Freedom

Freedom means different things in different settings.  We live in a country where normally we are free to go and come as we desire.  With mandatory “stay at home” orders from our governor, our freedom to move about is limited in order to better care for one another in the face of the current pandemic.  We can get angry about losing our freedom, or we can find that suddenly we have a new-found freedom to do things that we normally don’t make time for.

Araminta Ross chose her free name, Harriet Tubman, separating herself from the time in her life when she was a “Tasked”, as Ta-Nehisi Coates describes enslaved persons in his novel, The Water Dancer.  She was committed to freeing as many of the “Tasked” as she could, stealing them out from under the noses of the “Quality”, those who felt they had the power to “own” another human being.  Harriet risked her life multiple times, returning again and again to Dorchester County, Maryland to collect more and more family members and neighbors, guiding them to freedom in Philadelphia.  They had to pass through fields, forests and marshy areas without being caught by slave catchers.

Blackwater Refuge, Dorchester County, MD

They risked everything to reach a place where they no longer lived as the “Tasked”, but could make their own decisions about where to go and what to do. I am inspired by the courage and commitment exhibited by those who insisted that people do not own people.  Period.  

Jesus talks about freedom too....freedom which comes from the truth.  His listeners didn’t think they needed freeing, but they were mistaken.  (See John 8:31-41).  We all need to be freed from something.  Perhaps it is a negative attitude, or self-importance, or self-deprecation, or fears, or being a slave to our calendars, or ..... We all need to listen for the truth.