The Creation Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers Daily Meditations with Matthew Fox |
By Gianluigi Gugliermetto 9/24/2025 |
The comments I received after last’s week meditation on the Order of the Sacred Earth (see DM for Sept. 20) made me think deeply
on the issue of making vows. Vows, of course, include commitments but they are fundamentally different, as is indicated by the fact that I can be overcommitted, but not “over-vowed.” |
Commitments are about things that we promise to do. One can have “a sacred commitment” but I would argue that, in such a case, one has stepped into the territory of a vow. In the book The Order of the Sacred Earth, Skylar Wilson writes: "The Order includes making a vow and discerning
commitments to live by." Vow and commitments are here related as parent and children, in the sense that the latter descend from the first. Also one must be smart in choosing which |
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commitments are the best for each situation, but they can be tried and changed as necessary, while the vow remains the ground for those commitments to flourish. We say that vows can be broken to signify how sacred and important vows are. However, countless people — at least in my generation and previous generations — have been broken by the notion that they have broken their vows,
especially marriage vows. Where does the need to punish oneself for such circumstances come from? From the moralization of the vow, that is, from treating one’s vow as a moral commitment — the other equally unuseful attitude is of course that of pretending that nothing happened. |
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fulfill a commitment, we can speak of a specific moral failure. But if we treat a vow in the same way, we are making a spiritual mistake. It’s bad enough to discover that one’s vow is unable to carry one through life! Living through the shattering of vows is like being orphaned! It’s not at all a matter of being right or wrong. We need to understand that we don’t carry our
vows, and we are not morally responsible for them. It is our vows that carry us, as long as they can. A vow is the expression of a deep |
hope, a cry of the heart. It’s an ideal, that is, it is a tender flower to which we ascribe the power to support us in life — if we do our part, of course. Indeed, what is truly spiritual about a vow is that we utter it in response to a call from the divine depth of our hearts. We are not at fault if we utter it
in complete sincerity but then time tells us that our vow was not truly a free vow (we were coerced externally or internally) or that it was not the right vow for us (but we had not enough clarity to see that). Vows are not about devising the perfect route for one’s life. They are about responding to an inner call that has
become irresistible. I— and countless others — have made the mistake of not always understanding this simple distinction. |
A vow needs to be deep enough to support a series of moral commitments through life, and broad enough to accommodate different cir- cumstances that may arise. Most especially, it must warm our heart and kindle our imagination. Each and every day. |
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We all make vows, especially in our youth, even though often in informal ways. When one commits to a life of empathy and reconciliation, rather than one of strife and enmity, one is making indeed a vow before God. Yet making formal vows, at any age, as an answer to the divine call, can be a very important tool of long-term resistance and character-building. It can give us a kind of strength that is unparalleled by any device of our minds. It is something objective in
the spiritual realm, which the modern materialistic consciousness cannot understand. To be continued. |
Matthew Fox , Skylar Wilson, and jJennifer Listug, Order of the Sacred Earth, page 90. Banner image: “A Vow Under the Druid’s Oak” was painted in 1867 by Louis Dilbeek. It was also given other titles: “The Baptism by the Druid” or “Spring with Our Ancestors.” Wikimedia Commons. Public Domain. |
Queries for Contemplation Did you make the experience of a broken vow? How has it been a spiritual
experience for you? |
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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