In yesterday’s DM we considered the truly scary crackpot evangelical Christianity that is making headway in the Trumpian world: A so-called Christianity that is defining itself as anti-empathy and anti-compassion in support of the Trump-Vance-Musk commitment to taking a chainsaw to aid to the poor in Africa.
And in America, applying the chainsaw and deliberate chaos to Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, SNAP, and the Department of Education–just about any effort by the government as a whole to support the most vulnerable among us.
I cited Susan Lanzone, author of Empathy: A History, who declared that “the disparagement of empathy is…a deliberate effort to set up a permission structure to dehumanize others.” She added also that she had “never seen empathy vilified in the way it has been in these current sources.”*
Empathy allows us to understand at least in part the suffering of others. And to care. And to do something about it. Not unlike Jesus washing the feet of his disciples on the night of Passover.
Such empathy is not alive and well in certain forms of so-called Christianity today. Check out Project 2025 for example. And check out this recent headline that features the Roman Catholic version of fascism in God’s name, Opus Dei: “‘I became like a slave’: why 43 women are suing the secretive Opus Dei Catholic group in Argentina.”
At 12 years old, the parents of Andrea Martinez left their daughter in the hands of Opus Dei with a dream that she would escape their life of poverty through education and opportunity. First, they gave her a pink dress. Then they gave her a schedule “that detailed every task for every minute of her day.”
“I thought with an education that later I would be able to help my family. But I became like a slave. They treated me like a slave without any capacity to think or act or do.”
She and 43 other women are now suing Opus Dei for making them work up to 12 hours a day cooking and cleaning for the elite members for years without pay. They were banned from reading anything but children’s books and religious ones and when they eventually escaped, they had no money, clothes or qualifications for work.
At 16, they were given a cilice to wear 2 hours a day as penance for their sins and a whip to flagellate themselves during prayer. They were kept isolated, allowed only one phone call and one letter to their family per month, and that was censored to make sure they did not criticize Opus. They were to be celibate and were told that since they were poor and had no man to marry, there was no other option for them and “if I didn’t join, my family would be condemned to hell.”*
I have told the story of Opus Dei and the scandalous canonization of their fascist founder under Popes JP II and Benedict XVI in my book, The Pope’s War.
What makes this story especially relevant is that Project 2025, the bible for the current regime eager to move America from democracy to fascism, was overseen by Kevin Roberts, a close ally of Opus Dei (along with Leonard Leo who almost single handedly created our current Supreme Court). As one commentator put it, Opus Dei does not believe in the separation or church and state, seeing symbiotic relationship between the two, and its American adherents view the United States as the last stronghold of Christianity.***
Judging by today’s and yesterday’s DMs, America’s current apocalyptic moment has toxic religion at its foundation. Beware.
* Susan Lanzone, Empathy: A History. Yale University Press, 2018.
** Harriet Barber, “‘I became like a slave’: why 43 women are suing the secretive Opus Dei Catholic group in Argentina.” The Guardian, April 14, 2025
*** Rachel Leingang and Stephanie Kirchgaessner, “Kevin Roberts, architect of Project 2025, has close ties to radical Catholic group Opus Dei.” The Guardian, July 26, 2024.
See Matthew Fox, “Opus Dei,” in Fox, The Pope’s War: Why Ratzinger’s Secret Crusade Has Imperiled the Church and How It Can Be Saved, pp. 106-124.
See Matthew Fox, A Spirituality Named Compassion.
See Fox, Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ.
And Fox, Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society.
And Fox, Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.
Banner Image: A 3-link, 1mm-gauge half-leg metal cilice with tie-cord, $49 from Celice.co.uk, one of many online vendors of items for mortification of the flesh.
Queries for Contemplation
Given today’s and yesterday’s and Monday’s DMs, do you recognize a deeper relevance to the stories of Holy Week and their intense relevance to today’s moral and political crises?
Recommended Reading
The Pope’s War offers a provocative look at three decades of corruption in the Catholic Church, focusing on Josef Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI. The final section in the book focuses on birthing a truly catholic Christianity.
“This book should be read by everybody, not only for its ferocious courage, but also for its vision for what needs to be saved from the destructive forces that threaten authentic Christianity.” ~ Andrew Harvey, author of The Hope.
“In the gripping The Pope’s War, Matthew Fox takes an unwavering look at the layers of corruption in the Catholic Church, holding moral truth against power.” — Jason Berry, author of Vows of Silence: The Abuse of Power in the Papacy of John Paul II
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice
In A Spirituality Named Compassion, Matthew Fox delivers a profound exploration of the meaning and practice of compassion. Establishing a spirituality for the future that promises personal, social, and global healing, Fox marries mysticism with social justice, leading the way toward a gentler and more ecological spirituality and an acceptance of our interdependence which is the substratum of all compassionate activity.
“Well worth our deepest consideration…Puts compassion into its proper focus after centuries of neglect.” –The Catholic Register
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.
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society
Visionary theologian and best-selling author Matthew Fox offers a new theology of evil that fundamentally changes the traditional perception of good and evil and points the way to a more enlightened treatment of ourselves, one another, and all of nature. In comparing the Eastern tradition of the 7 chakras to the Western tradition of the 7 capital sins, Fox allows us to think creatively about our capacity for personal and institutional evil and what we can do about them.
“A scholarly masterpiece embodying a better vision and depth of perception far beyond the grasp of any one single science. A breath-taking analysis.” — Diarmuid O’Murchu, author of Quantum Theology: Spiritual Implications of the New Physics
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth
Fox’s spirituality weds the healing and liberation found in North American Creation Spirituality and in South American Liberation Theology. Creation Spirituality challenges readers of every religious and political persuasion to unite in a new vision through which we learn to honor the earth and the people who inhabit it as the gift of a good and just Creator.
“A watershed theological work that offers a common ground for religious seekers and activists of all stripes.” — Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, Spirituality and Practice.
“I am reading Liberating Gifts for the People of the Earth by Matt Fox. He is one that fills my heart and mind for new life in spite of so much that is violent in our world.” ~ Sister Dorothy Stang.
