Ruby Reed (advaya):
To get us to the topic of today — The Christian Mystics: Wisdom for Our Time — I’m incredibly honored to be joined by Dr. Matthew Fox.
Matthew is a spiritual theologian, Episcopal priest, and activist for gender justice and eco-justice. He has written 37 books on mysticism and spirituality, translated into over 70 languages. He has significantly contributed to the rediscovery of Hildegard of Bingen, Meister Eckhart, and Thomas Aquinas as pre-modern mystics and prophets.
He is the founder of the University of Creation Spirituality in California and has worked for over two decades to reinvent forms of worship, especially with young people. His efforts include introducing contemporary elements into Western liturgy, such as in The Cosmic Mass.
Matthew plays a crucial role in bridging scholarship, imagination, and writing skill—particularly in a time when the more official Christian theological traditions struggle to connect with both the spiritual possibilities of the present and their own rich, creative roots of the past.
At Advaya, Matthew has always been a shining light. He has spoken on several of our courses over the past ten years. What we’ve found particularly inspiring is his emphasis on direct mystical experience—connection with the divine, beyond the individual ego. His approach reframes historical figures like Hildegard of Bingen and Meister Eckhart not just as mystics, but as visionary prophets whose teachings we can apply today to build a world we truly want to live in.
As mentioned, Matthew has been deeply involved in gender and eco-justice, and in reconfiguring the role of spiritual practice with an emphasis on activism and justice—as it often originally was.
So, Matthew, welcome again, from the bottom of my heart. And to everyone joining us, feel free to say where you are in the world and what drew you to this topic. There’s no pressure, but it’s always meaningful to hear from each other and connect.
Dr. Matthew Fox:
Thank you very much, Ruby, and thank you for your vision and perseverance over these ten years in creating this kind of platform. It’s so needed. The work you and your team are doing is crucial to the survival of our species and the planet itself. We cannot survive without deepening our self-awareness as a species and realizing we are capable of compassion.
When we look at all the world religions, we see that they point to this truth. The Dalai Lama has said, “We can do away with all religion, but we can’t do away with compassion. Compassion is my religion.” In the Quran, the most common name for God is “the Compassionate One.” In Judaism, compassion is seen as the secret name of God. And in Christianity, Jesus unveiled that secret when he said, “Be compassionate, as your Creator in heaven is compassionate.”
So we find this word—compassion—at the core of all traditions. And yet, where is it in the world today? Too often, it has been sentimentalized. But real compassion, as taught by the Jewish prophets and Meister Eckhart, means justice. It means creating structures that allow the best of us—our compassion and our wisdom—to flow.
Speaking of wisdom—where has it gone?
Hildegard of Bingen, the 12th-century abbess, mystic, and musical genius, linked compassion and wisdom. She wrote the first opera in the West—300 years ahead of her time. Across cultures and religions, wisdom is associated with the feminine: Kuan Yin in the East, Sophia in Greek, Chokhmah in Hebrew—all feminine figures.
Wisdom was cast aside when patriarchy took over education and religion. But when the university was first created in the late 12th century, it was meant to help us find our place in the universe. True wisdom teaches us to understand the interconnectivity of all things—this is also the root of compassion.
So there is much to learn and recover from the mystical traditions. This includes restoring the feminine, which can balance the toxic masculinity we see manifested today, particularly in our continued assault on Mother Earth. In the U.S., an entire political party still denies the reality of global warming—what could be more foolish than that?
Hildegard’s first book was titled Scivias, meaning “Know the Ways.” The ways of what? Of wisdom and of folly. We’ve become far too adept at the ways of folly. Where are the ways of wisdom being proposed today? That’s what the mystical tradition offers, and why we’re so hungry for it.
When we go deep enough into our own traditions—whether Christian, Buddhist, Sufi, Jewish—we begin to find shared messages. That’s why I speak of deep ecumenism: the coming together of the wisdom traditions of the world. Instead of religions fueling division and violence, we can unite to guide our species toward a new level of consciousness, perhaps even the next stage of evolution.
