{"id":145503,"date":"2023-07-23T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-23T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/ask-a-priest-does-god-send-people-into-my-life-or-is-it-free-will\/"},"modified":"2024-09-17T11:36:07","modified_gmt":"2024-09-17T15:36:07","slug":"ask-a-priest-does-god-send-people-into-my-life-or-is-it-free-will","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/ask-a-priest-does-god-send-people-into-my-life-or-is-it-free-will\/","title":{"rendered":"“Ask a Priest: Does God send people into my life, or is it free will?”"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n\n\n\n
Q: I consider myself religious and believe god has a plan for us with regards to who he brings in and out of our lives .
\nBut I have a question. On earth, do each of us have free will to do what we want ?
\nDoes God control people’s actions ? Or do we all have free will?
\nHow can I know that God will place people in my life for a reason without it just being their free will to come and go ? Which is it?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

\n<\/address>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Answered by Fr. Edward McIlmail, LC<\/em><\/p>\n

A:<\/p>\n

Thanks for your note.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
It might help to think of life like a football game.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
God gives us a rulebook (the Commandments, etc.), but he doesn’t micromanage every play. He lets the quarterback (each of us) call the plays.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
We certainly have free will. God can work with that to bring about certain things. It could happen that he sends little inspirations here and there to nudge people in a general direction.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
But our free will remains. That is why we are responsible for our sins. God won’t force his will on us.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
That’s an answer in a nutshell, but one that I hope is helpful.<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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He was an assistant publisher of the National Catholic Register and Faith & Family magazine and an editor of the Zenit news agency\u2019s English edition. He has written for\u00a0SpiritualDirection.com\u00a0and\u00a0ePriest. Fr. McIlmail also worked in spiritual retreats in the Northeast, New England, the Midwest, and the South\u00a0and assisted with mission work in Mexico. Born in Philadelphia, he worked in journalism and was active in the pro-life movement before entering the novitiate of the Legion of Christ in 1992. His contributions to RCSpirituality include responding to\u00a0Ask A Priest\u00a0questions and sharing his insights in our\u00a0Weekly Newsletter.","url":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/author\/emcilmail\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/362"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145503"},{"taxonomy":"post_folder","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.regnumchristi.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_folder?post=145503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}