[The participants are John Lewis Selover and Scott Campbell.]

Campbell: It is tragic to see people who feel oppressed. Some have almost given up because of racial or class discrimination. The oppression some of us face may be the shackles we put on ourselves. But whether it is a self-imposed oppression or oppression from some outside force, it is natural for us to want to do something about it.

Selover: There is a crying need to do just that, and many do. It is inspiring to hear of people working without fanfare in the ghettos or in the Peace Corps and to hear of the dedicated work of teachers, parents, principals, law enforcement officers—all of whom are trying to bring to themselves and others a greater awareness of what freedom really is.

Setting free the oppressed is one of the basic demands of Christianity. Christ Jesus said that part of his Christian mission was "to set at liberty them that are bruised" (Luke 4:18), or as a contemporary translation puts it, "To set free the oppressed" (A New Translation of the Bible by James Moffatt).

Campbell: But let's consider, for example, someone who is living in an impoverished area. Perhaps he can't get a good job or live the way he wants to or raise his children the way he wants to. Perhaps he feels that he lacks dignity as a human being. What can set him free from this oppression?

Selover: What's needed is the freedom that Christ Jesus talked about in his healing ministry. He linked freedom to understanding more deeply the truth of everyone's real being. He said (John 8:32), "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." In our true selfhood we are all born free, created in the very likeness of God, infinite Spirit, and maintained that way. Paul who glimpsed this said (Acts 22:28), "I was free born." Elsewhere he described freedom in this way (Gal. 5:1): "Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage."

Campbell: How can we "stand fast" when all around us people are unable to break the hold that poverty and environment, for example, have on them and their way of life?

Selover: I'm not saying that there's any cut-and-dried formula that suddenly awakes us to this potential freedom. It is a spiritual search, which requires of us a steadfastness and an honest desire to broaden and deepen our understanding of God and man. This is what freedom is all about. This understanding enables us to be more responsive to what we can do right where we are to help break limitations and find true freedom.

Mary Baker Eddy writes in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (p. 226), "God has built a higher platform of human rights, and He has built it on diviner claims." God, as infinite Spirit, gives man a spiritual identity, unfettered and unshackled by human ancestry or physical environment. Surely a good and loving God doesn't bind even one of His creation to limitations or poverty; rather, He has created man in His own image to express the fullness and perfection of His creation. So man's true being is spiritual. This is how it really is for all of us in our true God-given nature.

On this basis we can learn to be free of anything that would limit or oppress. All of us have a right to express those qualities of intelligence and love which are so important to freedom. As Mrs. Eddy writes (Science and Health, p. 227): "Discerning the rights of man, we cannot fail to foresee the doom of all oppression. Slavery is not the legitimate state of man. God made man free. Paul said, 'I was free born.' All men should be free. 'Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.'"

Understanding this better, and standing fast in what we do comprehend, helps us to view ourselves and others in the spiritual light that opens doors, broadens horizons, and increases opportunities.

Campbell: But where does one begin?

Selover: There's no other place to begin than right here where we are. You and I, for instance, can quit thinking of two kinds of creation: one free, the other enslaved. As we do, we have a basis to express more of the God-derived judgment, decisiveness, perseverance, and enthusiasm that enable us to break through the ignorance or confusion about man's identity that underlies oppression. This understanding helps us see who man really is. And this has an effect on ourselves and everyone around us. Being of God, it brings results which heal, redeem, and change people's lives.

Campbell: This understanding really does have an effect, then, on a person's life?

Selover: Yes. Listeners to these broadcasts over the last few years have heard people share how freedom has been won on this basis from a number of forms of oppression, including racial prejudice, alcoholism, crime, illness, temper, and drug addiction. For example, a member of a black community told about overcoming racial barriers in employment. Another program told of an individual who not only had been in trouble with the law since his youth but also had spent years in prison. What he learned in prison about the freedom which God maintains completely redeemed him from a life of crime. Another broadcast told how an individual who felt he had good reason to be mean-tempered found his freedom from the oppression of a bad temper.

But the experience that I remember most vividly was one involving serious drug addiction. Although the addict came from a socially prominent family and had held a number of responsible positions, he was down to his last three dollars when he learned of the freedom we have been discussing today and was ready to change. He was completely freed from reliance on drugs and now leads a happy, productive life.

Campbell: He was freed from this reliance on drugs solely by this understanding you are talking about? He didn't have to go through withdrawal, for example, in a hospital?

Selover: No. But it didn't come easily. There were struggles along the way, but the qualities that he needed to express were strengthened and grew until the addiction to drugs dropped away.

Campbell: It is really interesting that just by becoming aware of this spiritual man people can overcome what everyone naturally considers to be insurmountable barriers.

Selover: This awareness brings out the great potential that exists for people when they turn to God for help. One individual approaching life in this way can bring about an awakening in a family, community, or neighborhood. It brings respect among people, as well as the desire and action that are required to improve living conditions. It can bring the right kind of support for what needs to be done. And we can know that what we're doing is right by the evidences of genuine freedom we and those around us experience. This approach can lead us out of any kind of oppression to the freedom that Paul talked about when he said, "I was free born."