Dear friends, As you know, Matthew’s colleague Gianluigi Gugliermetto (GG) has been writing three DMs each week to give Matthew time to work on several concurrent book projects. Unfortunately, GG needs to take some time off due to ill health, and so for the near future, Matthew will be doing all six weekday DMs. Please join us in sending prayers for GG’s quick recovery!
In yesterday’s DM, we sat at the feet of Father Bede Griffiths as he spoke of how meditation puts us in “solidarity with the universe,” both the remotest star in outer space and the “minutest particle in the atom.”
And how we “experience solidarity with every living thing” on earth and can go “beyond all these outer forms” of things to “discover the Ground from which they all spring.” We can know“the Father, the Origin, the Source, beyond being and non-being, the One ‘without a second.’” He adds, that “I can know the birth of all things from this Ground, their coming into being in the Word.”
This phrase, “coming into being in the Word” is very fitting for the Advent season we find ourselves in, and the Christmas Good News that awaits us this week. The “word made flesh” is made flesh not only in Jesus but in all beings, thus we call it the “Cosmic Christ.” (Or Buddha Nature or Image of God.)
“The word made flesh and dwelt among us” summarizes the entire Christmas story. How all things are sacred and birth is paramount. We know “the birth of all things from this Ground, their coming into being in the Word.” Thus Eckhart: “Every creature is a word of God and a book about God.” Every creature is another Christ.
All this spells the end of loneliness; it restores us to the cosmos and the cosmos to us. The modern era, so steeped in the “I” consciousness—“I think therefore I am”—piled on by telling us the universe was a machine—cold, mechanical, determined, uncaring, more powerful than us—ushered a “cosmic loneliness” into our lives.
Indigenous peoples were not lonely. As we indicated a few DMs ago, there is no word for loneliness in Swahili, and very likely in other indigenous languages as well.
We hear “all our relations” as a mantra among the Lakota people when they pray in the dark in a sweat lodge or under the sun in a generous act of the Sundance. To speak repetitively of “all our relations” is a medicine for the disease of loneliness foisted on us by individualistic consciousness, including a sick religious consciousness that leaves Creation and the Cosmic Christ out.
Russian Orthodox theologian Nicolas Berdyaev speaks to this truth when he writes: The central idea of the Eastern Fathers was that of theosis, the divinization of all creatures, the transfiguration of the world, the idea of the cosmos and not the idea of personal salvation. When one leaves creation and the whole and solidarity with the universe and with all creatures out of one’s religious viewpoint, perversion sets in. Individualism takes over the soul and fear and trauma accompany it. A neurosis is born.
Berdyaev continues: Only later Christian consciousness began to value the idea of hell more than the idea of the transfiguration and divinization of the world…The kingdom of God is the transfiguration of the world, universal resurrection, a new heaven and a new earth.
How wonderful it is to refigure the meaning of the coming of the Word into human, cosmic and planetary history at Christmas time. Christmas itself gets reborn in this non-sentimental and profoundly mystical context. A fine preparation for the mysteries we attend to, on this Christmas Eve.
Banner Image: A meticulously detailed diorama of the birth of the Christ. Photo by garten-gg on Pixabay.
Queries for Contemplation
Which speaks to you more: The ideas of hell and personal salvation? Or the ideas of the divinization of all creatures and the transfiguration of the world and the cosmos?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
Christian Mystics: 365 Readings & Meditations, pp. 261f.
The Coming of the Cosmic Christ: The Healing of Mother Earth and the Birth of a Global Renaissance.
Stations of the Cosmic Christ.
“Creation” and “Meditation and Mindfulness” in Fox, One River, Many Wells: Wisdom Springing from Global Faiths, pp.26-49 and 189-217.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality.
Meditations with Meister Eckhart: A Centering Book.
The Tao of Thomas Aquinas: Fierce Wisdom for Hard Times.
Sheer Joy: Conversations with Thomas Aquinas on Creation Spirituality.
Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality.
11 thoughts on “Father Bede, Berdyaev & A Fuller, Non-Sentimental Meaning to Christmas”
Not ideas at all .Just ABSOLUTE TRUTH , We ARE -all Beings- ALL creation ONE in HIM .
No separation , impossible . Listen to a stone ‘speak’ ,gaze upon a blade of grass . Those in another sphere face to FACE.
Oh dear sound so dogmatic. Cannot help it since babyhood and trauma and being surrounded in a shining cloud of THE indescribable holding of LOVE.
