From Timothy Keller’s book “Making Sense of God” under the above title:
Modern freedom is a freedom of self-assertion. I am free if I do whatever I want. But defining freedom in this way—as the absence of constraint on choices—is unworkable because it is impossible. Think of how freedom actually works.
Imagine a man in his sixties who likes to eat whatever he wants to eat. He also loves to spend time with his grandchildren. Both of these activities are a part of what makes his daily life meaningful and satisfying. Then at his annual physical a doctor says to him, “Unless you severely restrict what you eat from now on, your heart problems will worsen and you will have a heart attack. You must completely stop eating all of your favorite foods.”
The modern definition of freedom is to do whatever we want. However, how does that definition work when your wants are in conflict with each other? He certainly does not want to be bed ridden or to die, in which case his freedom to be with his grandchildren and see them grow up is curtailed. But, of course, he also wants to eat his favorite foods, eating being a major source of comfort and good feeling. This is the complexity of real life. He can accept either the limits on his eating or the limits on his health. It is impossible that he will have freedom in both of these areas. There is, then, not just one thing called “freedom” that we either have or we don’t have. At the level of lived life there are numerous freedoms, and no one can have them all. This man will have to decide which freedom to sacrifice for the other, because he will not be able to have both. The choice should not be hard in this case. If he wants the freedom of sustained loving relationships, he will give up the freedom to eat what he wants.
The question is not, then: How can this man live in complete freedom? The proper question is: Which freedom is more important, the more truly liberating. Education and training is another obvious example. If you want the freedom that comes with having a good income, you need for years to sacrifice innumerable other freedoms of time and money in order to get the best education. You will not be able to live any way you like in school. For example, if you don’t say no to most impulses to go out and hang out with friends and party, you will not get a degree. In the same way, if you want the varied set of freedoms that come with being a top performer in athletics or the arts, you will need to accept enormous constraints on your life. You will cede much control over your daily life to a coach. You won’t even be able to choose where you live. ~Timothy Keller, Making Sense of God, (Penguin Random House, LLC New York, NY, 2016), 101-02 (continued)
(Posts with a preamble asterisk * are for a more general audience and nor specific to teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.)
