Is Christian worship to be communion in correctness or communion in love?
Thomas Merton, Seasons of Celebration
Art work created in community at a conference called Hutchmoot (2016). There, people from many different Christian faith traditions worship in love. It’s a beautiful thing.
Sometimes we’re so concerned about being right, that we forget:
In essentials unity
In non-essentials liberty
In all things charity
(not Thomas Merton, likely not Augustine, maybe Rupertus Meldenius or Marco Antonio de Dominis)
We are so obsessed with doing
that we have no time
and no imagination left
for being.
As a result,
men are valued
not for what they are
but for what they do
or what they have –
for their usefulness.
Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander
(Emphasis mine)
Although sometimes what a man has
— homemade shortbread sent for a birthday —
is because of who he is
and not because of what he has done.
While he has done a lot in his life,
more importantly he has been
kind,
loving, and
generous.
God utters me like a word containing a partial thought of Himself.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
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.
Love is my true identity.
Selflessness is my true character.
Love is my name.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
The pocket mirror I carried during Lent (and my father’s reflection in it)
For the past several years during Lent, I have carried a mindfulness object to remind myself of something Christ-centered during that holy season. This year I carried a little pocket mirror on which I had written the first three words of today’s quote by Thomas Merton.
And these were some of my thoughts about his words —
What if, instead of the four Greek words for love, or instead of the five ways to say “I love you” in Mandarin, or instead of the nine ways to say it in Russian — what if, at any given time on the planet Earth, there are over 7 billion words for Love, uttered by God Himself, and they each have a face, and hands, and feet?
What if each time God utters a person into being, He’s saying another word containing a partial thought of Him — and that word is Love?
What if I am a word for love? Am I living my life in such a way that others can see that?
Therefore, if you spend your life
trying to escape from the heat of the fire
that is meant to soften and prepare to become your true self…
you will be destroyed by the event
that was meant to be your fulfillment.
Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
New Seeds of Contemplation (Thomas Merton) — the sealing wax analogy
The language of revelation is mysterious,
not in order that its meaning may be concealed from us,
but in order that we may be moved to seek it with a more fervent love.
A monk ought not to inquire how this one acts or how that one lives.
Questions like this take us away from prayer and draw us on to backbiting and chatter.
There is nothing better than to keep silent.
You do not need to know precisely what is happening
or exactly where it is all going.
What you need is
to recognize the possibilities and challenges
offered by the present moment and
to embrace them with courage, faith, and hope.
The monk does not exist for the sake of obligation; the obligation exists for the sake of the monk.
Duties and obligations are merely the signposts which point out the road to some ultimate end in which our whole nature and its capacities are fulfilled.
But do you imagine that if you become as prosperous as the United States you will no longer have needs? Here the needs are even greater. Full bellies have not brought peace and satisfaction but dementia, and in any case not all the bellies are full either. But the dementia is the same for all.
Thomas Merton, first draft of Day of a Stranger
Day of a Stranger was written in response to a request from a South American editor who asked Merton to describe a typical day. Some of it feels like stream-of-consciousness writing, but he pulls dementia into his thoughts on poverty and prosperity.
Dementia is indeed wealth blind.
Dad feeding Mom while I-Can-Do-It Mary watches.
My mother’s wealth, even in her dementia, was the constancy of my father. He visited my mother twice a day every day. I never saw any family visit I-Can-Do-It Mary.
Hot Dogs and Marmalade 