Thurman tells us what most occupied his efforts in spirituality:
All my life I have been seeking to validate, beyond all ambivalences and frustrations, the integrity of the inner life. I have sensed the urgency to find a way to act and react responsibly out of my own center. I have sought a way of life that could come under the influence of, and be informed by, the fruits of the inner life.
Again,
I am concerned about the removing of the last barriers between the outer and the inner aspects of religious experience.
The “inner” and the “outer” life—the mystical and the creative prophetic—this is the effort of all those committed to living out the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality.
Thurman talks about the “inwardness of religion” and the “outwardness of religion.” The former are Paths One and Two, the Via Positiva and the Via Negativa; and the latter are Paths Three and Four, the Via Creativa and the Via Transformativa.
The Via Creativa bridges the two and is celebrated in many guises by Thurman who approvingly cites a thinker who said that Imagination in humans is in fact the Image of God in us, “and those unto whom it is given shall see God.” To follow our religious imagination is to “operate from a new center,” one that is derived from our experience of the Divine.
Thurman is talking about art as meditation and how,
…when a person surrenders and has now a new center which takes the form of a central demand, then her powers are pooled and focused, and may be directed to achieve impossible ends.
With this surrender one “loses his life and finds it.”
The self is not lost in this process—rather there occurs
…an irradiation of the self that makes it alive with Godness and in various ways. There is awakened the desire to be Godlike. This is no vague pious wish, no moist-eyed sentimentality, but rather a robust affirmation of the whole spirit of the man.
Thurman calls what happens an “integration” or “creative synthesis.”
The fear of death is let go of—
Death no longer appears as the great fear or specter. The power of death over the individual life is broken.
When we truly resurrect and lose our fear of death, we enter into commitment.
There is no more searching question than this: Under what circumstances would you yield your life with enthusiasm?
Thurman did not just theorize about creativity. He practiced it. In his sermons, in his teachings, writings, liturgical creations and in his counseling of civil rights activists, he is evidently creating as he moves along. In his church of the Fellowship of All Peoples he created a unique interfaith and interracial post-denominational way of praying and doing church.
Hildegard too put great prominence on the Via Creativa. “Wisdom is present in all creative works,” she declares. She practiced this path by way of writing, composing, painting, preaching and founding new monasteries among other things.
Adapted from Matthew Fox, “Howard Thurman: A Creation-Centered Mystic,” in Creation Spirituality Magazine, March/April 1991, p. 9.
See also, Matthew Fox, Creativity: Where the Divine and the Human Meet.
Banner Image: “Trying the Light” by Jayson Musson Mercerized cotton stretched over cotton. Title from song lyrics by hip-hop duo OutKast: “Trying to find our spot off in that light, light off in that spot.” Photo by Regan Vercruysse on Flickr.
Does Thurman’s commitment to the “inner life” speak to the kind of journey that Thomas Merton says is far more important than flights to far away planets? He does so not to disparage ambitious truth seeking but to emphasize that if we ignore the inner work we will just bring it with us wherever we go. Meanwhile, without the inner work, racism, sexism, species narcissism and more go unchecked.
Recommended Reading
Creativity: Where the Divine and Human Meet
Because creativity is the key to both our genius and beauty as a species but also to our capacity for evil, we need to teach creativity and to teach ways of steering this God-like power in directions that promote love of life (biophilia) and not love of death (necrophilia). Pushing well beyond the bounds of conventional Christian doctrine, Fox’s focus on creativity attempts nothing less than to shape a new ethic.
“Matt Fox is a pilgrim who seeks a path into the church of tomorrow. Countless numbers will be happy to follow his lead.” –Bishop John Shelby Spong, author, Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism, Living in Sin
Events
Join Matthew Fox for a thought-provoking 7-week course: Answer the Call for an Uncommon Life Through the Mystical Teachings of St. Hildegard, Tuesdays, 6/15 to 7/27. While the course has begun, registration remains open, with recordings of past classes available. Learn more HERE.
Join us for a Virtual Teach-in with Isa Gucciardi and Matthew Fox, hosted by Rev. Cameron Trimble.
August 13-14, 2021 (Fri-Sat)
Shamanism in Buddhism and Christianity
Session 1: Friday, August 13 at 4pm-6pm PT
Session 2: Saturday, August 14 at 9am-12pm PT
Session 3: Saturday, August 14 at 12:30pm-2:30pm PT
9 thoughts on “Thurman & Hildegard on Inner and Outer Work and Creativity”
I love today’s meditation.
I,ve been reading Thomas Merton of late and this really resonates.
I love how you describe operating from a new centre when we let go in placing our identity and securities in those things we think sustain us but ultimately don,t, they are finite.
Perhaps this letting go is a death to self and ego (centric) and more eco (centric). Eco meaning our true home.
Thank you.
True surrender is the heart becoming pure in finding the “new center” that has it’s “central demand” of whatever the person is undertaking. Being “truthful” to the Self and others in surrender to “what is” is requisite to a loving undertaking. Mystics like Howard Thurman and Matt Fox get this vital point across. Executing and pondering this truism while undertaking a project of love can have miraculous results or as Thurman says: may be directed to achieve impossible ends.
Steve, You’ve summed it up beautifully, “Perhaps this letting go is a death to self and ego (centric) and more eco (centric). Eco meaning our true home.”
…when a person surrenders and has now a new center which takes the form of a central demand, then her powers are pooled and focused, and may be directed to achieve impossible ends. (Quote from todays meditation)
Give Us THIS DAY, from Liturgical Press, is daily prayer for today’s Catholics. In the Reflection for July 19, 2021, A Matter of Focus, sociologist Susan Pitchford sites philosopher Soren Kiekegaard who said that “purity of heart is to will one thing.” The Kiekegaard statement about the “pure heart” is what Howard Thurman means in the above quote from today’s Meditation, that is, the “new center”, the “central demand” stem from the pure heart of concentrating on one thing. I found a new center with my central demand of performing stand-up comedy and I had a great mystical experience that helped me know that we truly are ONE.
Gary, thank you for sharing the words from “Give Us This Day”–I especially like how Pitchford speaks of Kierkegaard and the “pure heart” and then how you show a connection as well with Howard Thurman’s “new center.”
The words, “wisdom is present in all creative works”, speaks to me. I see our life journey, the unfolding of our becoming, and all that this is, as the creative work in which wisdom is indeed present. The inner work is our co-creative participation within this process, through which wisdom reveals itself. Sacred journaling, self-reflection, meditation, contemplation, expressive arts, spiritual reading and writing, creating music, spending time in nature and ceremonial rituals are some of the artistic tools I use in this co-creative participation within my inner work, in which I do discover intuitively the gifts of wisdom offered that the Spirit reveals and makes known to me through the imaginative, creative language She speaks. There is a fluid movement within this co-creative process as one learns to surrender, opening oneself to receive intuitvely that which arises to the surface from within, a flowing current of trusting this sacred communion and union and the reality of this intimate relationship offered all, to engage with. The invitation is always there, awaiting our response.
Very different people and times, very similar mystics. }:- a.m.
Thank you for that flash mob video–the music and the people watching in awe brought me to tears. What might happen if we practiced this kind of creativity in response to an angry mob or to tense law enforcement stand offs in protests? What a miracle might come out of it!
Sue, My hope would be that only good would come from it!