The Creation
Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers Daily Meditations with Matthew Fox |
Hope: What Good Journalism & Citizens Rising Up Can Accomplish By Matthew Fox 12/02/2025 |
In
yesterday’s DM, we celebrated a victory for the free press and how The Guardian stood up to Trump’s $250 million lawsuit against them and won. We also honored writers like Mary Trump, Gil Duran and Thom Hartmann. |
Surely Common Dreams deserves a shout-out as well for the perspective they lend on behalf of a living democracy. Just recently, they offered an article by Thom Hartmann on a story I knew nothing about.* They reveal how, when John Adams was president (and Jefferson vice president and of another
party), Adams became more and more authoritarian to the point of jailing numerous newspaper editors who disagreed with him. He sought a war with France in order to bolster his political fortunes, since political togetherness often happens in times of war (cf. Trump currently threatening war with Venezuela as his poll numbers tumble). |
John Adams (seated) and Thomas Jefferson (standing). Cropped from a reproduction of a painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris. Public Domain, United States Library of Congress. Wikimedia Commons. |
The battle that
saved democracy occurred less in the government, since Adams’ party held both houses of Congress (sound familiar?) and more in state government and citizen resistance around the country. And how Jefferson and these more “local” movements eventually won the day and saved American democracy. As Hartmann puts it, Adams was
leading the United States in the direction of a fascistic state with a spectacularly successful strategy of vilifying Jefferson and his Party as anti-American and pro-French. He was America’s first Trump, albeit nowhere near as toxic or psychopathic. Adams shut down almost 30 newspapers and threw
publishers, editors, and writers into prison. But pamphleteers that generation’s version of Substack writers not affiliated with national publications—went to work, papering towns from New Hampshire to Georgia with posters and leaflets decrying Adams’ power grab and encouraging the state governments to stand tall with Thomas Jerrerson. People responded with protests in the streets. Adams employed the army to threaten protestors, but the states fought back. The key was to keep the protests non-violent. Jefferson knew that peaceful protests had greater power than police violence or even threats like Trump’s war-mongering against Venezuela today. |
Greg Palast reviews The Last American President: “a disturbing dive into
the roiling miasma of self-aggrandizing, self-deluding, psychologically shattered, wailing man-child…Commander-in-Chief.” | By the election of 1800, “the abuses of the Federalists were so burned into the people’s minds” that Jefferson was elected, freed the imprisoned newspaper editors, and the Federalist Party began its slide into oblivion two decades later. “As may well happen to Trump’s GOP two or four years
from now,” comments Hartmann. |
It
is a story of hope because it is a story of the people, inspired by alternative media, standing up to despotic power grabs. In his book on The Last President, Hartmann tells the story of how “America’s Voting Rights were stolen in 2024.” It is not a story I have seen covered in the dominant media. He calls
it Jim Crow 2.0…an old-fashioned, systematic campaign of voter suppression similar to the ones that characterized the fifty years or so following the collapse of Reconstruction. The media still has yet to acknowledge it, he declares. Under the claim of “voter fraud”—something so rare that you’re more likely to be hit by lightning than to ever encounter it—4.7 million voters were purged from voter rolls before the election. The purgings especially hit the black voter population hard in Florida, North Carolina, and Georgia, where black ballots were flagged twice the rate of white voters’ ballots. |
It was the KKK Playbook updated for the digital age… a coordinated national strategy, organized and executed by the GOP and several mostly billionaire-funded groups aligned with it. And once again, “the mainstream media refuses to even discuss” it. In black majority counties in |
The Thom Hartmann Program features investigative journalist Greg Palast: proving “Trump didn’t win 2024 Election. [It] was handed to Trump through underhanded voter suppression tactics.” |
Georgia, the number of ballot drop boxes was slashed by 75 percent. The result? Applying “the most conservative calculation” to the numbers, the suppression factor was “at least 2.3 percent of the vote,” or approximately 3,565,000 votes that largely would have gone to Kamala Harris. Were they
properly counted, she would have topped Trump’s official count by 1.2 million votes and won the Electoral College with 286 votes, winning Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia. This isn’t speculative: it’s the cold, hard math based on documented evidence from our own federal government. And it’s exactly what
Republican officials designed their laws to do.** |
*
Thom Hartmann, “Trump Delivers Darkest Thanksgiving in US History,” Common Dreams, November 28, 2025.
