Adrienne Rich reminds us that motherhood is primal in lives of both boys and girls. It is with a woman’s hands, eyes, body, voice, that we associate our primal sensations, our earliest social experience….Most of us first know both love and disappointment, power and tenderness, in the person of a woman.
Moreover, Motherhood is everywhere, since most women have been mothers in the sense of tenders and carers for the young. Yet there is often an unconscious resistance to motherhood in men.
There is much to suggest that the male mind has always been haunted by the force of the idea of dependence on a woman for life itself, the son’s constant effort to assimilate, compensate for or deny the fact that he is ‘of woman born.’
One reason why we need to move beyond the divorce of science and religion which was so prominent in the modern era is that much appreciation of creativity and motherhood was lost when religion and science split in the 17th century.
The 17th century began with the church torturing and then burning Giordano Bruno at the stake—not a good omen for the marriage of science and religion that was to come (including the condemnation of Galileo 33 years later).
A kind of schizophrenia set in when science became more divorced from conscience and wisdom on the one hand, but religion became more isolated and introverted and cut off from the universe, more preoccupied with sin and redemption than awe, wonder, gratitude and birthing. Yet the universe continues its vast birthing.
Potter, philosopher and poet M. C. Richards spoke about the price our culture paid for the divorce of religion and science, psyche and cosmos: There is palpable disunion. This split obstructs the poetic consciousness; it is a characteristic malady of our society….The inner soul withdraws, goes underground, splits off from the part that keeps walking around. Vitality ebbs. Psychic disturbance is acute. Suicide may be attempted.
Has much of American politics and media of late have contracted into a state of “psychic disturbance”? Is the denial of climate change a kind of suicide? And the waging of war and threatening of nuclear war?
If Adrienne Rich is correct when she tells us that patriarchy always embeds “fatalistic self- hatred,” is that what is going on in war? In climate change and its denial? And in dismantling democracy (with no alternative other than autocracy)?
Adapted from Matthew Fox, Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth, p. 1.
To read a transcript of Matthew Fox,’s video teaching, click HERE.
Banner Image: The love of a mother and child. Photo by Eye for Ebony on Unsplash.
Queries for Contemplation
Dwell on M. C. Richard’s naming of the result of psyche and cosmos being rent asunder in the modern consciousness. Is vitality ebbing? Psychic disturbance increasing? Suicide more prevalent? What is that telling you?
Recommended Reading
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth
Fox’s spirituality weds the healing and liberation found in North American Creation Spirituality and in South American Liberation Theology. Creation Spirituality challenges readers of every religious and political persuasion to unite in a new vision through which we learn to honor the earth and the people who inhabit it as the gift of a good and just Creator.
“A watershed theological work that offers a common ground for religious seekers and activists of all stripes.” — Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice.
13 thoughts on “Motherhood as Primal”
Matthew, Today our Queries for Contemplation ask us: “Dwell on M. C. Richard’s naming of the result of psyche and cosmos being rent asunder in the modern consciousness.” Richard’s herself says there is a split which obstructs our poetic consciousness; and she says that it is a characteristic malady of our society. “The inner soul withdraws, goes underground, splits off from the part that keeps walking around”–like the living dead–our souls have gone underground but are walking around like the living dead.
So you ask: “Is vitality ebbing? Psychic disturbance increasing? Suicide more prevalent?” My answer is: Yes, yes, yes !!! And so you ask: “What is that telling you?” That science and spirituality need to meet and kiss, just as justice and peace have kissed. I say science and “spirituality” because “religion,” because of its dogmatic and institutional forms, make it almost impossible for them to be flexible enough to change with the times and with new discoveries, which could require them to amend their beliefs in light of new evidence…
I too, see the ebb and flow of vitality wanning, and the disturbance of the psychi increasing, resulting in so much inner pain that the temptation to either numb oneself with drugs and alcohol… or end one’s life appears as the only option available to either ease or end this constant state and condition of suffering and anguish. The cause… disconnection, separation and fragmentation. From what… a sense of belonging… of knowing one’s connection, one’s union, one’s wholeness… to something, to someone much larger than oneself… that one is apart of. Can science and spirituality bridge the unfathomable gap? Potentially yes.
However, what about those whom are unable to find their way to the bridge… those so deep and lost in the chasim… those whom are blinded by their own inner anguish, entangled in their chronic pain, shackled to the chains of their suffering… those wandering in the absence of light, hidding in the shadows. How can we descend to meet these ones… where they are… as they are… that we may speak truth that gives life to these dry dead bones. In what ways can we gently and tenderly touch their wounds and begin to unwrap the sackcloth of death that they have enclosed themselves within, that they may awaken to their true beauty, their inherent goodness and the value and virtues of this… already there, buried deep within themselves… awaiting to be tended to, nurtured, cared for, and cultivated… through acts of unconditional loving, compassion and mercy showered upon them… that washes away the layers of lies that they have believed to be true? Will mercy and misery meet and kiss, becoming the bridge that these ones need? Yes, the potential is there for this too.
