Week of 2/5-10/2024: The Return of the Divine Mother; Celebrating Chenu’s Feast Day

February 5, 2024: Calling on the Cosmic Mother at the Hour of Our Creativity
We have been exploring the original version of the “Hail Mary” prayer, which lacks the 16th century addendum that talks of being sinners and the fear of death. In Matthew’s proposed addendum to the original 12th century prayer, we accept our divine powers of creativity for birthing compassion and justice by calling on the Divine Feminine, the Cosmic Mother of the universe, to be with us “at the hour of our creativity.” It is in our creativity that “the Divine and the Human Meet” as Matthew teaches in his book, Creativity: Where the Divine and the Human Meet. Unfortunately, sometimes our creativity can get us in trouble (weapons of war, polluting factories and vehicles, etc.), but that same creativity can also redeem us.

February 6, 2024: The Revolution in Values the Cosmic Mother Represents
We have been running on patriarchal “values” for long enough, values that appeal to the reptilian brain of power-over and domination, of “I win, you lose.” The rise of fascism happening now represents a patriarchal backlash to advances of justice and fairness toward women, gay and trans people, black Americans, and Gaia herself. It is time for the love and compassion of the Divine Mother. Pope Francis, whose people fled Italy in the 1930’s because of rising fascism, ought to write an encyclical on how fascism, an ideology of hate and power-over, is incompatible with everything Jesus taught and lived and died for. 

February 7, 2024: The Return of the Divine Feminine & the Revolution It Represents
Carl Jung says that archetypes return when we need them. In the face of the fascism and patriarchal privilege so evident today, we very much need the archetype of the Cosmic Mary and the Black Madonna. Today’s appeals court decision turning down an attempt to declare that any president is immune from prosecution rejects the notion of one individual’s unchecked power over the people and the common good. We need to remember that we are part of a larger whole, a sacred cosmos, represented by the archetype of the Cosmic Mary, the Divine Mother, as well as the Black Madonna. 

February 8, 2024: The Return of the Mother: Julian, Andrew Harvey, Leonardo Boff
We have been meditating on the Divine Mother and the compassion and love she embodies, so needed in this world today. Andrew Harvey, in his book The Return of the Mother, said: The Mother doesn’t just want to be loved; she wants that love to be made active in all things and in all moments so that the reign of her love can begin on earth. Meanwhile, Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff in his book, The Maternal Face of God, says that Mary brings both “denunciation and proclamation, prophecy and liberation.” He says: We can develop a prophetic image of Mary…as the strong, determined woman, the woman committed to the messianic liberation for the poor from the historical social injustice under which they suffer.

February 9, 2024: Harvey, Boff, and the Call of the Mother, continued
We are reflecting on the wisdom of both Andrew Harvery and Leonardo Boff as they talk about the need for a return of the Divine Mother. Harvey believes that if Christianity were to receive the sacred call of the Divine Mother in Mary it could also at long last open itself to the force of Christ. Because they are the same force, Mary’s and Christ’s. Harvey recognizes the kingdom that Christ called for as a place where there are no more poor, where there is no more cruelty and exploitation and injustice, where the forests are safe and the seas clean and the world protected, and human life and human love recognized as utterly sacred and holy. Harvey talks of personally having encountered Christ by way of Mary—the Christ who is as much the son of the Mother as of the Father. He discovered for the first time, with awe and amazement, the overwhelming presence of the sacred feminine in Christ himself.

February 10, 2024: Celebrating Feast Days of Père Chenu & Sister Dorothy Stang
Two very special people died on February 11th and 12th in years past: Matthew’s mentor, Père Chenu, and the activist/martyr Sister Dorothy Stang, who was once a student of Matthew’s. Chenu is notable for having coined the term “Creation Spirituality.” Chenu was beloved by many. The eminent French historian Jacques le Goff, an atheist, at one point in his eulogy in Notre Dame Cathedral spoke to Chenu in the second person, saying: You were in your existence the light, the vivacity of generous thunderstorms, a man who did not ignore the darkness but who followed the light, always present, ever flashing. A man always open to others, attentive to them. Human, too human some would say, but not those who have known you…. You have taught us courage, firmness, fearlessness, even resistance–but in humility. Matthew is currently writing a book on Chenu.

Recommended Reading

Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality
Selected with an Introduction by Charles Burack

To encapsulate the life and work of Matthew Fox would be a daunting task for any save his colleague Dr. Charles Burack, who had the full cooperation of his subject. Fox has devoted 50 years to developing and teaching the tradition of Creation Spirituality and in doing so has reinvented forms of education and worship.  His more than 40 books, translated into 78 languages, are inclusive of today’s science and world spiritual traditions and have awakened millions to the much neglected earth-based mystical tradition of the West. Essential Writings begins by exploring the influences on Fox’s life and spirituality, then presents selections from all Fox’s major works in 10 sections.
“The critical insights, the creative connections, the centrality of Matthew Fox’s writings and teaching are second to none for the radical renewal of Christianity.” ~~ Richard Rohr, OFM.

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.