The whole issue of freedom becomes very important in this circumstance because it sheds some light on all of those stupid things that we did in our earlier lives, The compulsion I had to radically position myself against a loved one and so create barriers, gaps, and distances. How petty and small this seems right now. And yet, how does one refrain from doing these same silly things earlier in one's life?

Of course, what is at stake is freedom. And by definition, adolescence, late adolescence, or, as with me, very late adolescence is not free. Thus, there seems to be an almost weird necessity in doing all of those things that are so often, or can be, destructive. These destructive actions are not free and, often enough, they are not freeing. It just does not play out this way.

And we would very much like to say, "I wish that that had not happened," but, it happened. This is all that I want to say about the death-watch experience, an experience that is so enormously important in human life. There is nothing like it, and it raises the question of freedom in the most radical fashion; that is, that "above everything else, I should have been free for you, [or] I wish I had been free for you as I wish you had been free for me".

As a transitional comment, I was thinking of the Hindu doctrine of the various stages of life and how psychologically, apt these stages of being are. For example, one is supposed to be a soldier, and then a merchant, and then finally a sage at the end of the four stages. Psychologically, this makes all kinds of sense because we have to struggle through those battles of freeing ourselves. However, these battles are never assured of success. I think that we all come to that next stage in the process as casualties, of having negotiated so ineptly the movement to (what I am sure the Hindu's have in mind) greater and greater freedom.

Finally, the main point in both the first and third readings, although it is not explicitly stated, is the freedom to seek Jesus. This is evident in Luke when a potential follower says, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father," which means, "Let me go home and hang around until the old man is dead and then I will show up." And later, when another would-be follower says, "I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home". This is temporizing. There is an inhibition in these situations; there is some sort of impediment to the free following of this man whom we reluctantly acknowledge ad supremely human, supremely free. Hence we, like these would-be followers, say, "I have other business to attend to first". And of course, this is connected to the essence of freedom. When Jesus says, "Follow me," -however this might work out in one's life," we understand that the decision to do this makes sense. And we even know that, in following him, everything else will fall into place.

As a statement of his freedom, Jesus can say that is, that "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head" and "...look at the lilies of the field, look at the sparrows...and no one falls without God being aware". This is freedom; to lie the totally God-ward life. It is the freedom whereby one does not let their business, or becoming a success, or getting their BA, getting married take first place. How often we feel we must first become settled in life in order to start praying and to "get religion". (This is where the age aspect of this discussion comes into play because now I can look back at my earlier life and acknowledge my foolishness.)

So, I do not know exactly where this places us. However, I do know that "For freedom Christ has set us free," free, above all, to respond to each other. This is the beginning, the middle, and the end of the law, rather than all of the intermediate measures that we insist are so vital to our lives. They are not. And this is why the death-watch is so useful, because the proper order of things comes through with an absolute, piercing clarity, and nothing else counts.

An epilogue. I had to go back to my home town where my mother lives: Taylorville, Illinois, population 8,000-9,000. And, as I walked through the streets, reflecting on my earlier life, I gazed at my old elementary and high schools. And I had this regret because growing up in Taylorville, especially in the years immediately following the Depression, signified very limited expectations. I never thought that I would earn a PhD in my life, least of all have two PhD's in a family out of the three children (my younger sister has a PhD), because Taylorville seemed to make life little, and cause smaller expectations. But what dawned on me during my visit to Taylorville was the presence of my mother's little life. My mother's life is a little life in the sense that most peoples' lives are little. How many Bill Gates' are there? Probably one too many in the world. What life is little? What are the stakes? Where is the real drama? My little German, hausfrau Mother raising three children, tending after a husband, grocery shopping, endless laundry, house cleaning...It dawned on me that all these can be the elements of the drama of greatness. We who live bedazzled by the disease of celebrity are perhaps the greatest slaves of all. That is, that unless I can be, or continue to operate as a Bill Gates wannabe, etc., I never look around and see where I should be free to respond to the world that is right here, just as these men in The Gospel of Luke discovered that they must shed their former lives in order to follow Jesus.

I am sorry that this has been somewhat dishevelled, but I think that there is a kind of coherence here. We are talking about where freedom is played out, what freedom consists of, what shape does it have, what coloration? I hope that we can extract something useful out of this discussion on freedom and that you and I can continue to think and pray over all of this.