Thomas Merton Archives - Page 5 of 6

The Desert Fathers and Mothers

08/24/2015

The men and women who fled to the desert emphasized lifestyle practice, an alternative to empire and its economy, psychologically astute methods of prayer, and a very simple (some would say naïve) spirituality of transformation into Christ. The desert communities grew out of informal gatherings of monastic monks, functioning much like families. A good number also became hermits to mine the deep mystery of their inner experience. This movement paralleled the monastic pattern in Hinduism

Thomas Merton: Thoughts in Solitude (Part II)

08/21/2015

Every spiritual director knows that it is a difficult and subtle matter to determine just what is the borderline between interior idleness and the faint, unperceived beginnings of passive contemplation. But in practice, at the present time, there has been quite enough said about passive contemplation to give lazy people a chance to claim the privilege of “praying by doing nothing.” There is no such thing as a prayer in which “nothing is done” or

Thomas Merton: Thoughts in Solitude (Part I)

08/20/2015

The spiritual life is first of all a life. It is not merely something to be known and studied, it is to be lived. Like all life, it grows sick and dies when it is uprooted from its proper element, Grace is engrafted on our nature and the whole man is sanctified by the presence and action of the Holy Spirit. The spiritual life is not, therefore, a life entirely uprooted from man’s human condition

A Search for God

08/17/2015

The desert tradition offers a rich teaching of surrender, through contemplation, to the wonderful and always too-much mystery of God. The desert fathers and mothers are like the Zen Buddhist monks of Christianity; their sayings are often like koans that cannot be understood with the rational, logical mind. The desert mystics focused much more on the how than the what. Note that this is very different from the primary emphasis of Christianity in recent centuries–the

The Mystery of Christ

03/27/2015

By Fr. Antony Hughes But the Cross and Resurrection present an unprecedented challenge to us. The coming of Jesus is the invasion of Reality into our fallen world. To embrace the message of Christ means the end of delusion, the opening of new doors, the renewal of the mind. The coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost punctuates the invasion even more, making it strikingly personal. Looking back I’ll bet the apostles said to themselves

New Seeds of Contemplation

03/26/2015

By Fr. Antony Hughes (Mark 10:32-45) In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God. Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ! I would love to make NEW SEEDS OF CONTEMPLATION by Thomas Merton the great Trappist monk and mystic required reading. It is a continual source of inspiration for me. I will refer to it in today’s sermon. When James and John heard Jesus tell of his

The Problem of “Ego”

01/29/2014

The problem of “ego” is so recurring in different religions, through successive periods of history and under various disguises, that we know we are dealing with some foundational and core issue, and one that must be almost unconscious. It is an issue that cannot be dealt with by simply being “moral” about this or that, or joining the right group; but by a fundamental “dying” which almost all of us are afraid to do. As

Ego

01/22/2014

We don’t teach meditation to the young monks. They are not ready for it until they stop slamming doors. — Thich Nhat Hanh to Thomas Merton in 1966 The piercing truth of this statement struck me as a perfect way to communicate the endless disguises and devices of the false self. There is no more clever way for the false self to hide than behind the mask of spirituality. The human ego will always try

The Art of Letting Go

07/01/2013

It is good to remember that a part of you has always loved God. There is a part of you that has always said yes. There is a part of you that is Love itself, and that is what we must fall into. It is already there. Once you move your identity to that level of deep inner contentment, you will realize you are drawing upon a Life that is much larger than your own

Desert Fathers and Mothers and the Patristic Period

03/11/2013

The desert Fathers and Mothers were honestly not referred to that much, because they just told little stories. These stories seemed like harmless anecdotes, and we wanted to go ahead with serious religion. But in the last 30 years, there’s been a rediscovery of the absolute simplicity of their message and the fact that it isn’t concerned about the issues that we’ve been concerned about in recent centuries. In fact, they’re usually concerned about the

Archive

The Desert Fathers and Mothers

Thomas Merton: Thoughts in Solitude (Part II)

Thomas Merton: Thoughts in Solitude (Part I)

A Search for God

The Mystery of Christ

New Seeds of Contemplation

The Problem of “Ego”

Ego

The Art of Letting Go

Desert Fathers and Mothers and the Patristic Period

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