Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton, O.C.S.O.was an American Catholic writer and mystic. A Trappist monk of the Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky, he was a poet, social activist, and student of comparative religion. In 1949, he was ordained to the priesthood and given the name Father Louis...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth31 January 1915
CityPrades, France
CountryUnited States of America
god-love unhappiness
The only unhappiness is not to love God.
today desert problem
The problem today is that there are no deserts, only dude ranches.
religious book people
Curiously, the most serious religious people, or the most concerned scholars, those who constantly read the Bible as a matter of professional or pious duty, can often manage to evade a radically involved dialogue with the book they are questioning.
war roots
The root of war is fear.
country men egypt
First, the desert is the country of madness. Second, it is the refuge of the devil, thrown out into the "wilderness of upper Egypt" to "wander in dry places." Thirst drives man mad, and the devil himself is mad with a kind of thirst for his own lost excellence--lost because he has immured himself in it and closed out everything else. So the man who wanders into the desert to be himself must take care that he does not go mad and become the servant of the one who dwells there in a sterile paradise of emptiness and rage.
enmity left-alone casts
Because of their enmity you will be left alone. They will cast you out and forsake you.
way strange unexpected
I can depend less and less on my own power and sense of direction...It is so strange to advance backwards and get where you are going in a totally unexpected way
suicidal evil world
The evil in the world is all of our own making, and it proceeds entirely from our ruthless, senseless, wasteful, destructive, and suicidal neglect of our own being.
being-yourself mean who-i-am
It is true to say that for me sanctity consists in being myself and for you sanctity consists of being yourself and that, in the last analysis, your sanctity will never be mine and mine will never be yours, except in the communism of charity and grace. For me to be a saint means to be myself. Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self.
real imagination silence
When your tongue is silent, you can rest in the silence of the forest. When your imagination is silent, the forest speaks to you. It tells you of its unreality and of the Reality of God. But when your mind is silent, then the forest suddenly becomes magnificently real and blazes transparently with the Reality of God.
silence grace may
May we all grow in grace and peace and not neglect the silence that is printed in the center of our being. It will not fail us.
jesus humility heart
Spread abroad the name of Jesus in humility and with a meek heart; show him your feebleness, and he will become your strength.
beautiful doe dull
Duty does not have to be dull. Love can make it beautiful and fill it with life.
thinking people lazy
People are in a hurry to magnify themselves by imitating what is popular- and too lazy to think of anything better.