[Oe List ...] Matthew Fox on Thomas Berry

[LAURELCG at aol.com]

Dear Friends,

Our friend and mentor to many of us, Thomas Berry,  died peacefully at 6:35 
AM this morning. We are all grateful to him for his  generosity of spirit 
and of mind, his love of marrying science and religion, his  integrity and 
passion for justice and especially eco-justice, and his hard work  in 
learning, teaching and mentoring. He was a man of wisdom and a man of  grace.

Below are a few words I spoke a few years ago at a gathering to  honor him 
and he was present for that gathering. (This has been posted on my web  page 
for a few years.)

Now Thomas joins the ancestors. And he leaves  behind much work for all of 
us to do. All part of the Great Work of which he  wrote so eloquently.

Cordially,

Matthew Fox



Some Thoughts on Thomas Berry’s Contributions to the Western Spiritual  
Tradition


By Rev. Matthew Fox, PhD.


Caribbean poet and  Nobel prizewinner Derek Wallcott says: “For every poet 
it is always morning in  the world; history a forgotten, insomniac night. 
The fate of poetry is to fall  in love with the world in spite of history.”

I believe Walcott names an  accomplishment of Thomas’ poetic and mystical 
side—Thomas calls all of us to  fall in love with the world in spite of the 
folly of human history. Thomas  creates a context when he says “ecology is 
functional cosmology”--a context in  which we can recover the zeal that comes 
from falling in love with the world  once again. He puts our own personal 
and collective histories into context and  he puts the context into a sacred 
context by reminding us that the primary  sacrament is the universe itself. 
Every other sacrament, being and action is  derivative of that holy sacrament.

When I think of Thomas I am reminded  of the great mentor relationships of 
western history. I think of Teilhard de  Chardin’s influence on Thomas Berry 
in the same light that I think of Plato’s  influence on Aristotle and 
Albert the Great’s influence on Thomas Aquinas for  example. Thomas had a mentor 
and all studies show that when young men have  mentors they go into deeper 
paths and new spirals of  achievement.

Speaking in general terms and using a biblical metaphor, I  think Thomas 
stands up as a kind of new Moses leading all religious people,  people of 
religious sensibilities and certainly Christians, out of a bondage of  a land of 
anthropocentrism to a land of cosmology and ecology, a land flowing  with 
milk and honey. A land that promises to respond to the great needs of the  
great human heart. He leads us out of the land of “autism” (his word) into a  
land of renewed communication with other beings and other species who are 
in  fact very eager to communicate, to reveal themselves to us. He leads us 
out of  the land of “academic barbarism” (his words—which I love) to a land 
of  educational responsibility where the power of knowledge is subsumed to 
the  greater common good. Where PhD’s instead of destroying the earth (his  
observation) are employing wisdom to save the earth and her beauty. He leads 
us  out of a land of psychologism where disenchantment, cynicism, trivia, 
inertia,  violence, commercialism and what Thomas calls the “illusory world of 
 advertising” reign, into a land of enchantment, beauty, wonder, intimacy 
become  are our values—a place where caring matters.

He leads us out of the land  of domestication to revelry of the sacred 
which always has something in common  with the wild. For example, he writes: “
Wildness we might consider as the root  of the authentic spontaneities of any 
being. It is that wellspring of creativity  whence comes the instinctive 
activates that enable all living beings to obtain  their food, to find shelter, 
to bring forth their young: to sing and dance and  fly through the air and 
swim through the depths of the sea. This is the same  inner tendency that 
evokes the insight of the poet, the skill of the artist and  the power of the 
shaman.” How beautifully Thomas marries the wild energy, the  sacred energy 
of the more than human world with human creativity in that  powerful 
passage. Such a reminder that we are capable as a species of  domesticating even 
Divinity Itself, making Divinity into our tidy images. Thomas  leads us out of 
the land of boredom to a sense of awe and with awe comes  gratitude and 
with awe comes reverence--what Thomas calls a “sense of the  numinous.” In 
this way he is setting faith in the premodern context of the  sacredness of all 
creation, of cosmology, of the more than human.

If a  “new Moses” is too strong a term for some to name Thomas’ 
contribution, then  surely we could settle on another term, “prophet.” The primary 
work of the  prophet as Rabbi Heschel teaches, is to “interfere.” And Thomas 
is nothing if  not a great interferer. He is so subtle about it they haven’t 
caught up with him  yet. Prophets wake a sleeping people and Thomas does 
that. Prophets cry in the  wilderness and Thomas does that. Prophets call 
people who are wallowing in  injustice and neglect back to justice and Thomas 
does that. He calls us to  Eco-Justice which is the necessary context for all 
other justice struggles be  they economic, racial, gender or class. He calls 
us as the prophets of old did  to the Great Work and thus to leave trivial 
work behind. He calls us to reach  for the Ecozoic Age and indeed, in his 
thoroughly challenging phrase, to  “reinvent our species.”

