Thomas Merton:\nContemplation and Action<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Contemplative\nResponsibility<\/strong>\nMonday, \u202fNovember 23,\n2020<\/p>\n\n\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p><em>Thomas\nMerton has been a primary teacher and inspiration to me ever since I read his\nbook <\/em>The Sign of\nJonas<em> as a teenager. He was one of the most\ninfluential American Catholics of the twentieth century. It was Merton who\nreintroduced the Christian contemplative tradition to the Western church in the\n1950s and 60s. By living a contemplative life, Merton grew in love for God and\nall of God\u2019s children and creation\u2014so much so that he became committed to doing\nwhat he could for the common good. Amidst the societal disruptions of the\n1960s, it was not enough for him to simply pray. He also devoted himself to\naction\u2014writing, collaboration, and teaching\u2014though he never lost his deep\nyearning for solitude and contemplation.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>As Merton began\nto seriously wrestle with the injustices plaguing the United States and the\nworld, he published <\/em>Seeds of Destruction<em>, a book urging Christians to reflect on their moral\nresponsibility to take a stand on issues such as racism, war, and poverty. His\nwords speak to our moment as well:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\ncontemplative life is not, and cannot be, a mere withdrawal, a pure negation, a\nturning of one\u2019s back on the world with its sufferings, its crises, its\nconfusions and its errors. . . . The monastic [<em>that is, contemplative<\/em>] flight from the world [<em>or what I call \u201cthe system\u201d\u2014RR<\/em>] into the desert is . . . a\ntotal rejection of all standards of judgment which imply attachment to a history\nof delusion, egoism and sin . . . a definitive refusal to participate in those\nactivities which have no other fruit than to prolong the reign of untruth,\ngreed, cruelty and arrogance in the world of people. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nfreedom of the Christian contemplative is not freedom<em> from <\/em>time, but freedom <em>in <\/em>time. It is the freedom to go out and meet God in the\ninscrutable mystery of God\u2019s will here and now, in this precise moment in which\nGod asks humanity\u2019s cooperation in shaping the course of history according to\nthe demands of divine truth, mercy and fidelity. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Therefore\nit seems to me to be a solemn obligation of conscience at this moment of\nhistory to take the positions which . . . are, it seems to me, in vital\nrelation with the obligations I assumed when I took my monastic vows. To have a\nvow of poverty seems to me illusory if I do not in some way identify myself\nwith the cause of people who are denied their rights and forced, for the most\npart, to live in abject misery. To have a vow of obedience seems to me to be\nabsurd if it does not imply a deep concern for the most fundamental of all\nexpressions of God\u2019s will: the love of God\u2019s truth and of our neighbor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Richard again: Thomas Merton knew\nthat contemplation and solidarity with the universal suffering of creation (the\nplanet itself, animals, humans) is to enter into the eternal suffering of God,\nwhat Dominican Gerald Vann called \u201cthe Divine Pity.\u201d<\/em>[1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thomas Merton:<br> Contemplation and Action<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Joy\nand Sadness: A Lesson from Merton’s Hermitage<\/strong><br>\nSunday, \u202fNovember 22,\n2020<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 1985 my Franciscan \u201cguardians\u201d (as Francis called our\nsuperiors) gave me a year\u2019s leave to spend in contemplation. It was a major\nturning point in my life, and ultimately led to the formation of the Center for\nAction and Contemplation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nfirst thirty days of my \u201csabbatical\u201d were spent in the hills of Kentucky, in\nThomas Merton\u2019s (1915\u20131968) hermitage about a mile away from the main\nmonastery. I was absolutely alone with myself, with the springtime woods, and\nwith God, hoping to somehow absorb some of Merton\u2019s wisdom. That first morning,\nit took me a while to slow down. I must have looked at my watch at least ten\ntimes before 7:00 AM! I had spent so many years standing in front of crowds as\na priest and a teacher. I had to find out who I was without those trappings\u2014the\nnaked me alone before God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In\nthe mornings I would put my chair in front of the door and watch the sun come\nup. In the late afternoons, I would move my chair to the other side of the\nhermitage and watch the sun go down. The little squirrels and birds came closer\nand closer. They\u2019re not afraid when we\u2019re absolutely still.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Father\nWilliam McNamara\u2019s definition of contemplation as \u201ca long loving look at the\nreal\u201d became transformative for me. The world, my own issues and hurts, all my\ngoals and desires gradually dissolved and fell into proper perspective. God\nbecame obvious and ever present. I understood what Merton meant when he said,\n\u201cThe gate of heaven is everywhere.