In recent years, there are two words that have captured my attention when it comes to the description of the spiritual journey. They are wholeness and determination/effort. I will discuss them separately, although obviously they are related as the goal and the road to achieve such a goal.
Finding the center. Photo by Fabrizio Chiagano on Unsplash
I will start with the goal, that is, with wholeness. Years ago I was struck by Matthew Fox’s critique of moral perfectionism, which he presents in Prayer and develops expecially in A Spirituality Named Compassion. He observes that Matthew’s Gospel and Luke’s Gospel report the same teaching by Jesus in quite a different way. Matthew writes: “Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect” while Luke states: “Be ye compassionate like your Father is compassionate.”
One of the understandings that can be derived from this observation is that the true meaning of “perfection” in moral life is “compassion.” The Gospel of Matthew — grounded in Judaism — takes for granted that God’s absolute perfection coincides with God’s utter compassion, while the Gospel of Luke makes it explicit for its non-Jewish readers. Compassion indeed is the core of the fourth path, the via transformativa, that is, the culmination of the spiritual journey. A complete human being is a compassionate person, engaged in social justice.
This makes me think that what started to wreck the train of Christian morality was the Gentile reading of “perfection” as the total fulfillment as individuals of all norms and requirements. Consequently, I would also observe that Christians have enacted a huge projection when they have defined Judaism as the religion of norms and requirements, devoid of Spirit.
I have met in my life several people who have been hurt by the moral perfectionism which they tought was contained in the Gospel of Matthew, and which they tried to obey literally, thus setting up themselves for failure. Mostly these were Catholic nuns or friars/monks, but I am sure that the situation is similar in many traditional Protestant settings — just not my experience.
Finding balance. Photo by Deniz Altindas on Unsplash
Imagine the strain at taking literally the prohibition to say “fool” to anybody or to look at another human being “with desire.” Or at taking literally the injunction to “love one’s enemies” (Matthew 5:22.28.44). Of course, each and all the verses of the Sermon on the Mount can be interpreted more deeply and more validly, but here I am concerned only with the effects of a literal interpretation, as I saw it playing out in real time before my eyes.
The sense of guilt that I met many times when dealing with moral perfectionism is almost immensurable and extremely sad. Most often, it was alleviated only by an external assurance of God’s forgiveness through the sacraments, which however ends up simply being a piece of an unending cycle, not a step toward wholeness.
I suspect that Matthew Fox developed his critique on the topic of moral perfectionism — present especially in his early writings — precisely because of the context in which he found himself, surrounded by friars and nuns who believed in perfectionism, to the detriment of their true spiritual life and the life of their communities. But perfection also means wholeness in Greek thought and philosophy. Aristotle teaches that all things enjoy perfection when they reach their goal, having become what they were supposed to become but they could not be without a process of becoming.
My present focus on wholeness has both roots: the critique of moral perfectionism, and the Aristotelian sense for the process and becoming of organisms. More recently, I have found new ways of developing the notion of wholeness through C. G. Jung and his theory of the four functions, which I have compared to the four paths of Creation Spirituality (see DM May 29, 2026). Jung taught me that I need to be very careful in applying the same scheme to all human beings and their development toward wholeness. My wholeness if not your wholeness. Knowing which is my primary function, and consequently my less developed function, is of the utmost importance for my approach to my development.
Great creativity is often evident during social justice actions. These three are part of a larger protest in suburban Pennsylvania. Photo by Cynthia Greb, with permission.
Yet there remains a reference scheme in the quadripartite functions/paths. As a human being I must develop to some extent all of them: I cannot truly exist without bodily enjoyment, without deep feelings, without some intuitive/creative abilities and — as we said — without compassion and action.
Most importantly, Jung is teaching me that I cannot pretend to develop one area/path of my life using the abilities pertaining to another area/path. This seems logical and self-evident. Yet it is tragically humorous — for example — to watch some intellectuals trying to foster their feeling function by thinking about it or, conversely, some very emotional people trying to make their feelings magically become coherent thoughts. The same holds true for artists trying to solve concrete problems in an artistic way, or for manually-oriented people pretending to create art works by simply tossing together this and that.
The path toward wholeness is instead marked by honest and hard efforts at developing qualities and habits which do not feel natural at first, and yet represent the missing pieces of the unique puzzle that each of us are.
Banner image: Finding wholeness in stillness and in Nature. Photo by Milan Popovic on Unsplash
Queries for Contemplation
How do you think about wholeness? How is such an archetype present in your life?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
Prayer: A Radical Response to Life
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality
Creativity: Where the Divine and Human Meet
A Way to God: Thomas Merton’s Creation Spirituality Journey
6 thoughts on “Wholeness”
Thank you Gianluigi for bringing up the issue of biblical translations. Whenever I want to clarify Bible verses that I find ambiguous, I consult André Chouraqui’s etymological translation of the Bible (in French).
In Matthew 5:48, Chouraqui does not use the word “perfect,” he writes “soyez intègres comme votre père des ciels est intègre,” i.e. be whole as your heavenly father is whole,” which perfectly matches your comment that “perfection also means wholeness in Greek thought and philosophy.”
As far as Luke 6:36 is concerned, Chouraqui writes “Soyez matriciels, comme votre père est matriciel,” i.e. be matrix-like (or mother-like) as your father is matrix-like.
It can be argued that, beyond the compassionate dimension of being like a mother, when applied to a father, “matrix-like” is another way to express wholeness, a.k.a. yinyang.
You certainly spoke to me today. This whole matter of seeking wholeness. I know that I primarily perceive the world with transactions and thinking. And I use thinking to grow into feelings. To grow I must uncover my feelings without thinking. Not certain I know how to do that. Must learn.
In my experience, the ideal is often a trap, an illusion that makes Don Quixote a fool with a great heart. The classical ideal of balance is appealing. Aim for magnanimity but keep grounded in reality. The pitiful person you see and hear may be a deceiver, conning you. Jesus advised prudence in his “Be cunning as serpents and gentle as doves.” I can’t be all things to all people, but I can help with some things sometimes. The Sabbath is holy, but if my ox fell into a hole, I get help to extract him then, not tomorrow.
‘Aim for magnanimity but stay grounded in reality..’ a lifelong lesson for me. Many thanks, joanna age 81
Wholeness to me is related to my spiritual journey of Being~becoming aware/conscious of my unique human and Divine Self in the Divine Flow/Spirit of Loving Diverse Oneness with All of ongoing Co-Creation~Cosmos, including all physical/nonphysical spiritual dimensions and beings, in the Sacred Process of the Eternal Present Moment…
Even though these words express my present intuitive understanding of my spiritual journey, I
don’t intellectually dwell on them. I mainly try to be transformatively open to feeling and expressing the Divine Loving Flow of Source and spontaneous Creativity of the Sacred Present Moment…
The Enneagram teaches that to be whole, we need to move toward healing our “deadly sin.” I don’t mean that literally. Each Enneagram type has its own “sin” or struggle to overcome to reach wholeness. As a four on the Enneagram, “The Tragic Romantic,” my “sin” is envy, and it rears its head for me not in wanting material goods but in envying others’ successes. I find myself working to overcome this inherent failing of mine whenever I hear of another playwright getting a production. Yeah, I’m terribly embarrassed to admit this, yet it is a struggle. To overcome envy, the guidance is for me to not focus on what is missing or out of reach, but to work toward “equanimity,” satisfaction with what is here, now, that the present is enough, that I have enough. If I were to find myself serene and satisfied, I think, for me, I would find at least some semblance of wholeness.