Contemplation in a World of Action, Part 1

Contemplation In a World of Action: Thomas Merton

“Togetherness is not community. To love our brother we must first respect him in his own authentic reality, and we cannot do this if we have not attained to a basic self-respect and mature identity ourselves. Are our efforts to be more “communal” and to be more of a “family” really genuine or are they only new ways to be intolerant of the solitude and integrity of the individual person? Are we simply trying to submerge and absorb him and keep him from finding an identity that might express itself in dissent and in a desire for greater solitude? Are we simply trying to guard against his entering a “desert” of questioning and paradox that will disturb our own complacencies?”

“Do not be impatient and do not be afraid. Do not imagine that everything depends on some instant magic transformation of constitutions and of laws. You already have what you need right in your hands! You have the grace of your vocation and of your love. No earthly situation has ever been ideal. God does not need an ideal situation in order to carry out his work in our hearts If we do what we can with the means and grace at our disposal, if we sincerely take advantage of our genuine opportunities, the Spirit will be there and his love will not fail us. Our liberation, our solitude, our vision, our understanding and our salvation do not depend on anything remote from us or beyond our reach. Grace has been given us along with our god desires. What is needed is the faith to accept it and the energy to put our faith to work in situations that may not seem to us to be promising. The Holy Spirit will do the rest.”

“But the goal of human freedom, peace, and unity is not unchristian in itself. On the contrary it stems from the New Testament idea of freedom before God, the freedom of the sons of God, the dignity of man redeemed in Christ and man’s vocation to work out historically, in harmony and love, the redemption of the whole world in Christ. Hence these characteristic modern aspirations should represent no special difficulty to us. We should be able to “save” and “redeem” those aspirations which are authentically germane to Christianity even though buried in a matrix of atheism.”

“Critics have also noted the American fear of loneliness. Individual identity is sacrificed in an effort to stay close to the herd, to be no different from others in thought, feeling, or action. To stand aside, to be alone, is to assert a personal identity which refuses to be submerged. Society will not tolerate this. Innumerable social features are designed to prevent it. Yet one of the surest signs of the resolution of the identity crisis is an increased capacity for being alone, for being responsible for oneself. The gradual process that will end in perfect identity involves an awareness of the fact that there are decisions in life and aspects of life’s struggle that a person must face alone. Here is the paradox: the more richly a person lives, the more lonely, in a sense, he becomes. And as a person, in this formative isolation, becomes more able to appreciate the moods and feelings of others, he also becomes more able to have meaningful relationships with them. But the unwritten code of our national culture prohibits aloneness, and this is the second causative factor for a prolonged identity crisis: the obstacles our society imposes to prevent personal reflection.”

“Perhaps our problem consists in wanting to have problems and consequently creating them out of nothing in order to seek solutions! It seems to me that we are now becoming self-consciously and naively “modern.” Hastily and uncritically adjusting any and every formula that seems to fit the new situation, without “changing our minds” in any deeper sense. Basically our trouble remains the same: an obsession with questions and answers, with problems and solutions, with momentous decisions and even with “identity” raised to the level of a kind of absolute.”

“To choose a value that is questioned and doubted is to place oneself in the position of being doubted. The mature person is able to assume this risk.”

“Our first task is to be fully human and to enable the youth of our time to find themselves and develop as men and sons of God. There is no need for a community of religious robots without minds, without hearts, without ideas, and without faces. It is this mindless alienation that characterizes “the world” and life in the world. Monastic spirituality today must be a personalistic and Christian humanism that seeks and saves man’s intimate truth, his personal identity, in order to consecrate it entirely to God.”

“It is true that “times have changed,” but are they not rather the “times” of the “world?” The truth is one and eternal. It does not change."