\u201d [1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\ntried to keep a journal of what was happening to me. Back then, I found it\nparticularly hard to cry. But one evening I laid my finger on my cheek and\nfound to my surprise that it was wet. I wondered what those tears meant. What\nwas I crying for? I wasn\u2019t consciously sad or consciously happy. I noticed at\nthat moment that behind it all there was a joy, deeper than any private joy. It\nwas a joy in the face of the beauty of being, a joy at all the wonderful and\nlovable people I had already met in my life. Cosmic or spiritual joy is\nsomething we participate in; it comes from elsewhere and flows through us. It\nhas little or nothing to do with things going well in our own life at that\nmoment. I remember thinking that this must be why the saints could rejoice in\nthe midst of suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the same moment, I experienced exactly the opposite emotion. The tears were at the same time tears of an immense sadness\u2014a sadness at what we\u2019re doing to the earth, sadness about the people whom I had hurt in my life, and a sadness too at my own mixed motives and selfishness. I hadn\u2019t known that two such contrary feelings could coexist. I was truly experiencing the nondual mind of contemplation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"315\" src=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-500x315.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-19519\" srcset=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-500x315.png 500w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-300x189.png 300w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-768x484.png 768w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM.png 1966w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thomas Merton: Contemplation and Action Contemplative Responsibility Monday, \u202fNovember 23, 2020 Thomas Merton has been a primary teacher and inspiration to me ever since I read his book The Sign of Jonas as a teenager. He was one of the most influential American Catholics of the twentieth century. It was Merton who reintroduced the Christian contemplative tradition […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19516"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19522,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516\/revisions\/19522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p><em>Thomas\nMerton has been a primary teacher and inspiration to me ever since I read his\nbook <\/em>The Sign of\nJonas<em> as a teenager. He was one of the most\ninfluential American Catholics of the twentieth century. It was Merton who\nreintroduced the Christian contemplative tradition to the Western church in the\n1950s and 60s. By living a contemplative life, Merton grew in love for God and\nall of God\u2019s children and creation\u2014so much so that he became committed to doing\nwhat he could for the common good. Amidst the societal disruptions of the\n1960s, it was not enough for him to simply pray. He also devoted himself to\naction\u2014writing, collaboration, and teaching\u2014though he never lost his deep\nyearning for solitude and contemplation.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>As Merton began\nto seriously wrestle with the injustices plaguing the United States and the\nworld, he published <\/em>Seeds of Destruction<em>, a book urging Christians to reflect on their moral\nresponsibility to take a stand on issues such as racism, war, and poverty. His\nwords speak to our moment as well:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\ncontemplative life is not, and cannot be, a mere withdrawal, a pure negation, a\nturning of one\u2019s back on the world with its sufferings, its crises, its\nconfusions and its errors. . . . The monastic [<em>that is, contemplative<\/em>] flight from the world [<em>or what I call \u201cthe system\u201d\u2014RR<\/em>] into the desert is . . . a\ntotal rejection of all standards of judgment which imply attachment to a history\nof delusion, egoism and sin . . . a definitive refusal to participate in those\nactivities which have no other fruit than to prolong the reign of untruth,\ngreed, cruelty and arrogance in the world of people. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nfreedom of the Christian contemplative is not freedom<em> from <\/em>time, but freedom <em>in <\/em>time. It is the freedom to go out and meet God in the\ninscrutable mystery of God\u2019s will here and now, in this precise moment in which\nGod asks humanity\u2019s cooperation in shaping the course of history according to\nthe demands of divine truth, mercy and fidelity. . . