Faith Forum: Freedom is there for those who choose it

By mark and cindy dunagan

The Beaverton Valley Times, Jul 19, 2010

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I write this article on the eve of our country’s 234th birthday, the anniversary of the declared independence of this blessed nation of liberty and justice for all, an occasion that for you and me brings to mind our precious liberty.

Having recently toured the Washington County Jail and spending a couple days job shadowing a few employees there, I found it sobering to see the newly arrested as they arrived during what may be the worst chapter of their lives. It’s a somber moment to witness the quite necessary removal of a good part of an arrestee’s freedom.

Since our national naivete of the ’60s, I think we now have a more mature understanding of the subject than when popular culture sang about what they called “freedom” at the same time crime rates soared to nine times the rate of the ’50s, in part thanks to Harvard psychologist Timothy Leary’s encouraging the use of LSD as a “mind-opening” drug.

Turns out John Milton was instead right when he said, “None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom but license.” That license cost some of my favorite musicians and countless others of that era life itself.

One lesson we learned: “Freedom is not the right to do as you please, but the liberty to do as you ought.” Have you witnessed that as I have?

Blessings, big and small, seem the richest in the lives of those who have “done what they ought.” The parallel between self-control and living the good life long term is undeniable. Had we only heeded FDR when he said, “Freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.” – true not only for nations, but also each individual within a nation.

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