For several weeks we have been honoring the seventh chakra and exploring its many deep dimensions whereby it gathers light from the other six chakras and links up with other light beings.
Recently, we have capped that teaching with the theme of the “spark of the soul” that is so dear to Meister Eckhart but also to the Jewish and Sufi mystical traditions as well. (We will be considering these shortly).
But we have also pointed out how a distorted seventh chakra is a gateway to all kind of chaos and havoc and evil including Envy and Lies, Self-Hatred and Violence, Hatred and War, a sort of apogee of the release of reptilian brain energy, the opposite of playing out our capacity for compassion and the best of our mammal brains.
On display in the commission report on Thursday was both the best of humanity and the worst of humanity. Among the best was the hard work to gather the facts behind the January 6 violent insurrection, the intellectual probing and thousands of documents and interviews gathered to get to the truth. A kind of soldiering for truth was at work, a hunter-gatherer energy that displayed that important archetype of authentic masculinity.
There was also the careful presentation of what was found admirably presented by Liz Cheney. There was lots of team work in evidence also and chairman Bennie Thompson deserves credit for that. There was the testimony of a real Shero, police woman Caroline Edwards, who endured severe physical traumas during the attack, being beaten unconscious, but returned to her job, slipping around in the blood of her fellow police trying to defend the capital and legislators trying to certify a presidential election.
Human courage was on display not only in her story but in her coming to congress and the nation to tell her story still one more time.
There were those who abided by their oath to serve the foundation of American democracy, the constitution, over individuals or parties.
And there were those who broke their oaths to do the same and apparently understood they had done so since it was revealed that several congresspeople were seeking presidential pardons for their bad decisions.
There was human creativity on display as with Nick Quested the film maker shared his footage of the mob violence and also leaders of the most extreme gangs of white supremacists meeting in a parking lot to coordinate their game plan for attacking the nation’s capital.
Human violence and killing of community almost prevailed. It is still very much with us today in the form of making voting as difficult as possible especially for communities of color; and carrying on the lying about a lost election even though even the previous attorney general called it “crazy” and “BS” to the losing president’s face.
There is much to ponder about the current state of politics in America but it comes down to a failure in living our humanness fully. The spark of the soul in all of us can be covered over by ambition and envy, narcissism and hatred. We will learn more surely in further commission meetings ahead.
See Matthew Fox, The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors To Awaken the Sacred Masculine, pp. 43-104.
To read the transcript of Matthew Fox’s video teaching, click HERE.
Banner Image: Sunrise meditation, Joshua Tree, United States. Photo by Darius Bashar on Unsplash
Queries for Contemplation
Did you recognize authentic masculinity–and toxic masculinity–in the story of January 6 and all that preceded it has followed from it? How oath-keepers and proud boys and fighting for white supremacy and wiping out the constitution and community as the nation recognizes it and hiring such hateful groups is a pitiful representation of what authentic manliness means?
Recommended Reading
The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine
To awaken what Fox calls “the sacred masculine,” he unearths ten metaphors, or archetypes, ranging from the Green Man, an ancient pagan symbol of our fundamental relationship with nature, to the Spiritual Warrior….These timeless archetypes can inspire men to pursue their higher calling to connect to their deepest selves and to reinvent the world.
“Every man on this planet should read this book — not to mention every woman who wants to understand the struggles, often unconscious, that shape the men they know.” — Rabbi Michael Lerner, author of The Left Hand of God
5 thoughts on “The January 6 Committee Hearing: A Report on the 7th Chakra?”
Matthew, These are quite the Queries for Contemplation! First you ask us: “Did you recognize authentic masculinity–and toxic masculinity–in the story of January 6 and all that preceded it has followed from it?” Yes, I did, but it wasn’t just any kind of toxic masculinity–it was racist-white supremacist, destructive, and coveting having their own way at any costs. You ask, “There is much to ponder about the current state of politics in America, but it comes down to a failure in living our humanness fully.” In one way our current state of politics has come down to the fact the many HAVE lived out their humanness–its just that it is the part that St. Paul disowns in Romans chapter seven. On the other hand, if they would live by the spark of the soul in all of us, they could withstand the calls of ambition and envy, narcissism and hatred which are at the root of all of the problems that stem from toxic masculinity. Then you ask, “How do oath-keepers and proud boys and fighting for white supremacy and wiping out the constitution and community as the nation recognizes it, while hiring such hateful groups seems to be a pitiful representation of what authentic manliness means.” Though they may say, THEY are the TRUE Americans, they are not, for they reject and fight against the very premises our nation was founded upon. Ours is a nation of native peoples, immigrants from other countries, and slaves which were liberated via the Emancipation Proclamation through the bloody civil war. Healthy masculinity keeps its anger at bay, its aggressiveness relaxed, its assertiveness patient–in a word, sacred. If only men could recognize the sacred within themselves and act according to that…
With some exceptions, certain occupations and professions seem to select for certain personality types. While negative (toxic) stereotypes abound about self-serving elected officials, politicians, judges, lawyers, and others who gravitate toward positions of power and money, there’s more than a grain of truth to them, especially today. Enough, I think, to note an inverse relationship between those who rise to those positions of “officialdom,” and by contrast, those who serve, hands on, on the front-lines of human suffering. Said Jesus, the greatest among us sees, identifies with and reaches out to him and the sacred as they appear and suffer in others. The law of attraction, where like seeks like in ‘birds of a feather’ fashion, will not find an Eckhart, a Merton, a Matthew Fox, or a Mother Theresa breathing the stifling air in the halls (sepulcher) of Congress. Neither would the lot of elected officials be found, towel in foot washing on bender knee, save for a photo-op. In the kingdom of God, as it plays out in a blessed but dark and suffering world, the cream always ‘rises’ to the bottom. As it’s ambassador, be content to reside there mostly unrecognized, unthanked, unheard, undervalued, and underpaid (if at all.) Any volunteers?
A BIG ‘thank you’ to Rev Matthew Fox for giving us the language of Creation Spirituality to understand and name what surrounds us. Reading Rev Matthew’s Meditations and his book ‘Confessions’ I have learned so much better how to reflect and grow spiritually through all that is and that happens around me. It feels as if I am undergoing a new ‘spiritual birth’ on top of meditation practice already in place in my life. There is great hope available here to reform and reconstruct our suffering earth.
Too many members of congress have broken their sacred oath to their country and lts people.They are deaf to the cries of the suffering and the inequality rampant here and are inbondage to money and power. They have hearts of stone and speak lies with forked tongues to confuse their constituents. Their eyes are soulless and their egos boundless.
Thank you for the archetypes to apply to the positive and hopefully productive response to the criminal mob that created mayhem, injury, and death on Jan. 6. Many were hunters and gatherers, and many were Spiritual Warriors, especially Caroline Edwards., all representing authentic masculinity, in contrast to the mob. I refuse to dignify any of them even with the title of insurrectionist because in my mind they are simply criminals and represent the very worst of toxic masculinity, men and women alike.
Just a small point, and probably no one else would notice, but the lovely banner image unfortunately brought to mind the perverted image recommending “tanning” for masculine potency put out by the guy on Fox “News”, Tucker Carlson. Sorry. Some images just cannot be unseen.