Contemplation in a World of Action. Part 3 [final]

Contemplation in a World of Action: Thomas Merton

"Where am I going to look for the world first if not in myself?"

"If I had no choice about the age in which I was to live, I nevertheless have a choice about the attitude I take and about the way and the extent of my participation in its living ongoing events. To choose the world is not then merely a pious admission that the world is acceptable because it comes from the hand of God. It is first of alll an acceptance of a task and a vocation in the world, in history and in time: in my time, which is the present. To choose the world is to choose to do the work I am capable of doing, in collaboration with my brother, to make the world better, more free, more just, more liable, more human."

"The great problem of our time is not to formulate clear answers to neat theoretical questions but to tackle the self destructive alienation of man in a society dedicated in theory to human values and in practice to the pursuit of power for its own sake."

"He who attempts to act and do things for others or for the world without deepening his own self-understanding, freedom, integrity, and capacity to love will not have anything to give others. He will communicate to them nothing but the contagion of his own obsessions, his aggressiveness, his ego-centered ambitions, his delusions about ends and means, his doctrinaire prejudices and ideas. There is nothing more tragic in the modern world than the misuse of power and action to which men are driven by their own Faustian misunderstandings and misapprehensions. We have more power at our disposal today than we have ever had, and yet we are more alienated nad estranged from the inner ground of meaning and of love than we have ever been."

"If our prayer is a deep and grace-inspired desire for newness of life- and not the mere blind attachment to what has always been familiar nad "safe"-God will act in us and through us to renew the Chuch by preparing, i nprayer, what we cannot yet imagine or understand. In this way our prayer and faith today will be oriented toward the future which we ourselves may never see fully realize on earth."

"Prayer is freedom and affirmation growing out of thingness into love. Prayer is the flowering of our inmost freedom, in response to the Word of God. Prayer is not only dialogue with God: it is the communion of our freedom with his ultimate freedom, his infinite spirit. It is the elevation of our limited freedom into hte infinite freedom of the divine spirit, and of the divine love."

"You who are read this are yourselves studying possibilities of renewal. Let me encourage you as a brother to forget about other people who are supposed to help you do it. Do it yourself with the help of the Holy Spirit. Find out what you are really looking for in the spiritual life. What are you seeking? Are you seeking security or are you seeking God? Are you seeking pleasant experiences or are you seeking truth?"

"But we always have to remember that all problems are illusory without some basis of natural maturity and a natural human growth. It is very important to stress these natural values. We must constantly emphasize the importance of growing up. Needless to say, we must not go to the other extreme and make everything an intense psychological problem. There are real religious problems which are not just psychological proglems; but they may be more rare than we realize. Many religious are just not mature enough to have an authentic religious crisis!"

"We get so involved in all these intellectual and abstract discussions that we forget the basic- this call of God's love to us, urging us to love him in return and to open our hearts to him and to give him our hearts so that he may fill them with love and faith. So let us then do this. Let us pray for faith, let us pray for an increase of faith and give ourselves, totally, completely, and with perfect confidence, to the God who loves us and calls us to his love."