It is a weekly abstract of the earlier week’s Each day Meditations. Some are written by Matthew Fox (MF), and a few by Gianluigi Gugliermetto (GG). You possibly can click on on the title of a DM to be able to view the unique piece in its entirety. Additionally, please observe, we are going to proceed to supply a video instructing by Matthew every Monday.
December 15, 2025: Prophetic Responses to ICE: Mangers With a Message & a Non-Sentimental Christmas (MF)
In a Nativity scene at St. Susanna Roman Catholic Parish in Dedham, Massachusetts, the Christ baby is lacking this Christmas. So too are Mary and Joseph. As a substitute, there sits a hand-painted signal: “ICE was right here.” At one other Chicago suburb church situated close to an immigration and Customs Enforcement facility the place protesters have regularly amassed, an indication on the manger reads: “Resulting from ICE exercise in our neighborhood the Holy Household is in hiding.” St. Susanna’s has supported ten refugee households since 2019, and labored alongside the federal authorities to take action. “It’s not a stunt. We work every day with refugees….We had been all the time taught: once you’re not sure, ask, ‘What would Christ do?’
December 16, 2025: Carl Jung, Murray Stein, Steven Herrmann & Christianity’s Future (MF)
Jungian analyst Steven Herrmann has gifted us with vital books on matters comparable to Non secular Democracy, Walt Whitman, Jung and Meister Eckhart, Vocational Goals, and rather more.* Now he kicks off a brand new collection on Neo-Jungian research with a e book on Murray Stein, subtitled “Individuation, Transformation, and the Methods to the Self in Jungian Psychology.” Stein, an internationally famend Jungian analyst, mixed theology and Jung by 50 years of influential work. Matthew stays inquisitive about how Jung’s work, up to date by Stein and Herrmann, can help the Christian motion because it evolves from the Age of Pisces to the Age of Aquarius and post-modernism that now beckons us. Stein acknowledges our post-modern instances as being contaminated by a “virus of superficiality.” He says, Maybe now’s the time to hear extra intently to the spirit of the depths.**
December 17, 2025: Deep Feeling, Not Sentimentalism
How can one differentiate between deep feeling and sentimentalism? GG realized at one level, with dismay, that the church is full of sentimentalism and hypocrisy, and that these two go facet by facet. Whereas, he says, Creation Spirituality has supplied a fantastic antidote to sentimentalism. Matthew Fox was writing as early as 1978 on “desentimentalizing spirituality” within the journal Spirituality Right now. Compassion, says Matthew in that e book, is just not solely distinct from sentimentalism, however the latter is the utter negation of the primary. GG says: There was a time in my life when — partly to flee sentimentalism — I used to be letting my “pondering operate” develop exponentially to the detriment of the “feeling operate,” however that was a mistake as a result of the 4 Jungian features — similar to the 4 paths — are… indispensable.
December 18, 2025: Sustainability as a New Phrase (GG)
Final week’s reference to the phrase “sustainability” sparked a little bit of debate. Sustainability, says GG, is a phrase that didn’t exist when he was in highschool. It was launched by the U.N. Brundtland Fee in 1983, which additionally offered the idea of “sustainable growth” in 1987. Upon additional analysis, GG found that the phrase “sustainability” truly existed since 1713 within the German language as Nachhaltigkeit. It meant that if you wish to minimize timber in a forest, you should do it in such a manner that the forest doesn’t die, however retains wholesome and grows sufficient new timber for the following generations. The elephant within the room that few need to see is that this: continued financial development is just not suitable with the lifetime of organic organisms — together with people. The capitalistic financial mannequin has been profitable within the quick run, nevertheless it’s suicidal in the long term.
December 19, 2025: The Face of the Different (GG)
Generally ecologists are denigrated as “tree huggers.” Such an accusation implies that emotions needs to be excluded from the ecological points dealing with humanity. Emmanuel Levinas, the French Jewish thinker, has famously grounded ethics within the expertise of “the face of the opposite.” GG says: I declare the fitting to be emotionally shattered — not simply moved — by the face of a ravenous baby in Palestine or Sudan, and I think about such an expertise the proper grounding for my reasoning concerning the issues affecting these areas of the world. The identical holds true for the face of Mom Earth, which retains being violated…. In conclusion, says GG, I would like to have the ability to see within the face of the kid Jesus all the youngsters damage and deserted by the Herods of our time.
December 20, 2025: A Surge in Loneliness (MF)
Matthew has been noticing a number of articles not too long ago about loneliness, which tends to be extra pronounced over the vacations. In line with one article, latest research have discovered that the loneliest folks in America right now are middle-aged folks between the ages of 45 and 49, of whom 49 % report loneliness. In a research of college college students within the UK, two-thirds of these dwelling in halls or dorms reported feeling “lonely or remoted.” An over-reliance on telephones and know-how apparently was a big contributing issue. Samantha Rose Hill, who’s writing a e book on loneliness, in a visitor essay for the New York Occasions, warned how tech firms promise “reduction by connection, however this type of connection isn’t the answer; it’s the issue.”
* To see all of Steven Herrmann’s books, see Matthew Fox’s Creation Spirituality bookstore HERE.
**Steven Herrmann, Murray Stein: Individuation, Transformation, and the Methods to the Self in Jungian Psychology, pp. 23, 13, 36f.
Banner picture: “We’re all immigrants.” Picture by Bob Morris on Flickr. Inventive Commons.
Associated Readings by Matthew Fox
Order of the Sacred Earth: An Intergenerational Imaginative and prescient of Love and Motion (by Matthew Fox, Skylar Wilson, and Jen Listug)
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Consciousness with Social Justice
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Reworking Evil in Soul and Society
Pure Grace: Dialogues on creation, darkness, and the soul in spirituality and science (by Matthew Fox and Rupert Sheldrake)
Prayer: A Radical Response to Life
Wrestling with the Prophets: Essays on Creation Spirituality and On a regular basis Life
Unique Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Items for the Peoples of the Earth
Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Imaginative and prescient for a New Technology
