Ten Freedom Quotes

by CAPP-USA

Freedom quotes from the Church to help us understand and seek true freedom.

Quotes about Freedom from the Catholic Church

The Catholic Church teaches that true freedom is centered on choosing good so often that it becomes a habit and way of life.

She views freedom as a precious and integral aspect of human life that should be exercised in alignment with moral truth and the common good.

Here are ten quotes by about the indispensability of true freedom in our lives.

“Freedom is the fountainhead from which liberty…flows”. (Pope Leo XIII, 3)
“When human beings set themselves against God, they…do not become free, but alienated from themselves.” (Pope Benedict XVI)
“There is no true freedom except in the service of what is good and just. The choice to disobey and do evil is an abuse of freedom and leads to ‘the slavery of sin’.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1733)
“If it is not exercised well…freedom can lead us far away from God, it can cause us to lose the dignity that he has bestowed on us.” (Pope Francis)
“[A] corruption of the idea and the experience of freedom, conceived…as an autonomous power of self-affirmation, often against others, for one’s own selfish well-being.” (Pope St. John Paul II, 6)
We need “light and strength to direct [our] actions to good and to restrain them from evil. Without this, the freedom of our will would be our ruin”. (Pope Leo XIII, 7)
“In the name of freedom, there has to be a correlation between rights and duties, by which every person is called to assume responsibility for his or her choices”. (Pope Benedict XVI)
“Excessive intervention by the state can threaten personal freedom and initiative”. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1883)
“Undoubtedly the principle of subsidiarity [is] an expression of inalienable human freedom.” (Pope Benedict XVI, 57)
“The exercise of freedom finds its guarantee and incentive in the right of ownership.” (Pope St. John XXIII, 109)

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Three circles containing symbols of the three principles of catholic social teaching: human dignity, subsidiarity, and solidarity.

Three Key Principles

Catholic social teaching is built on three foundational principles - Human Dignity, Solidarity and Subsidiarity. Human Dignity, embodied in a correct understanding of the human person, is the greatest. The others flow from it. Good governments and good economic systems find ways of fostering the three principles.

Human Dignity

This means a correct understanding of the human person and of each person’s unique value. All Catholic social teaching flows from this: the inherent dignity of every person that comes from being made in God’s image.

Solidarity

Solidarity is not “a feeling of vague compassion or shallow distress at the misfortunes of others. It is a firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good”. (Pope St. John Paul II, 38) Love of God and love of neighbor are, in fact, linked and form one, single commandment.

Subsidiarity

Subsidiarity “is a fundamental principle of social philosophy, fixed and unchangeable, that one should not withdraw from individuals and commit to the community what they can accomplish by their own enterprise and industry. So, too, it is an injustice and at the same time a grave evil and a disturbance of right order to transfer to the larger and higher collectivity functions which can be performed and provided for by the lesser and subordinate bodies”. (Pope Pius XI)

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