

Paul teaches that we have three choices: we can be bound to sin, we can be bound to the Law, or we can be bound to Christ's grace.  The Law offered a way out of bondage from sin, but the Law was impossible to follow, leaving us again in sin's snares.  Christ provided another Way out of bondage from sin, one that fulfilled the promise of the Law to free us from sin.  But we cannot be free of both the Law and of Christ's grace and expect to be free from the bondage of sin.  A Christian must choose.

Secular freedom rejects this choice.  It upholds autonomy and individualism.  You make your own rules; you "think for yourself"; you obey no one.  You are told that you can and should be both free from the Law and free from Christ's grace.  Christians, however, recognize that such freedom is not freedom.  It makes us slaves to sin.  The only true freedom is freedom in Christ.  And this freedom means obedience to God: it means following God's rules, thinking as God thinks.  

Yet what does "slavery to righteousness," bondage to Christ, mean?  We were not redeemed by Christ so that we could abandon God - although of course God in His goodness allows us to make that choice.  We were redeemed by Christ so that we could offer ourselves back to Him in gratitude for being "brought back to life."  

Medieval notions of chivalry understood this concept.  Read any Arthurian legend: when one knight rescues another, the rescued knight owes a debt of allegiance to the one who saved him.  To renege on that debt was an act of treachery, a grave offense.  We were rescued by Christ; we owe Him our allegiance.

Do we have any metaphors in our own culture for such loyalty?  Paul used the metaphor of slavery: no longer slaves to sin, but slaves to righteousness and obedience.  I am afraid I cannot think of any ways to "inculturate" such a notion into our own setting.  We live in a legalistic, bureaucratized society.  We do things because we are legally or contractually bound to do so, not out of a sense of moral obligation or duty.  We tend to do the bare minimum to fulfill the demands of our contracts, rather than offering our all.  A contractual society has its benefits, to be sure: it is more stable, more dependable, more predictable.  But it also tends not to make moral demands on its members.  It tends to require less.  

This requiring less is seen to serve the cause of freedom.  We do the bare minimum, so that we can be free to engage in our own pursuits independently of our obligations to others.  But, again, Christian freedom is antithetical to such notions.  Freedom is not to be found "independently."  Freedom is found in relationship - in fulfilling our obligations to others, in being bound to serving others.    

Paul reminds us that we are never truly free.  A promise of absolute freedom is a promise only Satan makes; when we accept that false promise, we fall into Satan's trap and away from the source of our life and joy.  We fall into alienation and atomization.  The freedom promised by God, like the freedom given to Adam and Eve, always requires obedience, because this freedom is predicated on love.  And love can only exist in dynamic relationship: when the wishes and needs of all parties are respected and fulfilled.

Our freedom in a fallen world is always hedged with snares.  The best way through is to follow the One who can lead us safely through.  Otherwise we will, inevitably, fall into sin's trap.