The Creation Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers Daily Meditations
with Matthew Fox |
Watch for Matthew Fox's
video meditation — now appearing every Monday! Don't miss Matthew's exciting interviews, webinars and courses, listed at the bottom of this DM (you may need to click the ... to see them). |
Week of 4/28-5/3/2025:
Denouncing Evil
while Maintaining BalanceBy Daily Meditations Team 5/3/2025 |
Gianluigi Gugliermetto (GG), who has been graciously subbing for Matthew Fox as he finishes writing his next book, each week writes on a theme. We thought it might be helpful to see his theme and summary of last week’s DMs.
How we can respond spiritually to the barrage of violence and cruelty that we witness every
day?
Monday: by denouncing evil (as Pope Francis did)
Tuesday: by facing the darkness with courage (like Stephen Kapos does)
Wednesday: by arming ourselves with both courage and clarity (and a modicum
of self-care)
Thursday: by examining evil in detail and our complicity with it (the ten deadly sins)
Friday: by finding balance (especially participating or creating communal celebrations of life)
Saturday:
by experiencing pain as cosmic pain
|
Monday, April 28, 2025: Denouncing Evil as Prophetic Action
Matthew tells us that justice and prophetic action are a very important part of the Creation Spirituality tradition. Pope
Francis was a wonderful example of someone who follows the path of prophetic action. In February 2025, Pope Francis, concerned about mass deportations happening in the U.S., exhorted us to disagree “with any measure that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of some migrants with criminality.”* How hypocritical of Trump and Vance to pretend to honor the pope’s memory when their actions have been in direct contradiction to the pope’s admonitions. Gianluigi Gugliermetto suggests that
“It is by experiencing in our depths the via negativa of these dark times that true rebirth may ensue.” |
“Pope Francis Warns Against Mass Deportations in Letter to US Bishops.” EWTN
News Nightly |
Tuesday, April 29, 2025: Experiencing Dark Times
No compassionate person can help but notice that we are living in dark times. How do we navigate such times? The Creation Spirituality tradition
teaches that it is important not to turn away from this pain, but to fully acknowledge it. Matthew says: Facing the darkness, admitting the pain, allowing the pain to be pain, is never easy. This is why courage — big-heartedness — is the most essential virtue of the spiritual journey. Matthew teaches that we must wade through the Via Negativa before we can reach the Via Transformativa. GG was impressed by those Jewish survivors of the Holocaust who, in London on the day of
remembrance, spoke out against the evils happening in Gaza. They said that “Never Again” applies to everyone. |
Wednesday, April 30, 2025: Courage and Clarity
Courage and clarity are indispensable virtues for a time like ours in which everything feels chaotic and evil. It’s helpful to remember role models who
exemplify courage and inspire us to act similarly. One such courageous man, who is not sufficiently well-known, is Franz Jägerstätter, a conscientious objector who was subsequently killed by the Nazis. As we aspire to be courageous during these tumultuous times, we have to guard against unfocused and undirected anger. This is where clarity of mind becomes very important. It is essential in denouncing evil. Thursday, May 1, 2025: What to Do? A List to Resist Evil
In his book Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh,
Matthew Fox describes the ten deadly sins of our time. The first deadly sin is the suffering we cause one another. Second, ignoring, which is the beginning of denial. Third, injustice. Fourth, severing relations. Fifth, dualism. Sixth, reductionism. Seventh, lack of passion, because if we let our passions get extinguished by the present oppressive powers, we become
collaborators with evil. Eighth, misdirected love. Ninth, dissipation of energy. Finally, the tenth and ugliest of the deadly sins, “that which devours.” Meditating regularly on this list, though an unpleasant task, can be a tool for analyzing evil and, therefore, resisting it both within and without ourselves during these dangerous times. |
Freedom Riders stand next to their burning Greyhound bus after it was firebombed by a Ku Klux Klan mob outside of Anniston, Alabama. May 14, 1961. Photo by the National Park Service, Wikimedia Commons |
Friday, May 2, 2025: Balance
Gianluigi Gugliermetto (GG) says there are three words that describe what spirituality is all about: justice, compassion, and balance. He said balance is essential if we
are to keep upright, healthy in body and mind, and ready to act wisely. GG suggests, “Right now, because of the amount of chaos surrounding us…our first duty is to take care of our basic spiritual needs... in order to keep our balance.” Yesterday, May 1, was celebrated in traditional rural Europe with dances around the May Pole. While last week, on April 25, his country, Italy, celebrated the 80th anniversary of its liberation from fascist rule, singing “Bella Ciao.” Joining such celebrations in person may prove a saving spiritual practice for many of us because we need community to get through these times. Saturday, May 3, 2025: Empathy and Cosmic Pain
For some of us, the pain and suffering that we are witnessing in the world, and the cruelty some human beings are inflicting on others, is heartbreaking. Are we too empathic? One well-known figure recently said that empathy is
the basic fault of Western civilization. GG disagrees. He says that empathy is what brings meaning to life. One important thing that GG says he has learned from Matthew, is that when pain is privatized it becomes deadly, but when it is shared it becomes a source of life. Essentially, Matthew teaches that when we are aware that pain is a cosmic reality, then — and only then — can we engage in healing. |
Responses are welcomed. To add your comment, or read other comments and enter into dialog, please click HERE to go to our website and scroll down to the Comments field. |
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 |
|
Letters to Pope Francis
Matthew Fox challenges the new Pope to live up to the promise of his namesake St. Francis and reshape a church that has been mired in corruption and bereft of authentic spirituality
and rigorous theological debate. Former Dominican priest Matthew Fox presents a series of heartfelt letters to his brother in Christ about the great challenges facing the church today, drawing from the deep spiritual and theological sources that have been suppressed since Vatican II, and implores him to restore the sensus fidelium (the sense of the faithful) and reshape a church with justice and compassion. |
|
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice
In A Spirituality Named Compassion, Matthew
Fox delivers a profound exploration of the meaning and practice of compassion. Establishing a spirituality for the future that promises personal, social, and global healing, Fox marries mysticism with social justice, leading the way toward a gentler and more ecological spirituality and an acceptance of our interdependence which is the substratum of all compassionate activity.
