Lately I have been stressing the need to name evil for what it is, both in the daily meditations and in the release of an op-ed article about 12 Roman Catholic bishops who got punked by the White House. Showing up in the Oval office two weeks before the current election, they seemed surprised that the resident there used them for MAGA’s own nefarious purposes.
I gave them the benefit of a doubt in my op-ed article by calling them “naïve,” but it’s hard to imagine how 12 people in positions of spiritual leadership could be so utterly blinded to MAGA intentions —unless they are utterly blinded to Evil and don’t even know it when they see and feel it. Unless their religion leaves evil out and they don’t realize that the Sacred and Evil are in battle with each other. When St. Paul says, “our struggle is against powers and principalities,” he is talking of angels or spirit beings.
German mystic and philosopher, Rudolf Steiner, near the end of his life in 1924, and nine years before Hitler took over Germany, gave a talk to German priests. In it he warned them that if priests talk about spirit without also talking about evil, they are preaching sentimentalism. Steiner said that German religion had been smothered in sentimentalism for the last 300 years.
Carl Jung warns that sentimentalism and violence go together.
Yes, sentimentalism gave rise to Hitler just as sentimental evangelical religion has given rise to MAGA and its omnipresent violence in the streets of our cities, its concentration camps for immigrants, its war in Iran, etc. Credit also goes to the fascism of 34 years of the papacy under Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI and the Opus Dei movement they championed, that influenced notable MAGA influencers like Steve Bannon and Leopold Leo, architect of today’s SCOTUS. And Project 2025 that buttresses many billionaires eager to displace American democracy with themselves running the world.
I stress how the Sacred is the opposite of Evil. True spiritual leaders teach us about both. They speak truth to power and don’t sell out to power or cover their eyes to Evil.
I have often cited Thomas Berry that the way we recover the Sacred when it has been lost is by returning to the universe, “the primary sacred reality.”
Another way to recover the sacred is to get to know—with one’s heart as well as head—the mystics. This in order to arouse and awaken the deep mystic and lover dwelling in us all.
With that in mind, I am eager to invite all to a new course I begin tomorrow on the Convergence platform where once a month we treat one or two mystics over a two-year period. Details are HERE.
Befriending the mystics is a way to deepen your own mystical and prophetic vocation. We all have such a vocation. One feeds the other because “the prophet is the mystic in action.” (Hocking) The mystic is the lover in us who says “Yes” to Life. The prophet is the warrior who says “No” to anti-life forces of injustice and lies that feed evil.
A marvelous model of a mystic/prophet, Delores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers, left us this past week. Still active in fighting injustice at 96 years of age (!), she flew from California to New England two weeks ago to support a justice-seeking politician there.
Today, the eve of an immensely significant election, is a great day to call in her spirit along with that of many ancestors who have stood up for justice and democracy, Abraham Lincoln and the “founding fathers” among them. And MLK, Jr., John Lewis, Sojourner Truth and so many more.
Vote and work to get out the vote!
An Encouraging Word from Matthew Fox on the Eve of the Midterms
To read the transcript of Matthew Fox’s video meditation, click HERE.
Banner Image: Promotional graphic for the “Journeying with the Mystics” series. From the GatherAtTheCommons website.
Queries for Contemplation
Meditations: Do you agree that the universe is “the primary sacred reality” and that therefore a return to creation and the cosmos can recharge our sense of the Sacred? And that learning more about the mystics and the mystic in us can do the same?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
The Pope’s War: How Ratzinger’s Secret Crusade Imperiled the Church and What Can Be Saved.
Trump & the MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ: Recognizing the Archetype of Evil in Our Time.
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society.
“On Desentimentalizing Spirituality,” in Fox, Wrestling with the Prophets: Essays on Creation Spirituality and Everyday Life, pp 297-315.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality.
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice.
Charles Burack, ed., Matthew Fox: Essential Writings on Creation Spirituality.
Adam Bucko and Matthew Fox, Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Vision for a New Generation.
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