Anybody here read any Thomas Merton?

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

I'm re-reading Seven Storey Mountain and wonder what the DU take on his writings is?

[AngryOldDem]

1. I love Merton

And would love to have a set of his writings. I read Seven Storey Mountain and his letters about a year ago this time.

I'm currently cofacilitating a group called JustFaith and we are reading "Compassion," written by Henri J. Nouwen (and two others), Image Books, Doubleday.

I like their take on Merton as it concerns displacement, or the removing of oneself as an object of interest in the world.

Nouwen, et. al. writes: "Voluntary displacement leads to compassionate living precisely because it moves us from positions of distinction to positions of sameness, from being in special places to being everywhere. This movement is described by Thomas Merton. After twenty years of Trappist life, he writes in The Seven Storey Mountain, 'My monastery...is a place in which I disappear from the world as an object opf interest in order to be everywhere in it by hiddenness and compassion.' To disappear from the world as an object of interest in order to be everywhere in it by hiddenness and compassion is the basic movement of the Christian life... It leads us to see with others what we could not see before, to feel with others what we could not feel before, to hear with others what we could not hear before." (pp. 66-67)

It was amazing to me the number of people who frequently corresponded with Merton. People whom you would think had it "all figured out" and knew their place in the world. But they didn't. And what they got from Merton was this unique perspective that only comes when you are, in effect, not part of this secular world.

Now I'm going to have to re-read Merton. That is always a good thing.

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

2. St Therese of Lisuex (Whom Merton had a special devotion to, as do I)

wrote of the same type of thing in her Cloister 100 years before. It is very true. It is also very similar to what Theresa of Avilla wrote in hers.

[struggle4progress]

3. I read and read "Wisdom of the Desert" many years ago ...

... and his "Quotations from Chuang Tzu" influenced me for years.

[DemBones DemBones]

4. Maybe we should have a Catholic book club?

Like I need another project! But it would be fun to have someone to talk about the books with.

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

5. I'd be up for it

[AngryOldDem]

6. Sounds good....

don't know if I'd have the time to do it, but this sounds good. I think this would be a group that could make something of the idea.

[Stunster]

7. I remember reading Seeds of Contemplation

about 25 years ago, and being kinda blown away by the power of it.

[bobbieinok]

8. have read several of his books

Not being a Catholic, I was really curious about what it means to be a monk in the modern world. I was also curious about the life both today and in medieval times.

Merton wrote a book (I can't remember/find the title now) that was really helpful.

I like the collections of his shorter comments....is one Confessions of a Guilty Bystander??

When he died during a journey to the far east in the 60s, there was some discussion that he had been eliminated by the govt because of his prominence as an anti-war spokesman.

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

9. His death was odd - no doubt, however - tin foil stuff I'm not buying

I've seen nothing that shows that he was a threat to anyone (except maybe the pre-Vatican II folks) - still not anything warranting a death by bathtub electrocution.