{"id":2198,"date":"2017-07-04T15:00:20","date_gmt":"2017-07-04T19:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2198"},"modified":"2017-07-04T15:05:14","modified_gmt":"2017-07-04T19:05:14","slug":"the-fourth-of-july-and-our-faith","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/the-fourth-of-july-and-our-faith\/","title":{"rendered":"The Fourth of July and Our Faith"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Back on June 22nd<\/sup> I wrote<\/a> about St. John Fisher, St. Thomas More and the \u201cFortnight for Freedom.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 That \u201cFortnight for Freedom\u201d<\/a> began on June 21st<\/sup>.\u00a0 It ends today on July 4th<\/sup>, the day we, in the United States, celebrate our nation\u2019s independence.<\/p>\n

Freedom is an important concept.\u00a0 Freedom needs to be taken very seriously.\u00a0 Many might interpret this to mean I think it is important that we allow people to be free to choose to live their lives as they wish.\u00a0 That is not entirely true.\u00a0 I hope all would agree that one\u2019s freedom ends with harm is clearly caused to another.<\/p>\n

Freedom is something God gives us.\u00a0 God allows us to choose to do whatever we want.\u00a0 We call it \u201cfree will.\u201d\u00a0 The thing that we seem to forget is that with this freedom comes great responsibility.\u00a0 We are free to choose what we want but with our choices come consequences.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s first reading <\/a>tells of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.\u00a0 This is a familiar biblical story to many.\u00a0 The cities are destroyed for their sins.\u00a0 God had allowed them to choose their way in live and they had chosen sin.\u00a0 For these, they suffered the consequences.<\/p>\n

One might ask, \u201cIf God was going to destroy them for sinning, then why didn\u2019t He just not allow them to sin?\u201d\u00a0 That would mean taking away their free will.\u00a0 That, in turn, would mean taking away their ability to love.\u00a0 If we have no \u201cfree will\u201d then everything we do is by dictate.<\/p>\n

Do I think God is going to start destroying whole cities for their sins?\u00a0 No, but two points here.\u00a0 I wonder how much we destroy ourselves by the earthly consequences of our sins.\u00a0 Some think society is getting better with all the moral freedoms that are allowed today.\u00a0 I don\u2019t.\u00a0 I think society is getting worse.\u00a0 There are more broken families.\u00a0 There is great conflict in our government and between our people.\u00a0 There is more terrorism.<\/p>\n

Secondly, while God does not destroy cities in this world because of sin, at the time of our death, we will be judged for the way we live our lives.\u00a0 There is a Heaven and there is a Hell.\u00a0 Is God merciful?\u00a0 ABSOLUTELY!\u00a0 But we have to try and live good lives.\u00a0 We have to learn how it is that God calls us to live.\u00a0 We might fall short but then we count on God\u2019s mercy who knows the desires of our hearts.\u00a0 If we don\u2019t even try, then we must submit to the eternal judgment and accept that might bring eternal damnation in Hell.<\/p>\n

I started with the mention of our “Fortnight for Freedom”<\/a>.\u00a0 Those who advocate for the \u201cfreedoms\u201d that go against our faith think we should be forced (see my homily for June 25, 2017<\/a>) to provide procedures, medications, etc. that violate our faith.\u00a0 This is where it must stop.\u00a0 If they believe they should have the freedom to do what they want, shouldn\u2019t we have the same?\u00a0 How can they force us to go along with their \u2018beliefs\u2019?<\/p>\n

Seeing how society is going leaves me feeling down at times.\u00a0 Right now there is something going on that is giving me hope.\u00a0 It\u2019s called a \u201cConvocation of Catholic Leaders.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 It will end today in Florida.\u00a0 It was organized by our United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) <\/a>on the theme from Pope Francis\u2019 apostolic exhortation, The Joy of the Gospel<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0I have watched some of it on EWTN.\u00a0 Seeing the joy of faith in people\u2019s hearts.\u00a0 Hearing some of the bishops, archbishops, and cardinals speak from their hearts has helped to feel hope in my heart. \u00a0I thank all who had a hand in making this convocation possible.<\/p>\n

In today\u2019s gospel<\/a>, the disciples are in a boat with Jesus in a terrible storm and he calms the waters.\u00a0 We face a great storm today from the consequences of the choices that people have made with freedom.\u00a0 We must face this storm but Jesus is right here in the boat with us.<\/p>\n

Today is July 4th<\/sup>, the day we celebrate our independence as a nation.\u00a0 It is a day of freedom and I choose to use my freedom to follow God.<\/p>\n

Peace,<\/p>\n

Fr. Jeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back on June 22nd I wrote about St. John Fisher, St. Thomas More and the \u201cFortnight for Freedom.\u201d\u00a0 That \u201cFortnight for Freedom\u201d began on June 21st.\u00a0 It ends today on July 4th, the day we, in the United States, celebrate our nation\u2019s independence. Freedom is an important concept.\u00a0 Freedom needs to be taken very seriously.\u00a0 …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘The Fourth of July and Our Faith’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[9,10],"tags":[310,311,307],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-zs","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2198"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2198"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2198\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2203,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2198\/revisions\/2203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}