Jeanette, You speak of those who “are blinded by their own inner anguish, entangled in their chronic pain, shackled to the chains of their suffering… those wandering in the absence of light, hiding in the shadows.” I too am troubled by these people, and I ask myself, “How Can I Help?” (a title of one of Ram Dass’ books). And you have answered this question with your closing words: “through acts of unconditional loving, compassion and mercy showered upon them… that washes away the layers of lies that they have believed to be true? Will mercy and misery meet and kiss, becoming the bridge that these ones need? Yes, the potential is there for this too.” Thank you for your comment !!!
Thank you for this meditation. For centuries life in the western world has placed a premium on the development, exclusivity, and separation of perceived contraries that in reality are seamlessly one: mind from body, head from heart, spirit from matter, spirit from soul, masculine from feminine, sacred from secular, etc. The collaborative efforts of science and spirituality afford the best opportunities for removing these schizoid walls of partition, and of arriving at the most comprehensive understanding of the universe to date. If Matthew or anyone is interested, I’ve created an integral model that explains how all these apparent splits consist of and are joined by a common element universally, one that is named repeatedly in Genesis 1 alone, and throughout Scripture. This integral paradigm was heavily influenced by Matthew’s Creation Spirituality work. I offered this prior, but in an awkwardly offensive way. Plz forgive me, as fear can drive one to do and say indelicate things. My inexcusable frustration then was from a contemplative soul with a timely voice and vision, and no audience or means to reach them before his time is up. Though of late, have become more peacefully resigned to same. Truth be told, these DM’s keep me personally grounded and hopeful that mankind will one day prrceive in wholes, and reconcile the multiple tensions that so painfully beset and malignantly divide it.
Joe, Thank you so much for your comment and that you have “created an integral model that explains how all these apparent splits consist of and are joined by a common element universally, one that is named repeatedly in Genesis 1 alone, and throughout Scripture.” I’m sure that we would all like to see a brief version of how your model works !!!
My hope is in the generation that is in the period of required educational years of science and technology — that they will learn truth and develop insight from the seed planted in Creation and that they better understand the source of Helium and Hydrogen.
Lois, Thank you for your comment. I know that Helium and Hydrogen were two of the very first elements to emerge from the “Big Bang” but what were their source ???
Richard, the word “universe” means “to turn around on one thing.” Theology tells us that one thing, or cosmic constant, is God. That takes care of the theological definition, though it explains nothing. But what of the scientific definition? What is the one constant in the universe according to physics? The answer that satisfies that question is the same 5 letter word used 10 times in Genesis 1 alone, and the distinguishing feature of divinity in all religions. I can explain how in detail, and have done so in book form.
Joe, is the word SPOKE… to make manifest… the Axis Mundi… the central pillar of the Tree of Life… that connects the macrocosim to the microcism… the as above to the so below.
Email me at jeanettemetler@gmail.com with your answer, if you so desire to.
I love Mystery and science as an evolutionary process. I do not feel a need to know necessarily but welcome the inspiration that Nature reveals as life unfolds in my time.
It is all far beyond me but the glimpses are truly awesome as I sense the nurturing of Mother Earth.
Wow Matthew, your poem is beautiful and haunting with the question of where is human consciousness, psyche, taking us in this troubled and destructive world ‘he’ (mainly the toxic male psyche) continues to create… Our faith and hope is that our Cosmic Christ Consciousness, God’s Loving~Wise~Creative Presence with-in our lives will consciously grow and rebirth enough of us to help us lovingly and creatively prevail to restore our Mother Earth and All Her creatures, and our loving, just relations with one another….
🔥❤️🙏
Thank you for that poem and meditation. I always start my day with DM, but my day starts many hours after others’ as I’m based in the UK. Thank you. Michael
Yes, our planet is a jewel set in a most exquisite setting: the cosmos, the darkness of space, which we now know is filled with astonishing light. In my play, “Puzzles and Borderlines,” astronaut Jane compares it to the pearl in Vermeer’s painting Girl with a Pearl Earring. “You have to ignore the whole rest of the painting to see it. Your eye is drawn into the darkness just off center. And there it is. Alone.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELMnjsWfxWo&t=136s
As you reflect, Matthew, there is a higher percentage of mystics within the community of astronauts than within the Christian church. It is that awareness that led me to write my play. I hope I have done it justice.