On January 1,1863, Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation into law giving the enslaved people in Texas and all secessionist states of the Confederacy their freedom. News did not travel as fast as it does today and it wasn’t until June 19^th, 1865, when federal troops entered Galveston, Texas, that those enslaved there realized that they had legally been free for over two years. They were the last of formerly enslaved people in the south to finally hear the news that they had been given their freedom. June 19^th has come to be known as Juneteenth through the years and a day to celebrate both freedom and African American culture. Juneteenth became a federal holiday in the United States on June 17, 2021, when President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Act into law.

Its almost impossible for most of us to imagine what it had been like to have been misinformed about something so significant for so long and how people’s lives may have been changed for the better had they realized their freedom earlier. But as I think of this, it makes me wonder how we all can be misinformed as we navigate the challenges in life. What false ideas have we all, in the past and present, held as true and how have those falsehoods unnecessarily kept us in difficult situations? I know that I personally have formed opinions and have taken actions on things I didn’t know the entire truth about. Those are moments that I have not only been quite embarrassed, but quite humbled when finally realizing the misconception I had been operating under. The false ideas we can embody can go far beyond mistaken facts and occurrences. The Science of Mind philosophy teaches how our inner thoughts and beliefs about our lives and the world can wreak even more substantial havoc in our for us when they are not based in truth.

Our inner false beliefs can be quite complex and nuanced, but I have found that they often involve one of three that are most common: that we are somehow unworthy, unlovable, or incapable in some way. Regardless of evidence that shows that the opposite is true, we humans can use one or more of these false beliefs as the foundational ideas that we build our lives upon. When we do so, it can seem that we never attain the lives we had dreamed or envisioned. Feeling unworthy, unloved, or incapable are beliefs, when embodied, that always work in the background to sabotage what may appear to be our best efforts to move forward in life.

Declaring freedom from false beliefs we have held for quite some time can be challenging. Even when we intellectually know that they are not true, it can be difficult to fully embrace a more liberating belief system. But we begin where we are. Juneteenth is celebrated this weekend and we are quickly approaching the Fourth of July where we celebrate and commemorate the declaration of freedom made at the inception of our nation. Both of these events teach us that freedom is a process. Begin where you are. Work to create and maintain a personal resolve that freedom is everyone’s birthright whether is it from unjust laws or limiting ideas that have allowed to limit personal potential. 

Blessings,

Rev. John