Today is Good Friday, a day to meditate on evil and sacrifice and the price good people pay for following their conscience and having one, for following what Jesus called “the will of the Father.”
The crucifixion of Jesus is an archetype that speaks to almost everyone—you do not have to be Christian to “get” it. It talks of power-over, of the power of an empire and of religious authority in league with an empire to torture and kill those it does not want speaking out about alternative values, alternative versions and visions of society.
What Jesus called a “kingdom/queendom of God” where justice and compassion reign and not power for power’s sake.
A place where there is room for the sacred and that which is bigger than ourselves, that which made us and that we do not make.
A place where “justice flows like water” and people help one another, even the stranger.
A place where grace flows freely, and forgiveness is possible.
A place where Evil is acknowledged and confronted, not covered over, worshipped, and allowed free reign.
People found in Jesus and his truth-telling a hope that energized them. His parables offered an invitation to participate in decision-making and forming one’s conscience. Those in positions of power in the Empire and in institutional religion found a threat. So they silenced him (they thought). But his story and his teachings are still around and are still strong and inviting.
The experiences of Awe (the sacred) and the Awful (evil) run parallel in our lives. Just as Awe can render us silent, so too can the Awful. Both the Sacred and Evil take us beyond words and into the realm of the apophatic and of silence and of searching for words to name the depths within ourselves that are touched by the ecstasy of the divine or the antics of the demonic.
As we have seen in recent DMs, Hildegard tries to name such truths in her paintings and music. At times she borrows from the apocalyptic language and imagery of the Bible to name the extremes and edge of Evil. She births strange figures or unseen beasts to name evil powers and tells us what they signify. “Cosmic powers of darkness” as she calls them are frequently pictured for us. And demons.
All this is a kind of invitation—not unlike Jesus’s parables—to stand before evil and meditate on it and not shrink from it or try to run from it or go into denial about it. We too have the right to paint our pictures of Evil like she is doing. Or sing them. Or put them to poetry. Or shout them in the public square.
Rabbi Heschel says: There is always an opportunity to do a mitsvah, and precious is life because at all times and in all places we are able to do His will. This is why despair is alien to Jewish faith.*
Is despair alien to our faith? Good Friday invites that question among others.
*Abraham Joshua Heschel, God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism, p. 378.
See Matthew Fox, A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice.
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.
And Fox, Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen.
And Fox, Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality.
Banner Image: Oil painting depicting the crucifixion of Christ at Calvary (Golgotha) outside the city walls of Jerusalem by Pietro Sassi, circa 1870. Wikimedia Commons.
Queries for Contemplation
What does Good Friday mean to you this year 2025?
Recommended Reading
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.
Illuminations of Hildegard of Bingen
An introduction to the life and work of Hildegard of Bingen, Illuminations reveals the life and teachings of one of the greatest female artists and intellectuals of the Western Mystical Tradition. At the age of 42, she began to have visions; these were captured as 36 illuminations–24 of which are recorded in this book along with her commentaries on them.
“If one person deserves credit for the great Hildegard renaissance in our time, it is Matthew Fox.” – Dr Mary Ford-Grabowsky, author of Sacred Voices.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality
Matthew Fox lays out a whole new direction for Christianity—a direction that is in fact very ancient and very grounded in Jewish thinking (the fact that Jesus was a Jew is often neglected by Christian theology): the Four Paths of Creation Spirituality, the Vias Positiva, Negativa, Creativa and Transformativa in an extended and deeply developed way.
“Original Blessing makes available to the Christian world and to the human community a radical cure for all dark and derogatory views of the natural world wherever these may have originated.” –Thomas Berry, author, The Dream of the Earth; The Great Work; co-author, The Universe Story