So thank you again for your work, Ruby, and to your team. It’s deeply inspiring to see your generation not only take these issues seriously, but also take real action by creating learning communities like this.
Ruby:
Thank you, Matthew. Something you just said really stayed with me: your role, speaking from the Western tradition, is not only to honor the treasure within it but also to critique it.
When we think of the Abrahamic religions, and Christianity in particular, so much harm has been done in the name of religious domination and colonization—far removed from the teachings of Jesus. I know you've written extensively about Jesus in the context of Creation Spirituality, and how those original messages have often been lost, distorted, or used as tools of oppression.
I often think about how important it is to excavate those original roots—not just to rectify past wrongs, but to re-center the living, healthy traditions that have survived alongside the darker ones. People like Hildegard and Eckhart have held that wisdom, and their example gives us a way to reimagine what this spiritual lineage can look like.
Dr. Matthew Fox:
Yes, that’s an essential point. A major turning point in Christianity came in the 4th century when the Roman Empire was collapsing. Emperor Constantine converted to Christianity and convened the Council of Nicaea, which produced the Nicene Creed—still recited by many Christians today.
I studied the Nicene Creed recently. What’s astounding is what’s not in it. It includes a cosmic dimension—starting with the universe rather than sin, which is a plus. But it doesn’t mention a single teaching of Jesus. Nothing about the Beatitudes, love of neighbor, forgiveness, or compassion. It’s all doctrine—heady and abstract—designed to build a religious structure that served the needs of empire, not the spiritual life of the people.
In that same century, St. Augustine introduced the concept of original sin—a notion alien to Judaism and something Jesus never taught. As Elie Wiesel once said, original sin is “alien to Jewish thinking.” And yet the Church was built on this idea.
I wrote a book titled Original Blessing as a counterpoint. It created quite a stir—especially in the Vatican. But the truth is, original sin serves imperial power. It tells people they're inherently flawed unless they submit. This is the theology that underpinned colonization. Instead of dialoguing with indigenous peoples about gratitude, reverence, and compassion, Christians showed up and said, “You're going to hell.”
The mystical tradition, in contrast, begins not with sin but with goodness. Genesis 1 doesn’t mention sin—it celebrates blessing. Even Thomas Aquinas emphasized original goodness. Unless we recognize and fall in love with goodness, we cannot contribute to it.
Today's Webb Telescope discoveries are offering us awe-inspiring views of the universe—reminding us of the wonder and beauty at the heart of creation. This awe is the beginning of mysticism and the spiritual life.
Ruby:
Thank you, Matthew. There’s a quote of yours that I’d love to revisit. We actually shared it a few weeks ago and it really stayed with me. It goes:
"Mysticism is about being with being—being with being in silence, in experience, in awe, in connection-making, in non-dualism. A prophet is a mystic in action."
A lot of what you’ve said—especially when you were drawing from the Beatitudes and talking about love—reminded me of this quote and the experiential aspect of mysticism, at least as I understand it. There’s a directness to it—a connection without ideology or dogma, which can otherwise lead to power, coercion, and domination.
This non-dualistic sense you speak of—being with awe, beauty, the Beloved, and love—I see it echoed in the works of St. John of the Cross, in Hildegard von Bingen’s writings and paintings. What they reveal seems so different from the public image of Christianity. Suddenly it becomes very personal, while still remaining deeply universal.
Matthew Fox:
Well, I love that you've picked up on all those dimensions of the mystical. They certainly mean a lot to me, and I can tell they mean a lot to you. Let me share a story.
Years ago, I was interviewed in Holland when some of my books were being released there. The interviewer was a bright young man, about 40, and this was a live interview. When it ended, the cameras turned off, and he leaned forward and said, "I have a question I didn’t dare ask on air." I said, "Go ahead." He said, “You Americans still believe we can experience God?”
