[BenL]

Chap. 4's great theme was adoption. Chapter 5 builds on that with the theme of freedom, liberation. "Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery."

Paul plays with the theme, admonishing his readers: "For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters; only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another." Slaves to loving your neighbor as yourself.

Here are the signs of slavery to sin instead of love: "fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these." Here's what's supposed to replace them: "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control."

I didn't see homsexuality mentioned in the first list, but I sure do see the kinds of things I want in my intimate relationships with God and with my spouse listed in the second: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness ...

The little reading I have done on attachment and addiction talks about how one gets from the first set of behaviors to the second. It's not easy when psyche and neurology team up to enslave a person. It's all in letting go, allowing grace (unmerited divine power and love) into the quiet places between our attachments, the way we used to be when we were children before we developed addictive behavior. Gerald May, who wrote "Addiction and Grace" calls addiction the idolatry of our age. We become so attached to the objects of our desires that they become for us false gods. The addicted person builds a life around paying homage to those idols.

For me, freedom only comes through the Divine. For me, that means through Christ, but I don't box God's power into only one path of revelation and salvation. We all search for that transcendant kind of freedom, the kind that brings true, soul-satisfying peace. Sounds like grace to me. Others call it something else. The name is far less important than the reality.