“Well worth our
deepest consideration…Puts compassion into its proper focus after centuries of neglect.” –The Catholic Register |
|
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 |
|
Christian Mystics: 365 Readings & Meditations
As Matthew Fox notes, when an aging Albert Einstein was asked if he had any regrets, he replied, “I wish I had read more of the mystics
earlier in my life.” The 365 writings in Christian Mystics represent a wide-ranging sampling of these readings for modern-day seekers of all faiths — or no faith. The visionaries quoted range from Julian of Norwich to Martin Luther King, Jr., from Thomas Merton to Dorothee Soelle and Thomas Berry.
“Our world is in crisis, and we need road maps that can ground us in wisdom, inspire us to action, and help us
gather our talents in service of compassion and justice. This revolutionary book does just that. Matthew Fox takes some of the most profound spiritual teachings of the West and translates them into practical daily mediations. Study and practice these teachings. Take what’s in this book and teach it to the youth because the new generation cannot afford to suffer the spirit and ethical illiteracy of the past.” — Adam Bucko, spiritual activist and co-founder of the
Reciprocity Foundation for Homeless Youth. |
|
Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election
Matthew Fox tells us that he had always shied away from using the term “Anti-Christ” because it was so often used to
spread control and fear. However, given today’s rise of authoritarianism and forces of democracide, ecocide, and christofascism, he turns the tables in this book employing the archetype for the cause of justice, democracy, and a renewed Earth and humanity.
From the Foreword: If there was ever a time, a moment, for examining the archetype of the Antichrist, it is now…Read this book with an open mind. Good and evil
are real forces in our world. ~~ Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Conversations with the Divine.
For immediate access to Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election, order the e-book with 10 full-color prints from Amazon HERE.
To get a print-on-demand paperback copy with black & white
images, order from Amazon HERE or IUniverse HERE.
To receive a limited-edition, full-color paperback copy, order from MatthewFox.org HERE.
Order the audiobook HERE for immediate download. |
|
Matthew Fox comments on Pope Francis' legacy of environmentalism and support for migrants, amidst more controversial aspects of his papacy, KPFA Pacifica Evening
News. |
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: - Activate your spiritual awakening with the mystics
- Say “yes” to life & the beauty, goodness & potential it offers
- Awaken your inner mystic & prophet for deeper awakening
- Nurture the life-giving qualities of your humanity
By Application only - apply
HERERegister for a free information session HERE |
|
|
|
|
|
Join Matthew Fox and other guest speakers in a 6-week journey into Mysticism and The Great Mystics (Matthew presents May 7 on "Dancing with the Divine: Creation Spirituality and The Mystics"), hosted by Creation Spirituality Communities Education. Wednesdays, May 7-June 11, 4:00-6:00pm PT. Register HERE. |
|
| Join Matthew Fox in a 6-Class Course: The Great Christian Mystics, exploring some of the richest and most
inspiring mystic-prophets in the Christian lineage, including Hildegard of Bingen, Julian of Norwich, Mechtild of Magdeburg, Thomas Aquinas, and Meister Eckhart. Open-ended course includes six modules of pre-recorded lessons, live community discussions, and live conversations with Matthew Fox. Starts Thursday, May 8; 10% off discount code: FOX-10 Register HERE. |
Join Matthew Fox online as he offers a Morning Worship Inspirational Message, “Mother's Day, 2025: Exercising Our Powers For Compassion,” at the Unity Inspired Living online service. Sunday, May 1, 10:00am PT. Join us HERE. Join Matthew Fox as he discusses his book, Wrestling with the Prophets: Essays on Creation Spirituality and Everyday Life, in an online Our Lady of the Prairie Retreat. Thursday, May 15, 4:00pm-5:30pm PT. Register HERE. Join Matthew Fox as he offers a lecture and Q&A on “Navigating the Dark Night of Soul, Society, and Our Species,” hosted by the Jung Center of Buffalo, Friday, May 23, 4 pm PT. Learn more 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: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88665302478
Meeting ID: 886 6530 2478 Learn more at www.orderofthesacredearth.org |
Creation Spirituality Conversations |
The Christian Mystics: Wisdom for Our
Time
Join renowned theologian and spiritual teacher Matthew Fox in a thought-provoking conversation with Ruby Reed on the lives, work and wisdom of some of The Christian Mystics and their vital role in our time.
In this webinar, we’ll explore how the mystic’s path can empower us to cultivate inner transformation and inspire action in the world by saying "Yes" to life and "No" to injustice, whether through art, contemplation, or activism. Discover how their insights can help us rekindle our spiritual fire and meet the needs of our time with resilience and love. This free video promotes Matthew's upcoming 6-session course with Advaya, that will be released on May 8. |
Inspired by this post? Share your insights on BlueSky, Instagram, Universeodon, or Facebook using the hashtag #RevDrMatthewFox and tag Matt with @RevDrMatthewFox FOLLOW MATTHEW FOX: |
|
|
|
