For more than six months we have been meditating on and exploring our response to the Sacred and offering what I hope is some support for our spiritual journeys… our living in this amazing but dangerous world, in an amazing but dangerous period in history, but hopefully living in depth.
We began on Mother’s Day with honoring Mother Earth and the Divine Feminine, so neglected and choked off when patriarchy rules as it has for many centuries.
We moved on to the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality because they name, archetypally I think, the depths of our human experience and therefore, of the work of Spirit in and through us.
Of course we are not “done” with them for they course through our lives and lived experience in and out, alone and together, on a daily basis and beyond. The Via Transformativa is not the last of the paths in the sense of finality; rather it takes us back to the Via Positiva again but hopefully with a deeper and a wider sense. The whole purpose of the VT after all is to set the table for more people and more beings to enjoy life more fully, i.e. to enter more completely into the Via Positiva, Via Negativa, Via Creativa.
This is why the symbol I use for the Four Paths is an ever expanding and open-ended spiral. Life is a spiral; DNA is a spiral; the galaxies are spirals. Why not our spiritual journeys also?
Just this past week the news has been very dark in America. The Impeachment hearings of a president and his many enablers are in our face regularly. In addition, we have heard the attorney general of the United States deliver a shocking diatribe based on sick religion and even sicker politics at a major Catholic University.
Also this week we learned that the Catholic Bishops of the United States elected as their head a bishop who has been a member of the extreme right wing organization Opus Dei.
As I noted in my DM two days ago, I do not know the man nor am I judging him personally. But I do know Opus Dei and have written in depth about it.* And it is alarming that an Opus Dei devote now speaks for the Catholic bishops of United States. Therefore we have been examining more about Opus Dei and posing questions for him that all Americans—not just Catholics—deserve answers to. And his enablers, all those bishops who gave him this power—ought to step up with answers as well.
It is fitting that all this happened as we were discussing the Via Transformativa, the prophetic path.
See Matthew Fox, A New Reformation: Creation Spirituality and the Transformation of Christianity, theses 20f., 30, 34.
*Matthew Fox, The Pope’s War: Why Ratzinger’s Secret Crusade Has Imperiled the Church and How It Can Be Saved, pp. 106-124.
Banner Image: “Chambered Nautilus” Photographer unknown. From Pexels.
Queries for Contemplation
Meister Eckhart says: “All things praise God. Even evil praises God and blesses God.” This is a hard saying. Meditate on it.
Can you meditate on the Impeachment hearings; or on William Barr’s histrionic speech; or the American Catholic Church electing an Opus Dei bishop as its leader –and find blessing there? How so?
Recommended Reading
The Pope’s War offers a provocative look at three decades of corruption in the Catholic Church, focusing on Josef Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI. The final section in the book focuses on birthing a truly catholic christianity. Matthew Fox presents insights from his 12-year, up-close-and-personal battle with Ratzinger, tracing the historical roots of degradation in the Church and offering a new way to understand why Benedict XVI is now mired in crisis as Pope. Fox then outlines his vision for a new Catholicism-one that is not Vatican-based but truly universal, celebrating critical thinking, diversity, and justice.
A modern-day theologian’s call for the radical transformation of Christianity that will allow us to move once again from the hollow trappings of organized religion to genuine spirituality. A New Reformation echoes the Reformation initiated by Martin Luther in 1517 and offers a new vision of Christianity that values the Earth, honors the feminine, and respects science and deep ecumenism.
5 thoughts on “Praying the News – Part 1”
I read the Mueller Report and watched the impeachment hearings and can now move another piece of the puzzle into place with the additional understanding of Opus Dei operatives involved at the highest levels of church and state. Though I am deeply disturbed, I will not surrender hope. I intend to do my throat chakra work and break my silence. It is easy to speak with like-minded friends, but not so easy with family members.
Dear Lynn,
Thank you for writing and sharing your story of transformation into a full throated fifth chakra prophet. Surely your willingness to break the surface of the pleasant white dominated culture we live in to face the trust about the attitudes and actions of the our power brokers is an act of courage. May your courage hold fast when you share your understanding with others, and may you find words for your family that enable them to begin to face the truth as well. Sometimes just a well placed word or short phrase is enough.
Hold on to hope – for all of us, and have a Happy Thanksgiving!
Gail Sofia Ransom
For the Daily Meditation Team
For those not-in-the-know about Matt’s fiery reference herein to AG Barr’s remarks, see cool, calm (analytically accurate) 10/18/19 NCR opinion piece at link here: https://www.ncronline.org/news/opinion/distinctly-catholic/notre-dame-had-right-host-barr-his-talk-was-ridiculously-stupid. Useful [not a raging diatribe]. 👨⚖
Thank you for your voice and your courage in speaking out. Netflix has a special called “The Family”, which is about the right wing (in my opinion) religious movement beginning in the 1930’s that has had a tremendous impact and power in politics. I do not recall if Opus Dei was mentioned in this group, that operated in complete secrecy for decades until the 2000’s. In my opinion, both of these groups are very dangerous and have too much power still. We must remain firm in love and hope and remember that “even evil praises God”–not easy in these times. Humor is absolutely required for my own sanity1
Dear Sue,
Thank you for sharing your concerns and your reminder that the abuse of clerical power is not only through Opus Dei. Do we not also hear about abuses that happen in so many other religions and sects as well? Ashrams, temples, cults, churches, yoga studios (yes, really.) The interesting thing to me is that we hear news of sexual abuse by those in power and financial abuse by those in power, but we don’t hear enough about cultural abuse, racial abuse, moral abuse or ecological abuse. These are the abuses that Matt is asking us to examine and resist. Watch the comedians and then write letters!!
Gail Sofia Ransom
For the Daily Meditation Team