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Thinkers, Earth Keepers Daily
Meditations with Matthew Fox
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Consciousness & Conscience:
The Interior Life of Humans |
Maybe one reason we humans are bad at governing and being governed is that we ignore our inner lives, our interior lives, the relation between our outer work and our inner work. |
Hildegard of Bingen tells us “there is no creature that lacks an interior life.” I often apply this teaching when discussing the diversity of beings in the universe—atoms and molecules, stars and our sun, trees and plants, animals, fishes and stone and rocks. It is a very contemporary question in today’s science: Where does consciousness begin and end? Is there consciousness in all beings? Is the universe conscious? Is Gaia, our home, conscious? | Representation of consciousness from the seventeenth century by Robert Fludd, an English Paracelsian physician, 1619.
Wikimedia Commons. |
Hildegard
proposed her answer nine centuries ago: “There is no creature that lacks an interior life.” But I want to steer this question now to humanity. Do humans truly possess an interior life? Is it possible for humans to reject their interior life, to turn their back on it, to become so thoroughly narcissistic and ego-driven and power driven and money driven and distracted that they put their interior life to sleep? Sit on
it? Ignore it entirely? |
The Elephant Ambassador first approached Deena Metzger in Chobe, Botswana, in 1999, and later told her in vision: “The stones are what the human race has
become. You are no longer sentient creatures. You increasingly become the drones, the robots, the weapons that you have invented as you disconnect from, injure and attack the natural world and all its creatures. The only way to save Creation is to re-enter it.” Photo by Michele Daniel, from Deena’s blog Ruin and Beauty. | Can humans choose to live so external and outer a life that we turn our back on our interior life? And what is an interior life for humans? For me, the four paths of creation spirituality help immeasurably in naming our interior lives. They also help to bring conscience and consciousness together. In the Via Positiva, we undergo awe and wonder, joy and delight, gratitude and reverence. It is perhaps summarized best by Meister Eckhart: |
If the only prayer you say in your whole life is ‘Thank you,’ that would suffice. In the Via Negativa, we face silence and solitude, letting go and letting be, and all Silence has to teach
us. Perhaps it is best summarized by the psalmist: “Be still and learn that I am God.” Emptying the mind of thoughts and busyness, meditation is integral to that practice of being still. But also in the Via Negativa we
undergo grief and loss and pain and suffering, which breaks our hearts and bring their own experience of letting go and letting be. |
In the Via Creativa, we dig deeply for our own images, our own responses
to the world and our life experiences in order to give birth and give back and learn. In the process we often learn what is deepest within us. And in the Via Transformativa, all the previous interior responses
to life come to fruition as we put our moral imaginations to work to heal and celebrate, to do justice and compassion. Here conscience marries our work. Indeed, humans do not lack an interior life. But there is inner
work to do to explore and express that interior life. As Eckhart puts it so wonderfully, | Portrait of Deb Haaland, first Native American Secretary of the U.S. Interior, also honoring her heritage. Art by Nissa Tzun, photo by Vince Reinhard on Flickr. |
The outward work can never be small if the inward one is great, and the outward work can never be great or good if the inward is small or of little worth. The inward work always includes in itself all size, all breadth and all length. |
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Adapted from Matthew Fox, Hildegard of Bingen: A Saint For Our Times, pp. 16f. And Fox, The Reinvention of Work, p. 58. Banner Image: Modern voices for justice and
compassion: Wangari Maathai, Winona LaDuke, Arundhati Roy, Malala Yosafzai, the Dalai Lama, Senator John Lewis (photos from Wikimedia Commons); Chase Iron Eyes (photo from TedX Charlottesville); Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Wikimedia Commons). |
Queries for Contemplation Where do you stand on the question whether every being possesses an “interior life?” And do the four paths assist you to recognize your interior life and that of your fellow humans? |
Responses are welcomed. To add your comment, please click HERE
to go to our website and scroll down to the Comments field. |
Hildegard of Bingen, A Saint for Our Times: Unleashing Her Power in the 21st Century Matthew Fox writes in Hildegard of Bingen about this amazing woman and what we can learn from her. In an era when women were marginalized, Hildegard was an outspoken, controversial figure. Yet so visionary was her insight that she was sought out by kings, popes, abbots, and bishops for
advice. “This book gives strong, sterling, and unvarnished evidence that everything – everything – we ourselves become will affect what women after us may also become….This is a truly marvelous, useful, profound, and creative book.” ~~ Andrew Harvey, author of The Hope: A Guide to Sacred Activism. | |
The Reinvention of Work: A New Vision of
Livelihood For Our Time Thomas Aquinas said, “To live well is to work well,” and in this bold call for the revitalization of daily work, Fox shares his vision of a world where our personal and professional lives are celebrated
in harmony–a world where the self is not sacrificed for a job but is sanctified by authentic “soul work.” “Fox approaches the level of poetry in describing the reciprocity that must be present between one’s inner and outer work…[A]n important road map to social change.” ~~ National Catholic Reporter | |
See Matthew Fox's full calendar HERE |
Join Matthew Fox at the Louisville Festival of Faiths for an online/onsite workshop on “Significant Stories for Our Times: A Workshop with Matthew Fox: Earth Survival
from Thomas Merton, Science, Creation Spirituality Mystics and Ourselves” November 9-12, 2022 (Wed-Sat) Louisville, KY: Onsite and Virtual - Friday Workshop – 4:00pm-5:15pm ET on-site (1:00pm-2:15pm PT virtual)
- Saturday Spiritual Practice – 8:30am-9:15am ET on-site (5:30am-6:15am PT virtual)
https://festivaloffaiths.org/ Purchase a Friday ticket HERE Join Matthew Fox for the monthly Our Lady of the Prairie Retreat, discussing Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality. Thursday, November 17,
4:00pm-6:00pm PT. Register HERE. Join Matthew Fox for the monthly Our Lady of the Prairie Retreat, discussing Christian Mystics: 365 Readings and Meditations. Thursday, December 15,
4:00pm-6:00pm PT Register HERE. Creation Spirituality Conversations |
In a podcast episode with the Earth and Spirit Center, Matthew Fox reflects on how creation-centered spirituality, and the marriage of the divine feminine and sacred masculine, can help us respond with hope
to the troubles of our apocalyptic times. Listen HERE. | |
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