Two Days of Celebration this Week: Juneteenth & Summer Solstice

FROM THE ARCHIVE: 6/24/2020.

This week we celebrate two days of celebration—Juneteenth and the Summer Solstice. 

The Feast Day of Juneteenth honors the enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation, and resilience in the face of 400 years of enslavement and ongoing oppression of Black people. Slaves ripped from their land, culture and religion; the middle passage; hundreds of years of slavery; the Civil War; Jim Crow; no voting rights; segregation; ongoing racism.  

We are reminded also of 500 years of ethnic and cultural genocide toward Indigenous peoples. Within 50 years of Columbus’ landing, the indigenous populations in America dropped from c. 80 million to 10 million. Today, only 1.6 million Native Americans live in the U.S., according to the 2010 census.

A wise African American teacher, Broderick Rodell, says that slavery traumatized ALL of us–blacks and whites.  “Black Lives Matter” represents a new and healing story.  “Native Lives Matter” also.   

Healing medicine can be found in Genesis 1, which celebrates the goodness of existence; life; the world; earth; ourselves.  “Original Goodness” or Original Blessing.  The Earth, cosmos and ourselves are “very good.” (Genesis 1)  A return to goodness inspires a worldview worth living for.

When people are in trauma, they don’t think real straight.  We do strange things, like making nuclear weapons to destroy the world and one another–and keep making them.  We pretend climate change is not happening; or science does not matter. Or choose new idols, strange gods and addictions such as power, money, drugs, alcohol, work, sex, religion, capitalism, etc.

The Feast Day of Summer Solstice reminds us of our place in the universe, for our North Pole has its maximum tilt toward the sun on this solstice.  We are invited at this season to reconnect psyche to cosmos.  The new creation story from science reminds us that we are born of 13.8 billion years of cosmic labor; we have been invited to a very special place that we call Earth, our home.

This awareness empowers us to face the truth of our culture and how its religion and education have often separated our psyche from the cosmos; humans from Earth; spirit from matter; soul from body. 

Indeed, James Joyce described one of his characters as living “a short distance from his body.”  Trauma often separates people from their bodies. 

Climate change and climate destruction are part of this same trauma, our forgetfulness of Mother Earth and narcissistic preoccupation with our own human agenda.

See Matthew Fox, Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality

and Fox, Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.

and Fox, Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality

and Fox, In the Beginning There Was Joy: A Cosmic Celebration for Kids of All Ages

Banner Image: Juneteenth Emancipation Day Celebration, June 19, 1900, Texas. Wikimedia Commons

Queries for Contemplation

How do you recognize the trauma of slavery and of native genocide at work still in our culture and our souls?  How does the Solstice awaken you to your place and our place in the universe?  Be with that connection, let it speak to you.

Related Readings by Matthew Fox

Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality

Matthew Fox lays out a whole new direction for Christianity—a direction that is in fact very ancient and very grounded in Jewish thinking (the fact that Jesus was a Jew is often neglected by Christian theology): the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality, the Vias Positiva, Negativa, Creativa and Transformativa in an extended and deeply developed way.
“Original Blessing makes available to the Christian world and to the human community a radical cure for all dark and derogatory views of the natural world wherever these may have originated.” –Thomas Berry, author, The Dream of the Earth; The Great Work; co-author, The Universe Story

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.
“I am reading Liberating Gifts for the People of the Earth by Matt Fox.  He is one that fills my heart and mind for new life in spite of so much that is violent in our world.” ~ Sister Dorothy Stang.

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.

In the Beginning There Was Joy: A Cosmic Celebration for Kids of All Ages

The first book in the Father Fox’s Fantastical Fables series tells the story of the big bang and how humans fit into the awesome, fantastical, cosmic picture! In this full-color, beautifully illustrated book, world- renowned theologian Matthew Fox weaves together modern science and classic spirituality in a whimsical, entertaining format to illustrate important truths to readers aged 4 and up. With artwork curated from illustrators around the world, this book expresses the joy and wonder of all peoples and cultures, planting seeds of respect, cooperation and hope to work together for the healing of our planet.
Receive a 20% discount when you buy this and one other book from Matthew Fox’s store! Use Promo Code 20% at checkout.