Text: We are used to thinking of freedom as an event that we experience. Nations celebrate the day of their ‘independence’ from foreign rule; those wrongly accused, celebrate a conviction that has been overturned, teenagers ‘coming of age’ celebrate the dawn of their new-found freedom. While these are no doubt milestones we may lose sight of the fact that the milestone though important, is not the journey. Two survivors of the holocaust were celebrating their release at the end of World War II. One had a sense of gratitude and with it an uncommon sense of forgiveness. The other in a reaction, asked him how he could put behind him the atrocities, pain and suffering he had endured. The remembrance of them, in fact made him bitter even as he walked into freedom. Revenge and retribution were very much in his mind. The friend insightfully observed that though he was outwardly free, he was still in that prison. Celebrating freedom can often become a mere ritual.
Spiritual traditions have at their heart the concept of ‘liberation’. Yet, ironically adherents of various religious hues use it as a pretext to enslave others. The enslavement takes various forms. Religion if not properly understood can become an obstacle on our journey to inner freedom. The word ‘religion’ itself derives from the Latin religare meaning ‘to link’. It signifies the outward manifestation of an inner attitude, the expression of our being “linked” to the divine which we have experienced deep at the centre of our being. Rituals, it would seem are an indispensable part of religion and are often identified with it. They serve a useful purpose as a pedagogical tool and are meant precisely to keep alive the initial experience from which they emerged. They are also a useful way of connecting to the original experience of the divine. The experience precedes the ritual. It is worth noting that the ritual is devoid of any meaning once it is separated from the experience. The genuine ritual is ever self-effacing. It is not magical. It is most effective when one learns to “pay attention” to the reality that it signifies. It is the door to contemplation.
Our spiritual experiences grow deeper in proportion to our experience of being loved and being able to love in return. The progressive and in the end complete loss of self in the act of Self- giving enables us to connect with the divine for whom the whole of creation is just the outpouring of the Divine self. Truly, in God “we live, move and have our being”. In love there is no room for fear. One of the characteristics of a genuine spiritual experience is therefore the absence of fear.
The experience of fear is so necessary for ‘self-preservation’. At the physical level it enables us to ward off dangers and minimise threats to life. Yet, we often continue to experience fear long after the threat has disappeared and sometimes even when there is no threat at all. When this happens there has been a subtle shift in the origin of our fear. It is the ego that is struggling to preserve itself. At the physiological level it manifests itself in stress. It is not surprising therefore, that meditation techniques are prescribed as the antidote to stress. Unpredictability engenders stress and it is so easy for one to use the ‘predictable’ ritual to soothe the pain of the wounded ego. But the ego is not easily deceived. At this point religion parts ways with spirituality. Religion degenerates into magic. A spirituality based on such a religion is nothing more than a caricature. Meditation on the other hand as the art of learning to “pay attention”, becomes the link between the ritual and the spi-ritual.
In a New Testament scripture text that is familiar to most Christians, St. Paul describes love, among other things as ‘never quick to take offence’ and ‘keeping no score of wrong-doing’. Love gives one the freedom not to see another’s transgression as a personal offence. That knocks the stuffing out of the other’s aggression – real or imagined. There is no room for fear because no threat has been perceived. One can then love in freedom. It is the practice of meditation that enables us to slowly begin progressively functioning not from our ‘ego’ but from our true Self. The true Self is God and God is LOVE.
When Religion is based on true spirituality, we are able to understand that differences need not cause divisions. Returning to our contemplative traditions and meditative practices is the surest way to eschew violence in the name of religion. It allows us to restore the original purpose of the ritual which is to enable us to connect us to the experience of God within us. We need no other security other than the awareness that we are in God and God is in us. The benchmark of inner freedom is most surely the increasing ability to be free to love and forgive.
-Christopher Mendonca