I’ve forgotten the rest of the interview, but I never forgot that question. It’s stayed with me because it speaks to a deep yearning. And that’s where experience comes in, the word you emphasized.
This is the real difference between spirituality and religion. Religion today often seems like a structure. But spirituality is about experience. That’s why, when I was a Dominican in the early ’60s, I asked my superiors to let me study spirituality. I said, “My generation will be less interested in religion, and more interested in spirit—spirituality—which is the experience of God.” They let me go to Paris, where I discovered my mentor, Père Chenu, a French Dominican who named the Creation Spirituality tradition for me.
I can’t emphasize enough: experience is central. Thomas Aquinas says the experience of God should not be restricted to the few or to the old. That’s exactly right. The young can experience wonder and the divine—wherever beauty, awe, joy, and reverence arise. And hopefully that’s often.
Take Julian of Norwich, the English mystic from the 14th century. She lived through the bubonic plague—the worst plague ever—but kept her wisdom. She defines mysticism as “one-ing.” She even invented the word, and others like “enjoy.” “One-ing” is such a beautiful word: the coming together of human psyche and cosmos, human and divine, human and one another, human and all the beauty of creation. These are mystical experiences.
For too long in the Piscean era, dualisms reigned: contemplatives in monasteries, and the rest of us on the streets. But a lot of my work—which has gotten me in some trouble—is about melting those dualisms. We are all mystics. We’re born mystics. I’ve met people in monasteries who aren’t mystics. There are no walls that guarantee that.
Now, it’s fascinating: Julian defines mysticism as “one-ing.” Meister Eckhart, who came just before her, defines it as “breakthrough”—a word he invented: durchbruch in German. He said, “In breakthrough, I learn that God and I are one.” How often does breakthrough happen? “For a person who is awake,” he said, “it doesn’t happen once a year or once a month or even once a day—but many times every day.”
Aquinas, who came just before Eckhart, used the word ecstasy. I love that word. Ecstasis in Greek means “to stand outside of.” In ecstasy, you’re outside your ego, your everyday self, your work mask—you’re in touch with your deeper self. It puts you in a trance. Aquinas even says ecstasy happens with love, with your beloved. He compares it to being drunk—with reference to the Song of Songs, the great love poem in the Bible: “The lovers are drunk on love.”
So whether you call it “ecstasy,” “breakthrough,” or “one-ing,” all are mystical expressions of non-dualism—a coming together.
The great prophetic feminist scholar Rosemary Radford Ruether said, “The foundation of all patriarchy is dualism.” So deconstructing dualism—through mysticism—is a way to deconstruct patriarchy. And this movement toward the experiential side of religion is a vital path today. It’s also about reclaiming healthy masculinity—archetypes that work—and balancing it with the Divine Feminine, so we can create cultures of wholeness.
Ruby:
Thank you, Matthew. That clarification on dualism as separateness really lands for me. Dualism enables difference, division.
Matthew Fox:
Absolutely. A major example is Augustine’s statement in the 4th century, just as Christianity became imperial. He said, “Spirit is whatever is not matter.” You can’t get more dualistic than that. He separates spirit from everything material.
Centuries later, Aquinas counters this. He says spirit is the élan, the vitality in everything—in the grass, the trees, animals, and our own bodies, especially when we dance, make love, run—matter is holy. He’s drawing from Jewish thought: Genesis says matter is good. But Augustine was shaped by Neoplatonism and Manichaeism—both of which denigrate matter.
Augustine also said, “Man, but not woman, is made in the image and likeness of God.” That’s dualism and sexism in one package. And it’s had vast consequences—religious oppression, colonization, wars. When Europeans arrived in the Americas, they killed millions. Many died of disease, yes, but the mindset of domination was rooted in these dualisms.
