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By Matthew Fox

8/25/2025

On Saturday, there was a beautiful gathering in celebration of the life of Joanna Macy. About 1,000 people participated live by Zoom and another 2,000 registered to tune in later.  

In today’s video, I share some of the marvelous stories told by some of the persons invited to speak, including two of her children (I was honored to be among them).

For this DM, I would like to share a special letter that Joanna sent me about 10 years ago, which was her response to my book Original Blessing. She told me she had written this response 20 years previously (the book came out in 1983).

In my talk on Saturday, I talked about how “deep ecumenism” was so much a part of Joanna’s mindset, and also how I came up with that language from meeting her and hearing about “deep ecology.” (See my Cosmic Christ book.) And how Joanna incarnated deep ecumenism including science.    

Joanna Macy speaks on the Kingdom of Shambhala prophecy in 2014. Video by Spirit Rock Meditation Center. 

The document that Joanna excitedly mailed to me is very much a document in deep ecumenism. She wrote:

Original Blessing is a revolutionary event in the spiritual life of our people. It takes our habitual religious notions and turns them over, turns them around. Like a revolving wheel, it sweeps us back to the past and then up and over into the future—back to recapture treasures of forgotten wisdom, forward to fresh insights and creativity. This revolutionary event can be dated ten year ago, with the publication of Original Blessing, or dated now, or tomorrow, for it keeps on happening each day with each fresh encounter with what Matthew Fox is saying.  Once set in motion, the wheel keeps turning.

The Eightfold Path of Buddhism. Graphic by Sai Pradyumna. Wikimedia Commons. 

The image of wheel comes naturally to me, for it is central to the Buddhist tradition, my spiritual path. It symbolizes the Dharma, the teachings of the Buddha about the dynamic interdependence of all things. When the Buddha gave his teachings, say the scriptures, he “turned the wheel of the Dharma.” And his followers today keep the     

wheel in motion, like Tibetan folk reaching out to spin their temple’s prayer wheels as they pass by. 

OB reminds me of the Dharma wheel because it brings a similar shift of focus—a radical shift from substance to process. The Buddha shocked ancient India by refusing to acknowledge an immutable god, a divinity aloof from the world. He focused instead on the presence of mind in every action, every breath. His teachings did not call people to seek a supernatural haven for the sinful, suffering self, but to recognize their interdependence with this imperfect world and to follow a magga or path where the self dissolves into aware and compassionate intention.

The spirituality of OB has the same kind of revolutionary thrust. It delivers us from theological hair splitting and from preoccupation with our separate selves, however sinful or noble we may deem them, and summons us into an invigorating flow of spirit-experience. It suggests that we are not entities to be perfected so much as processes to be valued and enlivened. As Buckminster Fuller exclaimed, “I seem to be a verb!” As verbs we want trajectories, ways to go, paths for exploring and unfolding.

Consonant with science and crisis.

In OB I find myself again as verb, as a going on the path—and the path is 

“Magga” means “Path,” and refers to the Eightfold Path in Buddhism. (Not to be confused with a certain acronym that means the exact opposite!) Photo by Adam Kring on Unsplash. 

multiple, complete in its fourfold multiplicity. In celebration and gratitude, I recall elements of each as I have lived them with Matthew Fox.

In her cover letter she drew a happy face and asked: “How do you like being compared to the Buddha?” I think I responded that I’ve been called a lot worse things.

I concluded my talk with a Buddhist-inspired prayer:

May all creatures be happy. 

May all creatures be saved. 

May all creatures be acknowledged as original blessings. 

May we all be grateful for our existence. And act like it. 

Amen. 

See Matthew Fox, Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality. 

And Fox, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, pp. 228-244. 

And Fox, One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing From Global Faiths. 

And Fox, The Lotus & The Rose: A Conversation Between Tibetan Buddhism & Mystical Christianity. 

And Fox and Bishop Mark Andrus, Stations of the Cosmic Christ. 

And Fox, Hildegard of Bingen: A Saint For Our Times. 

Banner Image: “A Gathering to Honor Joanna Macy.” Collage created by the Macy family for the online event held on August 23, 2025. Used with the family’s permission.

