REFLECTION ON FREEDOM BROUGHT TO US BY CHRIST

In Christ, we are freed. we gained our salvation and redemption. Christ is the representation of divine freedom. St. Proclus of Constantnople in his homily even noted that with Virgin Mary and most especially with Jesus, Eve's and Adam's

faults are taken away and forgiven, as such the fault of humanity is forgiven which is symbolically shown through baptism. In baptism, we are dead to sin and our past faults are taken away and we become a new and freed people. We are now called to live a new life, thus old things have passed away and we are drawn into the wonderful light of Christ's salvation. Remember always that old things belong to the old and we should not combine old things with new things otherwise there would be a complication and worst personality.
As a Christian, we receive the call to love even our enemy and that lies the difference between old life and new life. Also our life should be modeled on Christ since he is the high priest who takes cognizance of our human weakness. There is always an elongated struggle and conflict between our old self and our new self. The old self represents the carnality of one's living while the new self transcends to our spiritual communion with God. The old self cannot be happy to see a person transcends its jurisdiction and so it acts constantly on the real self (spiritual self) to draw it back. It is always the case that if one succumbs to the distractions from old self, then it will be dominant in one's life such that he forgets all about spiritual life. Such person will take glory always with mundane existence and his spiritual life will degenerate to religiosity-attending religious activities because of mundane pleasures( maybe for pretense, social pleasure and to fulfill a duty). In such moments, we degenerate to life of happiness through material things and from fleeting realities. New life is contrary to such mundane pleasure. it is manifested through love of God and love of our neighbor. Love according to its usage here signifies ability to sacrifice our life for God and for our neighbor without seeking reward or pay-back of any kind be it in kind or in cash. The underlying principle of christian morality is love. Reading through the scripture shows that other virtues and gifts affirm their existence in love without which our christian existence is regarded as false. (cf 1cor 13:1-13, James 2:14-26) Love is faith in action. The new life as Jesus preached began with love and culminated in love by sacrificing himself for our sake. New life consists in love because it is a driving force that aid us in acquiring other virtues. A pertinent question which is relevant in our modern time is "can humanity love?" Love is a divine and a transcendental reality and it is obvious that as long as we are in realm of finitude, the question of love becomes an illusion. This is clearly shown in the human language of love. In its analytical level, it is simply a mundane love which is an attraction to pleasurable situations. it may sound contradictory to talk about new life with an ungraspable supernatural reality which is love and as such some people may argue that new life which is characterized by love cannot be attained. We always participate in divine realities. Therefore, our human love is only a shadow of the divine love. Those who live by flesh does not participate fully in divine love because they have no grace in them. God can always bestow his grace of God which is realized through contemplation which is enough for us to have a share in the love of God. The character of grace-filled love (divine love) is the necessity to distinguish it with lust, selfishness, worldly passion and pretense. Hence new life (righteousness and perfection) has no partnership with old life(sin or imperfection). It is always of a pure and absolute calculation. It is either one or the other and not both the mixture of the two. In fact, not to identify ourself with one is dangerous, samely, to be in the realm of both righteousness and in sin is more suicidal and dangerous. The scripture explicated on this issue, thus "but because you are lukewarm, neither hot or cold, I am going to spit you out of my mouth (Rev 3.16). Thus Origen in his treatise on Prayer writes "we must understand this about the kingdom of God-as there is no partnership between righteousness and iniquity, no fellowship of light with darkness, no accord of Christ with Belial, so the kingdom of sin cannot co-exist with the kingdom of God. If we have God reign over us, then, sin must have not reign on our mortal body." What then can we say about the weakness and frailty of human nature in the sinful world? Even though we are in the world, we are not of the world. The world is characterized with certain "ages" which connotes negativity and which frequently exposes one into serious danger of sin. Just as the early Christian family seriously suffered persecution which is external in nature, the modern christian family is now suffering an internal persecution which is embedded in joining the evil society if one cannot beat them(world). The persecution is seriously embedded in the age which we find ourselves and it is a gradual process which tend to yield much result. The temptation of participating in action because it is legalized by conventional agreement by majority of people who are driven by Satan. it is always the case that Satan would send his agents to flock inside the world with the sole intention of deceiving and corrupting the world. Thus, we should always be conscious of evil-oriented and evil possessed people who tend to disrupt our virtues to follow the world's phenomenous characters. (cf mtt16:21-28, mk 8:31-9:1,lk 9:22-27, Revelation 1