OK … everybody knows exactly where they stand on this issue, so what would you do in this situation:

You fall in love with a feral cat in the backyard of your housing block, and entice him slowly up into your home over a period of several years. (He is over a year old when you start doing this). The backyard is not a nice place to be for cats, there are lots of dogs and aggressive humans, and there are foxes in the park etc.
He becomes an apparently domesticated cat over a period of time, but of course isn’t completely. His real roots are in the yard that he grew up in. He will normally be quite happy and content with his lot, but occasionally will become extremely frustrated, and want to return to his childhood home (which he can study from the kitchen window). He will scratch and miaw and gallop around and become very frustrated indeed.
If you let him out (he only wants to go out in the late evenings), you know that he will probably go walk-about, and not appear again until at the earliest the next morning. You don’t want to expose your cat to unnecessary (and very real) dangers, but you are obviously causing him anguish by forcing him to stay in. So there is no “right thing to do”. If you let him out, you expose him to danger. If you keep him in, you make him sad and unnaturally frustrated. There is no single “right” answer to these questions, one just has to try and find a reasonable and intelligent balance. What’s right for one may not be right for another.

I think the most important thing of all is to keep ones respect for and awe of the cat, surely one of nature's most beautiful and harmonious creations.

Isn’t that why we have them?

john