Week of 3/10-15/2025: Corruption & Christian Nationalism vs. the Common Good

March 10, 2025: Senator Blows Whistle on Putin-Like Corruption in First Weeks of New Administration
Senator Chris Murphy, in a recent speech on the Senate floor, names several blatant examples of corruption committed by Trump in his first six weeks. He compares it to what has become normalized in Russia under Putin. Here are a few of the more egregious examples: 1) Any CEO can meet with Trump for $5 million. 2) The IRS is being cut by 7000 workers–specifically including those who audit millionaires, billionaires, and corporations. 3) $400 million was approved to buy armored Teslas, which is of course Musk’s company. And Musk, of course, is the man who bought the election and now owns Trump. 4) Fossil fuel CEOs who backed Trump’s campaign are rewarded, while clean energy companies are attacked. Senator Murphy said, “Corruption has happened before—but never this openly or this frequently.”

March 11, 2025: Archetypes of the “Trickster” & the “Antichrist” in this Historical Moment
Tonight is the second round of our gathering called “From Darkness to Dawn” consisting of four conversations with host Cameron Trimble, Matthew, and four notable spiritual teachers and activists. In our first conversation, Mirabai Starr and Matthew interacted on the topic of “The Dark Night and the Call to Courage.” Response to the conversation and discussion was profound. In tonight’s Conversation with Andrew Harvey, we will be engaging on the topic of “The Trickster Unveiled – Archetypes in the Age of MAGA.” Next week, Bishop Yvette Flunder will speak on how faith communities can rise with courage and lead transformative action in these challenging times. In the fourth week, Father Adam Bucko and Matthew will explore how we turn reflection into meaningful action.

March 12, 2025: The Common Good, not Greed, as the Root of Government
In the midst of the craziness happening in Washington, let’s turn our talk to the common good. In his commentary on Aristotle’s Ethics, Aquinas says: The common good of the state cannot flourish unless citizens are virtuous—at least those whose business it is to govern. Aquinas also said: The common good of many is more godlike than the good of an individual. He also teaches: The sum total of the Christian religion consists of compassion. He also reminds us of the following: 1 John 3:18: ‘Let us not love in word, nor in speech, but in deed and in truth.’ 

March 13, 2025: Aquinas on Justice, the Cosmos, the Common Good & the Rich
Aquinas teaches that all of nature follows a love of the whole. Each part of creation naturally loves the common good of the whole more than its own particular good.…Each and every creature exists for the perfection of the entire universe. Aquinas warns that the super wealthy must be checked if they do not put it to the common good. In his Commentary on Aristotle’s Ethics, he warns that when one who has too much exceeds the mean…we will know by this mean what we ought to take from those who have more and give to those who have less. Exceeding the mean “is against divine justice,” for justice and the common good go together. How against the common good are all the mass firings being perpetrated by the multi-billionaire in the White House?

March 14, 2025: MAGA vs. the Common Good: An Amazingly Synchronistic Moment
Michael Ian Black is an actor and writer who watched a “Viral ‘Debate’ between liberal commentator Sam Seder and twenty young MAGA conservatives.* His blood pressure so rose watching it, that he had to turn it off. He said it was because he holds a conservative bias and vision of America which still believes that representative democracy remains the best form of government yet devised. The “notion, the promise of a common good, is the fundamental divide between my vision and that of the current administration.” Black said that when fact-checking the young MAGA folks, he found that their claims “were almost all incorrect” but never mind because “the MAGA worldview is not informed by facts but by feelings.” Black believed we were capable of “identifying that which binds us, otherwise known as the common good.” MAGA “rejects this” and in doing so, “rejects America.” 

March 15, 2025: “Christian Nationalism”—and Its Opposite: Join Me Saturday Morning
In yesterday’s DM, Matthew shared the very disturbing news about young MAGA followers who declared that Christian nationalism was “a good alternative” to American democracy. Actually, “Christian nationalism” is not in any way “Christian.” Jesus is not about selling hatred. Recently Matthew discovered a talk by Rabbi Abraham Heschel given to a gathering of 2000 Roman Catholics at a national liturgy conference held in Milwaukee in 1969.** In his talk, he brought up the Auschwitz death camps. He said: It is with…anguish that I recall that it was possible for a Roman Catholic church adjoining the extermination camp in Auschwitz to offer communion to the officers of the camp, to people who day after day drove thousands of people to be killed in the gas-chambers. Our understanding of Jesus has often been distorted by overemphasizing dogma and underemphasizing experience. Mysticism is the experiential side of healthy religion that leads to a Yes for existence and love and truth and justice.  

* Michael Ian Black, “The Viral ‘Debate’ Video That Proves Most MAGA Voters Are a Lost Cause.” The Daily Beast, March 12, 2025.

**Abraham Joshua Heschel, “On Prayer,” The Open Siddur Project, 1969.

Banner image: “If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention.” Signs at a protest in small town Pennsylvania, on International Women’s Day, 2025. Photo by Cynthia Greb. Used with permission

Recommended Reading

Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election

Matthew Fox tells us that he had always shied away from using the term “Anti-Christ” because it was so often used to spread control and fear. However, given today’s rise of authoritarianism and forces of democracide, ecocide, and christofascism, he turns the tables in this book employing the archetype for the cause of justice, democracy, and a renewed Earth and humanity.
From the Foreword: If there was ever a time, a moment, for examining the archetype of the Antichrist, it is now…Read this book with an open mind. Good and evil are real forces in our world. ~~ Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Conversations with the Divine.
For immediate access to Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: A Handbook for the 2024 Election, order the e-book with 10 full-color prints from Amazon HERE. 
To get a print-on-demand paperback copy with black & white images, order from Amazon HERE or IUniverse HERE. 
To receive a limited-edition, full-color paperback copy, order from MatthewFox.org HERE.
Order the audiobook HERE for immediate download.

Christian Mystics: 365 Readings & Meditations

As Matthew Fox notes, when an aging Albert Einstein was asked if he had any regrets, he replied, “I wish I had read more of the mystics earlier in my life.” The 365 writings in Christian Mystics represent a wide-ranging sampling of these readings for modern-day seekers of all faiths — or no faith. The visionaries quoted range from Julian of Norwich to Martin Luther King, Jr., from Thomas Merton to Dorothee Soelle and Thomas Berry.
“Our world is in crisis, and we need road maps that can ground us in wisdom, inspire us to action, and help us gather our talents in service of compassion and justice. This revolutionary book does just that. Matthew Fox takes some of the most profound spiritual teachings of the West and translates them into practical daily mediations. Study and practice these teachings. Take what’s in this book and teach it to the youth because the new generation cannot afford to suffer the spirit and ethical illiteracy of the past.” — Adam Bucko, spiritual activist and co-founder of the Reciprocity Foundation for Homeless Youth.

Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Vision for a New Generation

Authors Adam Bucko and Matthew Fox encourage us to use our talents in service of compassion and justice and to move beyond our broken systems–economic, political, educational, and religious–discovering a spirituality that not only helps us to get along, but also encourages us to reevaluate our traditions, transforming them and in the process building a more sacred and just world. Incorporating the words of young activist leaders culled from interviews and surveys, the book provides a framework that is deliberately interfaith and speaks to our profound yearning for a life with spiritual purpose and for a better world.
“Occupy Spirituality is a powerful, inspiring, and vital call to embodied awareness and enlightened actions.”
~~ Julia Butterfly Hill, environmental activist and author of The Legacy of Luna: The Story of a Tree, a Woman, and the Struggle to Save the Redwoods