That’s why I talk about “deep ecumenism.” We need to gather across religious traditions, share what’s common, and learn from one another. That’s how we evolve spiritually and culturally has birthed all this beauty. Every mother knows that labor pains are pains. They're not an abstraction—they’re real. But as Jesus observed, after the suffering comes the newborn, and you can put the pain behind you, most of the time.
So that's how we grow our souls: by entering into the joy and beauty of life, but also by recognizing the suffering. Not running from it. Not taking drugs to deal with it. Not copping out. But recognizing the suffering around us—the suffering of Mother Earth today, the suffering of the poor who don’t know when their next meal is coming, or who don’t have a roof over their head—and trying to alleviate that. Entering into dialogue with those who suffer differently than we do.
And so, those are the two ways the mystics teach: the via positiva and the via negativa. Part of the via negativa is what I alluded to earlier: the emptying meditations. The meditations that empty your mind so you're not busy thinking about all these problems, but you're actually entering into your own silence, into your own depth.
Of course, the East is very strong in these practices—but the West has them too. And we have the statement in the Psalms: “Be still and learn that I am God.” So it's in our stillness that we also communicate with the Divine. The Divine communicates with us. And in that process, we grow our souls. So we have a circle of energy that supports us.
And then I want to mention one other way: art as meditation. Because emptying your mind is one kind of meditation—stillness—that’s good. But so is art as meditation: meditation by dance, by running, by music, by poetry, by sculpture—so many ways to meditate that way. And that way is called the way of the prophets.
That way leads you right into social action. I see what Gandhi and King did—filling the jails, for example—or marching to the sea without killing anyone, to overthrow the Empire. All those practices, when you think about it, are art forms. They’re social art. They’re gathering the anger of the people, which is what Gandhi said he was doing—gathering the anger and turning it into something useful that works. Not by hating others, but by putting yourself in a position where you might get temporarily hurt or jailed or something else, but you're willing to take on that oppression in order to recycle hatred into love.
So that too—art as meditation—prepares you for this non-dualism in process and action. It’s about dealing with the suffering of the world, and those forces—which are often blind—of greed and injustice and hatred and sadomasochism that keep things as they are.
Ruby:
Thank you, Matthew. I’ve loved our conversation so far today, and the immense knowledge that you bring—and the immense skill you have in communicating the very essential aspects of mysticism and theology in such a clear way that is so meaningful to so many of us, in a time when the sense of beauty is often disregarded in conversations about social justice and social change.
To bring those two together—how we can access, through beauty or through a sense of love, something that can create real change in the real world—is powerful. And I think also recognizing this living lineage within the Western tradition, one that isn’t about domination and genocide, but something life-giving and life-revering: of compassion and interconnectedness.
In the last five minutes, because we are doing a course together, I’d love you to just share a little bit about the course that you’re teaching with Advaya—and the different mystics that you’re exploring within the course—just so that everyone here can have a little bit of insight in case they want to join us. I’m so excited about the course and would hate to miss this opportunity.
Matthew Fox:
Well, thank you, Ruby. And thank you for your questions and our dialogue today—I appreciate them very much. And again, I’m keen that your generation will have the spiritual resources and the inner strength to carry on the genuine battles you’re engaging in. Because this is no ordinary moment in history—we’re facing climate change and rising seas.
I was just at a science conference in Florida last week. A scientist there said Florida is a disappearing state. He gave the facts: this year, a third of it will be gone; by some point in the near future, two-thirds; by the end of the century, possibly all of it. That’s the time we’re living in.
So it’s vital that your generation be clear—and grounded—for this great moment. Because our species has no guarantee of surviving this era. All our cousins—the Neanderthals, Denisovans, and others—are gone. Extinct. Fourteen of them, I think we’ve counted so far. But we still have a chance. And you, the younger generation, are carrying that energy.
So as an elder, it’s my job to help you ground yourselves and encourage you.
In our class, we’ll explore six wonderful people.
