The Creation Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers |
Post-Modern Holiness Sign # 4: Justice 06/30/2023 |
For a number of weeks we have been meditating on what the signs of holiness might be in the 21st Century. We began by citing Rabbi Heschel that “holiness” is the “most precious word” in
religion.
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I begin my new Preface of my revised edition of my book on Evil citing Pulitzer-prize winning author Ernest Becker who tells us in his book Escape from Evil
that …the commercial-industrial hero system is almost openly defunct; it so obviously denies | Instead of heroism, American Christianity peddles victimhood: A new Public Religion Research Institute and Brookings report reveals almost half of Americans claim Christians are
as much discriminated against as other groups, including blacks and minorities. Secular Talk |
reality, builds war machines against death, and banishes sacredness with bureaucratic dedication. Men are treated as things and the world is pulled down to their size. Religion goes along and “in a perverse way the churches have turned their backs both on the miraculousness of creation and on the need to do something heroic in this world.” This flies in the face of …the
early promise of Christianity [which] was to bring about once and for all the social justice that the ancient world was crying for; Christianity never fulfilled this promise, and is as far away from it today as ever. No wonder it has trouble being taken seriously as a hero system. |
Friendly Atheist Hemant Mehta comments on the implications of the Pew Research Center study revealing the percentage of Americans who claim no religious affiliation is now at 29% — higher than
it’s ever been. | This is not unlike Alfred North Whitehead’s observation that religion without adventure is dead. Or Teilhard de Chardin’s comment that …because it is not sufficiently moved by a truly human compassion, |
because it is not exalted by a sufficiently passionate admiration of the universe, our religion is becoming
enfeebled. Does this have anything to do with why those who identify as “nones” today, when asked if they belong to any religion are now the same number of Americans (28%) as those who belong to the Roman Catholic church or to
evangelical Protestantism? Or that last year in Germany over 500,000 Roman Catholics chose to formally leave the church? |
Becker challenges society and religion’s complicity in evil when he
writes that both science and religion are capable of exposing “unfulfilled life based on a continuing denial of social justice” including “internal victimage | CBN News spot profiles evangelical preacher Voddie Baucham
differentiating social versus biblical concepts of justice. |
based on the inequality of social classes and the state repression of freedom.” This is
possible because …in science, as in authentic religion, there is no easy refuge for empty-headed patriotism, or for putting off to some future date the exposure of large-scale social lies. Previously we have named Joy, Courage, Generosity as signs of holiness for our time. Let us now add: Justice. To be continued. |
Adapted from Matthew Fox, Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society (2016 edition), pp, xlf. Banner Image: Peaceful protestors Adelaja and Pancho Ramos-Stierle are arrested at Occupy Oakland protest, 2011. Photographer: Noah Berger |
Queries for Contemplation Do you find society banishing sacredness with bureaucratic dedication? How do we bring it back? |
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Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society
Visionary theologian and best-selling author Matthew Fox offers a new theology of evil that fundamentally changes the traditional
perception of good and evil and points the way to a more enlightened treatment of ourselves, one another, and all of nature. In comparing the Eastern tradition of the 7 chakras to the Western tradition of the 7 capital sins, Fox allows us to think creatively about our capacity for personal and institutional evil and what we can do about them.
“A scholarly masterpiece embodying a better vision and depth of perception far beyond the grasp of any
one single science. A breath-taking analysis.” — Diarmuid O’Murchu, author of Quantum Theology: Spiritual Implications of the New Physics | |
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality Matthew Fox lays out a whole new direction for Christianity—a direction that is in fact very ancient and very grounded in Jewish thinking (the fact that Jesus was a Jew is often neglected by Christian theology): the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality, the Vias Positiva, Negativa, Creativa and Transformativa in an extended and deeply developed way. “Original Blessing makes available to the Christian
world and to the human community a radical cure for all dark and derogatory views of the natural world wherever these may have originated.” –Thomas Berry, author, The Dream of the Earth; The Great Work; coauthor, The Universe Story. | |
See Matthew Fox's full calendar
HERE |
Join Matthew Fox and 35 speakers for “The 2023 Mystics Summit: Draw Inspiration From Ancient & Contemporary Mystics to Illuminate Your Unique Path of Love” where Matthew discusses "The Unio Mystica according to Otto Rank, Julian of Norwich, Meister Eckhart, Mary Oliver &
Others" Monday - Friday, June 26-30 Register HERE. Join Matthew Fox and Brian Swimme in a free online event hosted by The Shift Network: “Hope for Humanity’s Future: Science, Spirituality & the Noosphere: Find Deeper Meaning in Our Spiritual Traditions With Illuminating Insights in Science & Technology.”
Saturday, July 22, 10:00am PT. Register HERE. Join Matthew Fox for a Cosmic Mass and Panel Forum at the 2023 Parliament of the World’s Religions - A Call to Conscience: Defending Freedom & Human Rights, August 14-18 in Chicago, IL Wed., 8/16,
7:00pm CT - The Cosmic Mass - Honoring Gaia, Solidarity for Our Earth Thurs., 8/17, 1:00pm CT – Panel and Response to The Cosmic Mass Register HERE. |
Creation Spirituality Conversations |
Brentwood Inspired Living Center, APRIL 16, 2023. REV. MATTHEW FOX, PhD shares the message with "Otto Rank and Père Chenu: Two 'Real, Raw and Radiant' Guides calling us to Deep Freedom." See the full worship service HERE. Matthew's talk begins at timestamp 34:25. |
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