**Thom Hartmann, The Last American President: A Broken Man, a Corrupt Party, and a World on the Brink, pp. 99-102.
Banner Image: Presidential portraits: John Adams, by Gilbert Stuart); Thomas Jefferson, by Rembrandt Peale. Map of 1800 Electoral College votes: U.S. Geological Survey. Wikipedia
Commons. |
Queries for Contemplation Do you take hope and empowerment from the stories of good journalism that
stands up to power and awaken people to their own agency and to non-violent action? |
Responses are welcomed. To add your comment, or read other comments and enter into dialogue, please click HERE to go to our website and scroll down to the Comments field. |
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| Counterpoint: A Response to Peter Thiel’s Antichrist An Important Conversation with Matthew Fox and Gil Duran Did you miss this two-session series with its powerful counter-narrative rooted in wisdom, justice, and |
authentic spirituality? This is your
chance to add it to your library of classics to be watched, re-watched, and contemplated. Fox explores the archetype of Christ and Antichrist as it plays out in our world today but also in artists of old. He draws from the teachings of Jesus and Hildegard of Bingen, Meister Eckhart, Carl Jung, and other mystics and visionaries, illuminating the stark contrast between life-giving and life-destroying spiritual energies. Purchase HERE. |
UPCOMING EVENTS See Matthew Fox's full calendar HERE |
Join Matthew Fox in a lecture and Q&A on “Dorothee Soelle: Mystical Feminist Who Transformed Theology through Suffering,” a presentation in the Spiritual Wanderlust Mystics and Prophets series. Saturday, December 6, 9:00am-10:30am Register HERE. |
Celebrate the traditional feast of the Black Madonna and the Immaculate Conception when Rev. Dr. Matthew Fox joins award-winning singer/author Alessandra Belloni and music director John La Barbera in a 90-minute online event, “Honoring the Black Madonna as Our Lady of Freedom (Madonna della Libera),” in which they share the wisdom of the Black Madonna and her healing powers for our times when both democracy and Mother Earth are
in peril. Alessandra will also talk about her book Healing Journeys with the Black Madonna and present a 10-minute excerpt of her movie |
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Join Matthew Fox in a free 4-session Online Lecture/Discussion/Q&A event, “Creation Spirituality and the Celebrating & Healing of Mother Earth & Ourselves,” co-presented by the Episcopal Diocese of Wisconsin and Matthew Fox Legacy Project. Wednesdays, January 14, 21,28, February 4, 2026, 4:00pm-5:30pm
PT January 14 - Creation as an Original Blessing and the Springboard of Awe and Wonder January 21 - Sacred Mother Earth: The Holiness of Creation and Recovering the Cosmic Christ January 28 - The Cosmic Mass, and the Stations of the Cosmic Christ: Reinvigorating Liturgy and Rituals February 4 - Jesus as a Teacher of Democracy and the Renewal of Education and Values through the “10 Cs” Register 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 |
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Awakening the Divine Human: An Immersion in the Living Wisdom of Creation Spirituality …a week-long retreat in Sardinia, Italy, May 25-30, 2026 Join us on the sacred
island of Sardinia for a deeply immersive 6-day retreat rooted in the teachings of Matthew Fox, C.G. Jung, and the ancient wisdom of the land. Set along the turquoise shores and among the Neolithic sites of this timeless Mediterranean island, this retreat invites you into a transformative journey of reconnection—with Earth, Self, Gender, and the Divine. 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 HERE, Meeting ID: 886 6530 2478 Learn more at www.orderofthesacredearth.org Creation Spirituality Conversations |
Join Matthew Fox for a transformative 4-part series that brings together some of the most provocative spiritual leaders, thinkers, and activists of our time. Together, we’ll explore the deep spiritual roots of this political moment and uncover pathways toward
collective action, resilience, and renewal. Learn more HERE. |
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