In trying to assess Thomas’ contribution to  western spirituality, I 
believe we are assisted by his own work. In a brief  essay on Hildegard of Bingen 
he wrote this about western spirituality: “Thus far  Christians have been so 
concerned with redemption out of this world, so attached  to their 
spiritual life development or their social mission of reconciliation  that they have 
had little time for their serious attention to the earth. Nor do  
Christians seem to be aware of the futility of social transformations proceeding  on 
an historical-industrial rather than on a comprehensive ecological basis….We 
 find relatively few Christian guides in the past to enlighten or to 
inspire us  to a more functional relationship between the human and the natural 
worlds.” But  then Thomas offers three examples of the past: Benedict offered 
an agrarian  model, he being the father of course of western monasticism; 
Francis of Assisi  offered a model based on the universal community of 
creatures; Hildegard is a  third model with her sense of the earth as “a region of 
delight, we might almost  say of pagan delight” which she has found from 
within her own experience and in  a “unique model of Christian communion.” 
Hildegard writes: “The entire world has  been embraced by this kiss [of God and 
creation].” Thomas adds: “Because of this  erotic bond, the earth becomes 
luxuriant in its every aspect.” I propose that  Thomas enfolds Benedict’s 
agrarian model, Francis’ community model and  Hildegard’s erotic model into 
his work.

I see in his work a fourth model  which I would call the cosmic scientific 
model and I think the precursor of this  model is in fact Thomas’ own 
namesake whom he quotes so often, St. Thomas  Aquinas of the 13th century who was 
condemned three times by the church before  they canonized him a saint. Like 
Thomas Berry, Aquinas had the imagination, the  scientific curiosity and 
the courage to propose a whole new direction for  Christian theology in his 
day and the direction was that of incorporating  science and of course the 
breakthrough science of Aquinas' day was Aristotle, a  pagan, who came to 
Europe by way of Islam. Aristotle came double-tainted into  Christianity and this 
is why Aquinas was condemned three times because he was  working overtime 
with those who were more than Christian.

Some of  Aquinas' observations follow. “Faith comes in two volumes: Nature 
and the  Bible.” We all know Thomas Berry’s notorious remark that he has 
repeated more  than once—that we should “put the Bible on a shelf for twenty 
years”. This is  simply a logical conclusion that we have been overdoing the 
book-bit in the name  of revelation at least since the invention of the 
printing press. Why is it that  by now EVERY seminary, every school that 
pretends to be training spiritual  leaders, does not have scientists on its 
faculty telling us the revelation of  nature, its mysticism and the ethics to be 
derived from that as well as biblical  theologians? We must find the balance 
anew between the revelation of nature and  the revelation of the Bible.

In fact in the Bible there is a whole  tradition, the wisdom tradition, 
scholars now agree was the tradition of the  historic Jesus which is total 
nature mysticism. One prevalent teaching of  scholars today is that Jesus as a 
child, being considered illegitimate, was  excluded from the synagogue so he 
went out and played in nature while others  were meeting to pray indoors and 
that radicalized him. It comes through in all  of his parables and all of 
his teaching which are all nature based. Wisdom  literature is not based on 
reading books. Jesus was illiterate like most of his  country people.

Another connection between Aquinas and Berry—Berry is of  course carrying 
this in all new directions-- is Aquinas' observation that “every  human 
person is capax universi (capable of the universe).” That’s who we are as  a 
species. That’s how big we are and neither our souls nor our hearts nor our  
minds will be satisfied and therefore relieved of temptations to greed and 
power  until they are reset in the context of cosmology and the universe 
itself. In  this regard the exciting teachings of the universe story in our time 
that  emerges from the work of Thomas and Brian Swimme in recovering a 
universe story  fulfills Aquinas’ observation.

Consider for example the great Otto Rank,  the father of humanistic 
psychology who broke with Freud over many issues. Rank  came to the conclusion that 
the number one problem for human beings is the  feeling of separation that 
begins with leaving the womb which was our universe  for nine months and the 
rest of life is about trying to find a reunion with the  cosmos. He says: “
We surrender ourselves in art or love to a potential  restoration with the 
union of the cosmos which once existed and was then lost.”  He talks about “
original wound” (much better than “original sin”) that haunts  our species. 
This is that wound: That we feel separated from the cosmos. He says  the 
only solution is the Unio Mystica, being one with the all, in tune with the  
cosmos. And indigenous people all know about this. Rank said: “This  
identification is an echo of an original identity not only merely of child and  
mother but of everything living. Witness the reverence of the primitives for  
animals. In humans identification aims at reestablishing a lost identity with  
the cosmic process that has to be surrendered and continuously 
reestablished in  the course of self-development.” Thomas Berry's work is a profound 
work of human  healing because it restores that lost identify and relationship 
and passion  between the human and the cosmos.