Mystic-Warriors at the Roof of the World

In Monday's DM, we shared the story of Marianne Grosspietsch and the Shanti Leprosy Aid organization of Nepal: faced with the loss of food from USAID, her community is planting thousands of fruit trees to nourish the hungry in the region while mitigating the effects of climate change.
We invite you to consider supporting this work HERE (US$) or HERE (€ and other currencies).

Queries for Contemplation

Do you also seem to be a verb? And on a path that is focused on process and on exploring and unfolding and consonant with science and crisis?

To view today's video, please click the image. You will be taken to today's post on the DailyMeditations with Matthew Fox website, where you can see the meditation in a larger version and also view and post your Comments. In the sharing that follows, a kind of community is developing around the DM.

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Recommended Reading

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

The Coming of the Cosmic Christ: The Healing of Mother Earth and the Birth of a Global Renaissance

In what may be considered the most comprehensive outline of the Christian paradigm shift of our Age, Matthew Fox eloquently foreshadows the manner in which the spirit of Christ resurrects in terms of the return to an earth-based mysticism, the expression of creativity, mystical sexuality, the respect due the young, the rebirth of effective forms of worship—all of these mirroring the ongoing blessings of Mother Earth and the recovery of Eros, the feminine aspect of the Divine.
“The eighth wonder of the world…convincing proof that our Western religious tradition does indeed have the depth of imagination to reinvent its faith.” — Brian Swimme, author of The Universe Story and Journey of the Universe.
 “This book is a classic.” Thomas Berry, author of The Great Work and The Dream of the Earth.

One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Global Faiths

Matthew Fox calls on all the world traditions for their wisdom and their inspiration in a work that is far more than a list of theological position papers but a new way to pray—to meditate in a global spiritual context on the wisdom all our traditions share. Fox chooses 18 themes that are foundational to any spirituality and demonstrates how all the world spiritual traditions offer wisdom about each.“Reading One River, Many Wells is like entering the rich silence of a masterfully directed retreat. As you read this text, you reflect, you pray, you embrace Divinity. Truly no words can fully express my respect and awe for this magnificent contribution to contemporary spirituality.” –Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit

The Lotus & The Rose: A Conversation Between Tibetan Buddhism & Mystical Christianity

How can we move away from “us vs. them” thinking as our surroundings feel more divided and polarized than ever? Co-authors Matthew Fox and Lama Tsomo discuss how Tibetan Buddhism and Mystical Christianity answer this question from unique points of view, with many commonalities and practical tools to break down the barriers between us.
“The Lotus and the Rose is an extraordinary example of what can happen when spiritual leaders from different traditions open up and speak from the heart.” — Paul Chaffee, The Interfaith Observer.

Stations of the Cosmic Christ
By Matthew Fox and Bishop Marc Andrus. 

This is a book of meditations on the Cosmic Christ, accompanying the images of 16 wonderful clay tablets by Javier Ullrrich Lemus and M.C. Richards. Together, these images and meditations go far beyond the traditional Stations of the Cross to inspire a spirit awakening and understanding of the cosmic Christ Consciousness, Buddha consciousness, and consciousness of the image of God in all beings, so needed in our times.
“A divinely inspired book that must be read by every human being devoted to spiritual and global survival. It is cosmically brilliant.” — Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit

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.

UPCOMING EVENTS

See Matthew Fox's full calendar HERE

Join Matthew Fox in a new 6-month program of mystical wisdom for a new world. In this 6-month immersion program with Matthew, you’ll explore what it means to be a modern mystic and prophet, integrating this sacred knowledge into your life through the authentic teachings of Jesus and other wisdom keepers. This journey births what Matthew calls Christianity 2.0 — based not on dogma, but on a spirituality that recovers the sacred sense of original goodness. By Application only - apply HERE Register for a free information session HERE

MONTHLY: Join Matthew Fox and Skylar Wilson of the Order of the Sacred Earth in a free virtual meeting for connection and networking with other mystic warriors. Last Tuesday of every month, 4:00-5:00pm PT. 
Join Zoom Meeting HERE, Meeting ID: 886 6530 2478

Learn more at www.orderofthesacredearth.org  

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