Thomas Merton (1915-1968)
Thomas Merton (1915-1968) was a Trappist monk who spent most of his adult life at the Abbey of Gethsemani just outside of Bardstown, Kentucky. He was born in France where his parents met in art school. His mother was an American Quaker and his father was from New Zealand. Merton was baptized in the Church of England and converted to Catholicism as a young adult. Shortly after he was born Merton’s family moved to the United States, settling in New York. He completed his undergraduate studies at Columbia University in Manhattan.
Merton’s autobiography, The Seven Story Mountain, was published in 1948 seven years after he entered the monastery. It became an international bestseller and launched Merton’s career has a writer. In 1961 Merton’s spiritual classic on the topic of contemplation, New Seeds of Contemplation, was published. Many of his readers consider this book to be an essential Merton text and a seminal work on contemplation. Thomas Merton is widely credited with being a person whose teaching, insight, and influence spurred the reawakening of the contemplative dimension of Christianity in the west.
The Mystics Reading Group at Good Shepherd is reading New Seeds of Contemplation and other select Merton writings right now. Come join us!
You will likely want to purchase your own copy of New Seeds of Contemplation. We have 3 class copies that will be loaned out to anyone who needs one during the session to be returned at the end of each session. On days when we read select writings Fr. Hendree will provide photo copies.
The Wisdom Tradition
Before we proceed further with Merton’s work here is a brief summary of what we call the Wisdom Tradition which will serve as contextual aid to our study.
The Wisdom Tradition (sometimes called the Perennial Tradition) is found in the mystical streams of many of the world’s religions and is articulated in one way or another around these basic tenets:
There is a God and something of the divine presence of God is found in all things and creatures.
Humans can know this divine essence which indwells them
“The final goal of all existence is union with this Divine reality.”
The Divine presence within me is the same divinity found in all life.
As Meister Eckhart (d.1328) says, “My ground is God’s ground, and God’s ground is my ground.”
In their writings the mystics are trying to wrap words around the ineffable. They always come up short because by definition the ineffable is indescribable. Jean-Luc Marion says, “[When we talk of God all we can do is search for the least inadequate words.]” I add - and have fun doing it!
Notes on New Seeds of Contemplation
Merton’s key points:
“Contemplation is a vivid realization of the fact that life and being in us proceed from an invisible, transcendent and infinitely abundant Source.” p. 1
“Contemplation is an awareness of our contingent reality as received, as a present from God, a pure gift of love.” p.3
“All sin starts from the assumption that my false self, the self that exists only in my own egocentric desires is the fundamental reality of life to which everything else in the universe is ordered.” p.35
“The only one who can teach me to find God is God, Himself, Alone.” p. 36
“To seek God perfectly is to: put away heavy loads of judgment and censorship and criticism and the whole burden of opinions that I have no obligation to carry.” p. 46
“The saints are what they are, not because their sanctity makes them admirable to others, but because the gift of sainthood makes it possible for them to admire everybody else.”
The saint does not know sin, the saint knows mercy and sharing mercy.
“To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that love is the reason for my existence, for God is love.” p.60
“No despair of ours can alter the reality of things, or stain the joy of the cosmic dance which is always there. Indeed, we are in the midst of it, and it is in the midst of us, for it beats in our very blood, whether we want it to or not.” p.297
The fact remains that we are invited to forget ourselves on purpose, cast our awful solemnity to the wind and join in the general dance.” p. 297
In the first chapter Merton makes an effort to describe the indescribable. Contemplation is a spontaneous, gifted experience of God beyond thoughts, words, images, and feelings. And it is not that at all in as much as it is infinitely more than that and altogether less than that too. This quote from Merton is a great way to start:
“Whatever I may have written, I think it can all be reduced in the end to this one truth: that God calls human persons to union with Himself and one another in Christ, in the Church which is His Mystical Body. It is also a witness to the fact that there is, and must be in the Church, a contemplative life which has no other function than to realize these mysterious things and to return to God all the thanks and praise that human hearts can give to Him.” (from the Silent Lamp: the Thomas Merton Story by William Shannon)