Gaston Bachelard, the late twentieth  century French philosopher, comments 
on what happens when cosmos and psyche  reconnect. In the Poetics of Space 
he talks of the holy trinity of Immensity,  Intensity and Intimacy. When you 
have an experience of Immensity—in Thomas’  words, an experience of the 
cosmos, or relationship to it, it is an intense  experience. All awe is both an 
intense and intimate experience. Humans cannot  separate the immense, 
intense and intimate experience and Thomas Berry by  leading us into a cosmic 
awareness again, an awareness as important for our  hearts as for our minds, is 
bathing us anew in Immensity, Intensity and Intimacy  far beyond any mere 
anthropocentric relationship could ever do for  us.

Bachelard declares that “grandeur progresses in the world in  proportion to 
the deepening of intimacy…a primal value.” We have to take back  immensity 
as a primal intimate value where “we are no longer shut up in the  weight 
of the prison of our own beings.” The new cosmology helps us to do this  and 
so do solitude and meditation. I honor Thomas and Aquinas and others who are 
 helping us to name the vastness of our souls. Ernest Holmes put it this 
way:  “Spirituality is a word that is often misused.” (He said this 100 years 
ago!)  “From our viewpoint, spirituality is one’s recognition of the 
universe as a  living presence of the good, truth, beauty, peace, power and love.”
 Holmes  recognizes that spirituality is not spirituality if it is 
psychologized—if it is  not about the universe. Holmes was right and Thomas Berry is 
 right.

Thomas Berry carries us into diversity as well. Many western  philosophers 
have fought over the issue of the one vs. the many but neither  Aquinas nor 
Thomas Berry is the least bit in doubt about the resolution. Many  times I’
ve heard Berry quote Aquinas on exactly this issue of the wealth of  
diversity. Berry calls the universe the primary artist. “In every phase of our  
imaginative, aesthetic, and emotional lives we are profoundly dependent on this  
larger context of the surrounding world.” The tragedy of the ecological 
crisis  is a soul crisis because we have been gifted with so much. Aquinas 
says:  “Because the divine goodness could not be adequately expressed by one 
creature  alone, God has produced many and diverse creatures so what is wanting 
in one in  the representation of divine goodness might be supplied by 
another. Thus the  whole universe together participates in the divine goodness ….”
 So the  celebration of diversity is honored in both Aquinas and Berry’s  
thinking.

The sense of cosmology, looking at the whole and not the part,  is 
intrinsic to all post-modern thinking but also to all premodern thinking  including 
Aquinas and indigenous people This is how Aquinas put it: “Divinity is  
better represented by the whole universe than by any single thing….Not only are  
individual creatures images of God but so too is the whole cosmos.” How 
many  theologians or preachers have you ever heard say that—that the cosmos is 
an  image of God? Thomas Berry says it. Aquinas says: “God has produced a 
work in  which the divine likeness is clearly reflected: I mean by this the 
world  itself.” The world itself is a mirror of the Sacred, a mirror of 
Divinity, a  face of God, a Christ, a Buddha, Shekinah, the Goddess—call it what 
you will—all  that is renamed in Thomas Berry’s contribution.v 
Another dimension to  Berry’s work that is pushed in Aquinas is that of 
asking the question: What is  the human’s role in all this? Why are we here? 
Aquinas says: “God wills that  humans exist for the sake of the perfection of 
the universe.” By ‘perfection’ he  means bringing to completion the tasks 
of the universe. Like Thomas Berry he is  setting us in an ethical context of 
carrying on the Universe’s work. As Aquinas  very bluntly puts it: “It is 
false to say that humanity is the most excellent  being in the universe. The 
most excellent being in the universe is the universe  itself.” And he says “
we bless God by recognizing the divine goodness.” If I  were to pick one 
line for Thomas Berry’s epitaph it would be that. Thomas taught  us to see 
with new eyes (old new eyes?) the divine goodness, to see the beauty  within 
all systems—eco, cosmic, fireball, relationship of microcosm (atoms) to  
macrocosm. He reseeds the goodness or blessing that is inherent in all of  being.

