Abstract
The Heidelberg Catechism courageously mentions that Christians participate in the work of Christ as the eternal king. This means that, during their life on earth, Christians fight against sin “with a free conscience”. These words anticipate the call for human rights in the French Revolution. Although the Catechism uses the word “free” only at this point, the text shows the context in which we have to understand “freedom”. It instructs us that we have to understand the word not as a freedom “from” and, therefore, not as freedom only for myself, but as freedom “for” a life with others. The reason for this is that real freedom is founded in the gift of the divine liberator, who loves us only along with our neighbours. We are free in relation to God and our fellow human beings.
Highlights
The subject of my article is “Freedom in the sense of the Heidelberg Catechism”
The Christos in his exercise of the three offices, namely the chief Prophet and Teacher, the only High Priest, and the eternal King, who governs us by His Word and Spirit
According to the Catechism, this corresponds to the following, that “with a free conscience I may fight against sin and the devil in this life, and hereafter in eternity reign with Him over all creatures”
Summary
The above is by far not everything that the Catechism considers as “freedom”, even if it is expressed only indirectly. I will explain this by means of an example: “Freedom” has, according to Martin Luther King jr., quite another meaning than the same word at the same time in the mouth of the governor of Alabama, George Wallace, who fought resolutely for upholding segregation. In this instance, it meant the liberation from the unjust suppression, and there it meant a tolerance of the ruling situation, which resists such a liberation. The theologians support this by interpreting the biblical law of love as I will love only when I love at first myself
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