The Creation Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers |
Jesus (and Gandhi) as Artists and Prophets 06/03/2023 |
Jesus was a poet, a storyteller, a parable maker, an artist. This was how he chose to share his message. He was not a priest or theologian or academician or a dispenser of sacraments primarily, but an awakener to the sacrament of existence, the
sacrament of the cosmos, the presence of the kingdom/queendom of God in which we actually dwell. |
In a discussion I was once part of when I was writing my book Original Blessing, a theologian shouted “Christ is the cross and
nothing but the cross!” Under the spell and paradigm of fall/redemption religion, it is easy to forget that Jesus’ choice of action was as an artist. His choice to teach in parables was deliberate and it was an immensely | |
creative choice. His parables are the closest we will ever come to his exact words, his exact images, his exact
message. Behind them all lies what Brother David Steindl-Rast has rightfully called “a poetic mind who sees everything in the world as a symbol if only we have the eyes to see.” |
| Behind this unique method of parable-telling that Jesus chose, there lies trust: Jesus’ trust in his own, unique images—leaven and a dragnet and a mustard seed and a pearl and a coin lost around the house symbolizing the kingdom/queendom
of God, for example. |
Or the good Samaritan to instruct us on what compassion is and is not all about. Jesus also trusted his listener’s ability to find
truth in the power of images he relays. Parables are non-elitist. Jesus trusts the intelligence and creativity of his listeners. South African theologian Albert Nolan put it his way: Nothing could be more un-authoritative than the parables of Jesus. Their whole purpose is to enable the listener to
discover something for himself. They are not illustrations of revealed doctrines; they are works of art which reveal or uncover the truth about life. |
As Steindl-Rast
puts it, he appeals to “the divine authority within each person” and by doing so invites a deep transformation or metanoia in the individual, change of consciousness that leads to a change of life. They invite a whole society to let go and start over again, trusting its images and power for creativity. | “What’s the Danger in Reading Parables?” Dr. John Pennington explores the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins. Video by Bible Study Fellowship. |
He appealed to the imagination. Not unlike Gandhi who said, “we struck the religious imagination of an angry people.” All prophets do that. |
Adapted from Matthew Fox, Original Blessing, pp. 239f., 257. Banner Image: Statue of Jesus teaching the children at Saint John the Baptist Catholic Church in Draper Utah. Photo
by Always dreamin. Wikimedia
Commons. |
Queries for Contemplation Do you agree that artists appeal to“the divine authority” within each of us? And to the prophet in
all of us to change and be change agents in society? Do you think our educational and religious institutions know this? |
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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; co-author, The Universe Story | |
See Matthew Fox's full calendar
HERE |
Join Matthew Fox for an online lecture and Q&A on “Letting Our Minds be Remade Regarding Religion,” hosted by The World Community for Christian Meditation, Tuesday, June 13, 11:00am-12:30pm PT. Learn more:
https://wccm.org/events/metanoia/ Join Matthew Fox as he discusses “The A.W.E. Project – Reinventing Education, Reinventing the Human” in an online Our Lady of the Prairie Retreat, Thursday, June 15, 4:00-6:00 pm 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: https://parliamentofreligions.org/ |
Creation Spirituality Conversations |
Tikkun Magazine releases a new Interview of Matthew Fox by Andrew Harvey regarding Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality (Orbis, 2022) edited by Charles Burack. Read the interview HERE. | |
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