FREEDOM
by Norman Lowry
Our world cannot survive without a sense of meaning, in particular one that will lead us to the depths of love. —Unknown
Freedom is the highest of my basic needs. I need freedom more than I need to breathe or to survive. Where most seem to see freedom as being a prize at the end of some great and often violent struggle, I see freedom as being the end of life’s greatest struggle: it is wonder with God, humanity and creation, based in absolute nonviolence; an actual state of being untangled from violence.
Our world is bathed in violence. If we’re honest, mostly we’ve lived by the belief that, as great evil violence exists, great righteous violence is necessary to overcome it. I mean, someone has to protect us from predators and terrorists, right? And so we choose violence as our method.
Violence surely exists, and we tell ourselves that violence offends our sense of public morality. Yet how can this be? What morality, or what kind of morality, is really being offended? Maybe if we were concerned about actual harm done (to both the offended and the offender), we would have cause to believe that our choice of violence has anything to do with morality. Yet there are few for whom this seems to be the case.
Mostly when violence occurs we think of ourselves, as if our peace of mind were most important. We cry to change laws, asking others to give up their rights, that we might feel safer. We cry for the perceived offender to be stripped of rights and even of life itself, for the sake of our peace of mind. This is not an issue of morality, but of structure, and there is a vast difference.
By definition, morality implies virtue, according to principles of right and wrong. Structure regards the components of our lives and the manner in which they are arranged. If our concern were morality, violence would never be our option—even if and when a really bad person uses violence on or against us. But because we have convinced ourselves that violence is a necessary tool with which to thwart violence inflicted on us, we keep it in our toolbox, along with its ever-expanding arsenal of weaponry. Thus, violence is a chosen component of the very structure of our lives.
Two great and parallel societal problems regarding how we view and deal with violence lie in our religious and nationalistic dogma. Overwhelmingly, we seem to believe what some venerated expert tells us to believe. The stuff in my chosen religious book, the Bible, is way to weird, wonderful and important to allow some expert to tell me what it means, without me also doing my own homework. The same goes for what I believe about America. The God I know, love and serve (out of mutually-shared intimacy) is absolutely nonviolent—has never been violent, will never be violent, and has never asked or commanded anyone to be or do anything violent. America’s violences have never set anyone free and have never kept anyone free, period! Simply put, we do not employ or cosign violence until we have sacrificed our morality; our very humanity.
The nature of freedom, as a state of being untangled from violence, is simple: First, it is uncomplicated: as violence equals unforgiveness, nonviolence equals forgiveness. Second, it is unconfused: not a mixture of judgmentalism, fear and hostility, but all about intimacy in human relationships. Third, it is unbound: all entanglements in contention, discrimination and violence become nonexistent.
Freedom for me is wonder with God, humanity and creation, based in absolute nonviolence; an actual state of being untangled from violence.
8/24/16
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