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Therefore\nit seems to me to be a solemn obligation of conscience at this moment of\nhistory to take the positions which . . . are, it seems to me, in vital\nrelation with the obligations I assumed when I took my monastic vows. To have a\nvow of poverty seems to me illusory if I do not in some way identify myself\nwith the cause of people who are denied their rights and forced, for the most\npart, to live in abject misery. To have a vow of obedience seems to me to be\nabsurd if it does not imply a deep concern for the most fundamental of all\nexpressions of God\u2019s will: the love of God\u2019s truth and of our neighbor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Richard again: Thomas Merton knew\nthat contemplation and solidarity with the universal suffering of creation (the\nplanet itself, animals, humans) is to enter into the eternal suffering of God,\nwhat Dominican Gerald Vann called \u201cthe Divine Pity.\u201d<\/em>[1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thomas Merton:<br> Contemplation and Action<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Joy\nand Sadness: A Lesson from Merton’s Hermitage<\/strong><br>\nSunday, \u202fNovember 22,\n2020<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 1985 my Franciscan \u201cguardians\u201d (as Francis called our\nsuperiors) gave me a year\u2019s leave to spend in contemplation. It was a major\nturning point in my life, and ultimately led to the formation of the Center for\nAction and Contemplation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The\nfirst thirty days of my \u201csabbatical\u201d were spent in the hills of Kentucky, in\nThomas Merton\u2019s (1915\u20131968) hermitage about a mile away from the main\nmonastery. I was absolutely alone with myself, with the springtime woods, and\nwith God, hoping to somehow absorb some of Merton\u2019s wisdom. That first morning,\nit took me a while to slow down. I must have looked at my watch at least ten\ntimes before 7:00 AM! I had spent so many years standing in front of crowds as\na priest and a teacher. I had to find out who I was without those trappings\u2014the\nnaked me alone before God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In\nthe mornings I would put my chair in front of the door and watch the sun come\nup. In the late afternoons, I would move my chair to the other side of the\nhermitage and watch the sun go down. The little squirrels and birds came closer\nand closer. They\u2019re not afraid when we\u2019re absolutely still.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Father\nWilliam McNamara\u2019s definition of contemplation as \u201ca long loving look at the\nreal\u201d became transformative for me. The world, my own issues and hurts, all my\ngoals and desires gradually dissolved and fell into proper perspective. God\nbecame obvious and ever present. I understood what Merton meant when he said,\n\u201cThe gate of heaven is everywhere.\u201d [1]<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\ntried to keep a journal of what was happening to me. Back then, I found it\nparticularly hard to cry. But one evening I laid my finger on my cheek and\nfound to my surprise that it was wet. I wondered what those tears meant. What\nwas I crying for? I wasn\u2019t consciously sad or consciously happy. I noticed at\nthat moment that behind it all there was a joy, deeper than any private joy. It\nwas a joy in the face of the beauty of being, a joy at all the wonderful and\nlovable people I had already met in my life. Cosmic or spiritual joy is\nsomething we participate in; it comes from elsewhere and flows through us. It\nhas little or nothing to do with things going well in our own life at that\nmoment. I remember thinking that this must be why the saints could rejoice in\nthe midst of suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At the same moment, I experienced exactly the opposite emotion. The tears were at the same time tears of an immense sadness\u2014a sadness at what we\u2019re doing to the earth, sadness about the people whom I had hurt in my life, and a sadness too at my own mixed motives and selfishness. I hadn\u2019t known that two such contrary feelings could coexist. I was truly experiencing the nondual mind of contemplation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"315\" src=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-500x315.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-19519\" srcset=\"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-500x315.png 500w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-300x189.png 300w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM-768x484.png 768w, http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/Screen-Shot-2020-11-23-at-10.26.23-AM.png 1966w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thomas Merton: Contemplation and Action Contemplative Responsibility Monday, \u202fNovember 23, 2020 Thomas Merton has been a primary teacher and inspiration to me ever since I read his book The Sign of Jonas as a teenager. He was one of the most influential American Catholics of the twentieth century. It was Merton who reintroduced the Christian contemplative tradition […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19516"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19522,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19516\/revisions\/19522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19516"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19516"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19516"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}