We’ll begin with Hildegard von Bingen, whom we’ve already talked about. She was very prophetic—she took on the Pope and emperors. One follower of Luther in the 16th century called Hildegard “the first Protestant.” But she was a Benedictine abbess in the 12th century! So what did she do that sounded like Luther four centuries later? Well, we’ll find out.
We’ll spend two weeks on Hildegard because she’s so special. She not only has music to share, but also a lot of paintings. I call her the grandmother of the Rhineland mystic movement. She really stepped up and shook up an entire civilization.
Then comes Thomas Aquinas. Now, two years after Hildegard died, Francis of Assisi was born—but we won’t include him, not because he’s not worthy, but because a lot of people already know about him. So we’ll jump ahead to Aquinas, who followed closely after Francis. Aquinas doesn’t get the credit he deserves. He was a genius—on par with Einstein or Hildegard. He read the Bible once and memorized it. He had a photographic memory.
He was also very prophetic. He broke from the Neoplatonist dualism that Augustine set up. He coined the term the common good—which is so important today and often lost. When I looked it up recently, the internet said in big letters: Thomas Aquinas brought this term into Western jurisprudence in the 13th century. Of course, he got it from Aristotle, but he made it central. He had a deep sense of cosmology. That’s why he loved Aristotle—because Aristotle cared about the universe.
Here’s one line from Aquinas: “Compassion is a fire that Jesus came to set on the Earth.”
Well, if that doesn’t parallel what the Dalai Lama says about doing away with religion—but not compassion—I don’t know what does.
After Aquinas, we move to Mechthild of Magdeburg—a member of the Beguine movement, the women’s movement of the Middle Ages. She knew Aquinas well. She kept a spiritual journal all her life, and her Dominican spiritual director helped her publish it: The Flowing Light of the Godhead. It’s a beautiful book. She talks about the “dark night of the soul” 300 years before John of the Cross coined the term. She says: “There comes a time when the lights go out. What do we do then?” She’s speaking to our time.
Then comes Meister Eckhart—the greatest mystic of the West. The East tells us this. Hindu and Buddhist thinkers like Ananda Coomaraswamy and D.T. Suzuki recognized Eckhart as aligned with their own deepest truths. Even though Eckhart never met a Buddhist or a Hindu, he went so deep into his own tradition that he discovered the same universal truths.
Finally, we explore our sister Julian of Norwich—the first woman to write a book in English, and a champion of Creation Spirituality. She said, “God is a goodness in nature.” She was preaching this during the bubonic plague, when many were saying the plague was punishment for our sins. But Julian held her ground. She insisted that goodness is everywhere—and that’s where you find God: in nature, in our own nature.
I think these teachers will be very valuable for our journeys. Because we have to take care of ourselves. If we burn out or run away, what good are we contributing? We’re here to contribute—that’s the prophet in us. And these mystics were all also prophets. They had enemies. Julian’s book wasn’t printed for 300 years after she died. That’s how women were treated in the 14th century. Geoffrey Chaucer was printed right away—Julian had to wait 300 years. If she hadn’t been ignored, European colonizers might have followed a very different theology—and we might have had a very different history.
Ruby:
Thank you, Matthew, so much for today—and thank you to everyone for joining us. We’re going to have to wrap up—we’re a little over time—but I’m incredibly excited for the launch of our course, which will be sent out tomorrow.
As Dylan mentioned at the start of the call, everyone here gets a small discount code for the course—it’s **
MYSTICS15**, and we’ll send that out by email as well.
Matthew, this was such a rich conversation. Thank you again for joining us this morning. And thank you, everyone, wherever you are in the world. Just another call to explore Matthew’s profound body of work—his website, his many books, his lectures. I found his teachings on Hildegard von Bingen incredibly inspiring—they gave me so much insight, especially around the soul and beauty—and how to enrich the world I live in through those teachings.
So thank you again—and we’ll be in touch with everybody!
