Meister Eckhart, the fourteenth-century theologian and mystic, used imagery which highlighted the truth of that divine life, like human life is implanted internally and comes about through a process of gestation and birth. "We are each meant to be mothers of God," he wrote.
For Eckhart, birthing God essentially meant birthing compassion. He believed compassion to be the ultimate fruit of our birthing, a slow breaking out of divinity from within us. God is compassion, he insisted; therefore, as God is born more deeply in the soul, so too is the compassionate life.
— John Mogabgab, editor, Communion, Community, Commonweal