Surprised by freedom

Last night I was talking to a religious in another order. He was talking about his current assignment - one he would never have imagined or chosen for himself - and how much he has been surprised by joy in the past year or so. Joy is indeed something which can surprise us - even when we might be expecting it, such as on a wedding day, or when making our vows. And indeed, I can still remember being utterly filled, every fibre of my being suffused, with pure, God-given, completely astounding joy on the day I made my first vows, more than twenty-six years ago.

And today it is twenty years since I professed my perpetual vows; twenty years since this radiant, shining photo was taken. It was a day for joy, yes; but I can especially remember being surprised by freedom. Shortly after making my vows, after binding myself irrevocably and forever, I just felt so completely, utterly, and amazingly free!

There are paradoxes which lie at the heart of our lives, and of the choices we make. A friend who is an enclosed religious, only leaving her monastery occasionally, and for specific reasons, once wrote to me about the paradox of enclosure - that being 'confined', as it were, can open the heart well beyond the monastery walls. And there is certainly a paradox in finding liberation through being bound by vows! Even if I could say I was being liberated from old ways, I was still pledging and binding myself to something else - although the fact that it was to Someone else, the Source of all joys and graces, probably made all the difference. 

But as I write these words I am startlingly reminded that liberation and delivery derive from the same root. Delivery was originally about being rescued, or set free from bondage, and only later came to acquire its more modern sense of handing over. And thus it was that in the handing over, the yielding, the delivery of myself, I came to know - even if only for a few intense minutes - true liberation!

Twenty years on, I know that there is still much that I withhold, much that I do not hand over... and therefore much that prevents me from being truly, gloriously, amazingly free. As I begin a new decade of vowed commitment and mission, I pray that God may grant me that grace, and surprise me with both freedom and transformation...