In the last two seasons of the Walking Dead we have seen the survivors at Alexandria, the Kingdom, and Hilltop trying to break free from Negan and the Saviors. After a virus wipes out civilization Negan formed a group called the Saviors to restore order to a chaotic world. He requires total obedience to him and forces the communities he conquers to provide him with the majority of the food they raise and the goods they scavenge. He forces compliance through great brutality that he sees is as tragic but lovingly necessary.
We live during a time when the culture believes that real freedom is having the ability to do anything you want any time you wish to do it. Murdering a developing baby in the womb is a choice. The culture demands that we all accept a different definition of marriage and now goes as far as to tell us a person has a right to choose for themselves what biological gender they wish to be. This isn’t true freedom. It is slavery to our passions. It is slavery just as much as the survivors on the Walking Dead are slaves to Negan.
Take smoking as an example. No one takes up smoking because it is the right thing to do. People take up smoking because it gives them pleasure. They get a high when they breathe in that nicotine rich smoke. But soon they become a slave to that pleasure. They become addicted, a slave to smoking. Eventually the cigarette dictates when they must go and have a smoke, when they must leave a party, a family event, their job. Those bound by the heaviest chains find it even difficult to travel if they can’t get their fix at the required intervals. This is slavery to a passion.
We as Catholics fast during Lent to strengthen our will power. The only real freedom any of us have is the ability to say no. Yes, sin is pleasurable. It can be as addicting as smoking. Having the ability to say no to that pleasure is liberating. Come, enjoy the freedom of having sex with someone desirable and cheat on your wife. NO! Come, enjoy the freedom of cheating your neighbor out of his goods. NO! Come and abort the baby growing within you so you can continue the freedom of a care free life. NO!
No is the only real freedom we have. The “Thou shall nots” in the Ten Commandments do not restrict freedoms. They make one more free. “Thou shall not commit adultery” does not take away your freedom from having sex with anyone you find desirable. It liberates you to be able to fully love your spouse and not be a slave to animalist desire. Let a river run free and many times it will be anorexic, shallow, and lacking. Restrict its flow and the river will team with life. God gives us restrictions so that we can have life and have it more abundantly.
Fasting is an exercise that increases our ability to say No. The more we fast the easier it is for us to liberate ourselves from the chains of slavery to self pleasure and sin. This liberation is never easy. Just ask a two pack a day smoker or the survivors in the Walking Dead. The more we can say no to ourselves the easier it becomes. The craving for a cigarette may never go away but the ability to get past the craving without falling slave to it becomes easier the more we do it. No should be one of the most important words we have at our disposal. Practice using it more.
