“The Lord is Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is,
there is freedom” (2 Cor. 3:17). And this is said of you … in the sense that You are our spirit and our life.
Are you truly the Spirit of freedom in my life, or are you
not rather the God of law? …. Your laws, which you yourself have given us, are
not chains – your commands are commands of freedom. In their austere and
inexorable simplicity they set us free from our own dull narrowness, from the
drag of our pitiful, cowardly concupiscence. They awaken in us the freedom of
loving you.
But, Lord, what of the commandments imposed upon us by men,
issued in your name? Let me tell you quite frankly what rumbles through my
heart when the spirit of criticism and discontent is upon me, O God of freedom and
of sincere, open speech, I can tell you with confidence – you listen
indulgently to such things.
…. You have established rulers of this world, both temporal
and spiritual, and sometimes it seems to me that they have diligently set about
patching up all the holes that your spirit of freedom had torn in the fence of
rules and regulations by His liberating Pentecostal storm.
First there are the 2414 paragraphs of the Church’s
law-book. … how many “response” to
inquiries have been added to bring joy to the hearts of the jurists! And then
there are several thousand liturgical decrees clamoring for our attention. … In
order to praise you in the Breviary … I need a road map, a directorium so intricate and elaborate it requires a new edition
every year!
…. I don’t mean to accuse them, Lord, these wise and
faithful servants whom you have placed over your household. Rather I must say
to their praise that they are not vulnerable to the reproach which your son
once made against the Scribes and Pharisees who sat upon the chair of Moses.
Unlike those rulers and teachers of old, your modern stewards have imposed
heavy burdens not only on others, but on themselves too.
… Lord, your household of the laity has only your sweet yoke
and your light burden to carry, belief in your Word, your own commandment that
frees us unto love, and the burden of your grace flowing from the sacraments.
And if this yoke weighs heavy upon us, then it’s only because we’re weak and
our hearts are evil, so that we should actually complain against ourselves and
not against your yoke. The burden … is mainly our burden, the burden of your
priests, which we have actually picked up and set upon our own shoulders.
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