Thank you Matthew, love All your writings and books. 🙏for G.
Firstly, I’m very sorry to hear of GG’s ill health and wish him well; just as I wish Matthew and all DM readers a very Happy Christmas! As for today’s question, I lean towards the latter.
YES! “The ideas of the divinization of all creatures and the transfiguration of the world and the cosmos.” “Solidarity with the universe, both the remotest star in outer space and the minutist particle in the atom.” “The word made flesh is made flesh not only in Jesus but in all beings, thus we call it the Cosmic Christ (Or Buddha Nature or Image of God.).”
These meditations on loneliness have come like an answer to a prayer. Ordinarily, I do not feel lonely at Christmas, but this year is different. My oldest sister just died yesterday. A few months ago a friend that I’ve known for years (a member of our weekly book discussion group) died. I was flipping through old pictures a few days ago, and so many of the people I have loved are now gone. And, this may sound silly, but I received very few Christmas cards this year, which makes me feel sort of forgotten. So, being reminded of solidarity, of the truth that in the incarnation, God became one of us and united everything into a divine One is very timely for me. I practice centering prayer, which seems like a solitary undertaking although it isn’t. In silent prayer there are times when I feel the love of God, not just for me, but for all creation. Not all the time, but enough times to remind me that nothing can separate us from the love of God. The word became flesh and dwelt among us. The incarnation changed everything, and that truth consoles me during this lonely time in my life.
So grateful not to be living under the fear of hell and the preoccupation of personal salvation. Today, my spirituality rests in the goodness of Creation which includes myself. Thomas Keating said, “The acceptance of our basic goodness is a quantum leap in the spiritual journey“.
Thank you for the DM. It gives me healthy direction and connection on my spiritual journey.
First, my warmest get well wishes to Gianluigi, and my heartfelt wishes to our DM community for lucid and loving Christmas, Hanukkah, solstice, end of the year, etc. celebrations. I hope baby Jesus is not fed up being born on our war-torn planet, but in case he is, we should follow Angelus Silesius’ advice:”Were Christ born a thousand times in Bethlehem, and not in thee, thou art lost eternally.” Happy birthday to all!
What comes to me this morning as I read Berdyaev is this: The focus of conservative Christianity on going to Heaven and avoiding Hell requires that a human ignores all that God has created–the Carina Nebula, our planet, the coral reefs, the beauty of the mountains and rainforests, canyon lakes, iridescent deep sea creatures, the birth of a grandchild, the laughter of children, music, the majesty of elephants, and the ludicrousness of the platypus. It ignores God as the Creator of beauty and that God has a sense of humor. The whole idea of “substitutionary atonement” — that Jesus came solely to give us a ticket to Heaven and a ticket out of Hell — completely ignores every other thing God has done. It ignores all of creation. So, we are here to get out of here. What an absurd idea.
Michele, I resonate with everything you eloquently write except at the end. Actually, I do believe we are here to get out of here but the way to achieve that “Resurrection” – and I believe the only way – is through Love and Service to all.
First of all, I’m sending blessings of robust health to GG. I so very much resonate with much of what he writes.
And just as primary, I send blessings of gratitude to Matthew. You have become one of my major mentors, and I have been blessed to have met you twice in my life – and hope to meet you again!
Please pray for me to be lifted out of dark solitary despair and into the infinite light of Cosmic Christ Consciousness.
Generating Peace, Joy, Love this Season
Eileen
To Kenneth and Katherine and Eileen, prayers for comfort and solace as you grieve; to GG, prayers for healing; to Matthew, prayers of deep thankfulness for your steadfast love and prophetic voice.
Dear Fr. Matt,
This is fascinating and I will go back and read yesterday’s because I did not see it. I am swept up in reading your book about Meister Eckhart, and finding so much wonderful coherence and meaning, as you speak of how Jung was essentially healed in his need for mystical meaning and coherence from reading and understanding Meister Eckhart. Somehow I had not focused at all on Meister Eckhart, but I think this is your finest work yet, to be able to hand us this in-depth look at creativity and the union of the Godhead and the soul. I am truly grateful and also amazed at how long it has taken me to get beyond the dogmatic stuff we were given when we were young. It is fascinating that Fr. Bede also helps us get into this mystical coherence. Best to you, and thank you, and I hope you have a happy Christmas season! With love, martina