It’s interesting that many traditions of the world propose that  the 
consequence of seeing the world cosmically and seeing it in a context of  goodness 
is right behavior. Without this consciousness we are short on right  
behavior. For example, Black Elk says: “The human heart is a sanctuary at the  
center of which there is a little space, wherein the Great Spirit dwells, and  
this is the Eye. This is the Eye of the Great Spirit….” Thus our cosmology  
becomes our ethics. Black Elk continues: “The first peace—which is the 
most  important peace—is that which comes in the souls of people when they 
realize  their oneness with all its powers….” Thomas Berry draws us to this 
very  teaching, that at the center of all hearts lies the center of the 
universe and  Wanka Tanka the Holy One. If Black Elk is correct, then Thomas is an 
ethical  teacher showing us the way to recover our peacefulness and ways of 
reconnecting  to the powers of the universe itself.

Still another dimension to Thomas  Berry’s work is intimacy, a common word 
in his work. Aquinas put intimacy this  way: “God is in all things in the 
most intimate way. Insofar as a thing has  existence it is like God.” This is 
what Black Elk is saying: Wankan Tanka is  within all things; Hildegard said 
“no creature lacks an intimate life.” So our  questing for intimacy is 
responded to by the yearning for intimacy from other  beings of the universe 
and this planet. We have a right to intimacy and things  are set up biased in 
favor of intimacy. An anthropocentric consciousness is not  capable of 
providing intimacy and this is why television is run over with soap  operas—an 
infinite amount, unending number, of pseudo-love shows that are  destined not 
to satisfy. Intimacy is found in a more than human context and we  are 
invited to participate.

Another dimension to Berry’s work that  carries us to the next century is 
his profound study of deep ecumenism which  embraces the wisdom of all our 
religious traditions and of science itself. He  brings together what has been 
rent asunder in the 17th century, science’s wisdom  and the potential wisdom 
of religion. We see in Thomas the yoga of study itself.  By his life style 
Thomas reminds us of something that our educational system has  practically 
forgotten and that is that learning itself is prayer. Learning  itself can 
be a spiritual practice. The pursuit of truth is a spiritual act, a  
meditation. The rabbis of old knew this—studying Torah is prayer. Aquinas knew  that—
his study was his prayer. Our secularization of education has sucked out of 
 us the joy and commitment and thrill and yoga that study is. The 
excitement and  spiritual experience of learning is so often left behind. Whether you 
study  languages, mathematics, science, if you bring your heart to it, it 
is a  spiritual discipline. We thank Thomas for that as well as Aquinas.

And  finally, Thomas Berry is a true elder to the young—so important in our 
time. The  young are yearning for elders and there are so few. What can you 
say of the  captains of industry, the Enrons, the Andersons, the Talibans, 
the World Coms,  the Vaticans in this moment of history? They all suffer 
from a terminal disease  called Patriarchal Excess and from Adultism. They want 
to use the youth but are  not there to awaken the stories of the youth. And 
Thomas Berry has been  inspiring youth for years. The real work of the 
elder is to pass on stories that  motivate the young to be generous and alive 
and use their god-given gifts to  effect history so that history will not be 
the nightmare that Walcott named it  but will be closer to that “love of the 
world” that it can become. Thomas Berry  has done this for so many 
individuals. Recently I received a letter from a 22  year old Jesuit novice who told 
me this story: He read my work and found Thomas  Berry that way and decided 
to take a Greyhound bus down to North Carolina to  spend a day with Thomas. “
Now I know what I have to do with the rest of my life  and what my 
generation has to do,” he wrote me. That is eldership. That is the  kind of effect 
Thomas’ being and work have had on countless people and will  have. I visited 
Earth Haven in North Carolina, an off the grid community,  drawing very 
bright people to commit their lives to what is sustainable. This is  the 
monastery of the twenty first century. To get to the 22nd century there will  be 
people this generous and this alive to truly alter our ways of living on this 
 earth. They are beholden to Thomas Berry and his work and Tom has visited  
them.

These are just two examples of Thomas Berry as elder. In effecting  the 
relationship of young and old he is challenging everyone to grow into our  role 
as elders and to reject our culture’s heresy of ‘retirement’ as finding 
the  nearest golf course and squatting there until they bury you. Instead, 
start  investing your time, wisdom, imagination and excess money if you have 
some into  those movements that can make us sustainable and carry our species 
into a 22nd  century that will be more honorable.

If human history survives and our  species survives into the 22nd century, 
I believe that history will record that  among us a certain prophet rose in 
the latter part of the 20th century imbued  with the spirit of Teilhard de 
Chardin, the intellect of Aquinas, the eros of  Hildegard, the humility of 
Francis, the science of Einstein, and the courage and  imagination of Jesus. 
His name was Thomas Berry. We will remember him by  carrying on his vision, 
by building institutions and movements and infiltrating  all of our 
professions from education to politics to business to worship with  his many and 
sustainable visions.

© 2004 Matthew  Fox
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