Thomas Merton Bridges to Contemplative Living Blog

We Are One Man - CHAPTER 9, A Body Of Broken Bones - CHAPTER 10

6/9/2015

It was wonderful to experience some of New Seeds of Contemplation with this group! These past 3 months went by very quickly. In this time we shared Merton's insights into Contemplation, the True Self/false self and Love as the image and essence of God. As we went from one chapter to the next, Merton took us on a journey from a focus on ourselves (false self) to our deepest relationship with and to God (Contemplation and True Self) and finally to the unity we share through God and with others (Love). At the end of this journey, we saw that God, at the deepest level, remains as Mystery. That God is beyond all images we can possibly hold or imagine but that God can be experienced through Love.

It was fitting that we explored Merton's reflections on Trinity only a few days before Trinity Sunday. His writings reveal what most contemporary contemplatives such as Fr. Richard Rohr, Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault and Fr. Thomas Keating teach about the Trinity. All these teachers agree that the Trinity is a circle of relationships between the persons of God and that, through Christ in us, we are all invited to participate in that single flow of Love. At our very centers we are all Christ and we all compose the mystical Body of Christ. In this way, as Merton puts it:

We all become doors and windows through which God shines back into His own house. When the Love of God is able to love you through me and you are able to love God through me.

Merton contends that we will one day live entirely in God (and therefore in the flow of perfect Love) and in one another as the Persons of God live in One another. But until that day our current human experience is that of a Body of Broken Bones:

In the whole world, throughout the whole of history, ... Christ suffers dismemberment... All over the face of the earth the avarice and lust of men breed unceasing divisions among them, and the wounds that tear men from union with one another widen and open out into huge wars, murder, massacres... Christ is massacred in His members, torn limb from limb.

Because of this human condition, our experience of love is imperfect and painful, like the "resetting of a Body of broken bones." Based on this experience, it is difficult for us to understand love and it is the folly of the false self to try to define it. However, as we discussed by example, we can all recognize genuine Love when we experience it. It is in that experience of genuine Love that we come to recognize and experience God.

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Union and Division - Chapter 7, Solitude Is Not Separation - Chapter 8

5/20/2015

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It was wonderful to be able to share two chapters of New Seeds plus thoughts on chapter 2, What Contemplation Is Not with the group last Thursday. The sense of lightness and liveliness this evening was also delightful!

In reflecting from our last meeting we commented on how much the Sufi writings we shared impacted a number of people and observed that it seemed that no matter the starting point in terms of faith tradition, when people go deep they seem to encounter what we know to be "God". This is an inexpressible truth that can only be experienced. It is beyond words, and in fact, words stand in the way of being able to convey the underlying Mystery which is encountered.

I shared an excerpt from Thomas Merton's 1959 letter to the Zen scholar D.T. Suzuki which speaks to how Merton experienced what Suzuki wrote about. Though Zen outwardly appears to be a completely different tradition from Christianity Merton's experience in reading Suzuki speaks to how those who go deep find inexpressible commonalities and a common ground of being:

I will not be so foolish as to pretend to you that I understand Zen... All I know is that when I read your books -- and I have read many of them ... I feel a profound and intimate agreement. Time after time, as I read your pages, something in me says, "That's it!" Don't ask me what ... I have my own way to walk, and for some reason or other Zen is right in the middle of it wherever I go. So there it is, with all it's beautiful purposelessness and it has become very familiar to me though I do not know "what it is." Or even if it is an "it". Not to be foolish and multiply words, I'll say simply that it seems to me that Zen is the very atmosphere of the Gospels, and the Gospels are busting with it. It is the proper climate for any monk, no matter what kind of monk he may be. If I could not breathe Zen I would probably die of spiritual asphyxiation. But still I don't know what it is. No matter. I don't know what the air is either.

Looking at key statements from the portion of Chapter 2 we reviewed, Merton conveys how our own ambition impedes us in trying to achieve Contemplation. But Merton observes that suffering and inner struggle can be useful. As we explored the difference between the two, we discussed how ambition is the stuff that builds and promotes the false self. By suffering and inner struggle, however, we are forced to face our own limitations and inadequacy. In doing so we die to our false self dependency of our own efforts and open to our True Self dependency on God who is the source of Contemplation.

As we looked at both Chapter 7 (Union and Division) and Chapter 8 (Solitude Is Not Separation) we saw that the two chapters were both related. In Chapter 7 we saw Merton describe one method people have of firming up the false self which was by living "lives centered on themselves... asserting their own desires and ambitions and appetites in a struggle with the rest of the world... building a barrier of contrast and distinction between themselves and other men." This false self attitude was even worse when embraced by spiritual people as exhibited through "the disease which is spiritual pride." We discussed how such people are taken as being judgmental and stubborn which are attitudes that lead to what Merton states as "making the name of God odious to other men." We talked about how Merton may have experienced this "spiritual disease" generally in aspects of "the Church" but also among the other monks he lived with. As I write this I wonder if Merton may have also experienced this in himself as he traveled his own spiritual journey.

In Chapter 8 Merton discusses how modern people give themselves over to a new type of separation which is "immersion in the mass of other men,... escape into the great formless sea of irresponsibility which is the crowd... sharing nothing with them but the common noise and the general distractions, isolates a man in the worst way, separates him from reality in a way that is almost painless... divides him from other men and from his true self."

Merton saw this later form of separation as worse because it lead to someone who has "no sense of self to esteem." The insight from that group was that if the spiritual journey is about the losing / dying of the false self, there must first be a false self that exists. In the case of the person described in this Chapter, there is simply no self to be recognized.

We were drawn to Merton's commentary on "the gift of sainthood" of which he writes: "makes it possible for (saints) to admire everybody else.... It teaches them to bring the good out of others by compassion, mercy and pardon... A man becomes a saint... by the realization that he is one of them, and that all together need the mercy of God!"

The following speaks to the earlier comments of God as mystery: "It is certainly madness if I think I know what the holiness and perfection of God really are in themselves and if I think that there is some way in which I can apply myself to imitating them. I must begin, then, by realizing that the holiness of God is something that is to me, and to all men, utterly mysterious, inscrutable, beyond the highest notion of any kind of perfection, beyond all relevant human statement whatever."

To me, the following lines of Merton say something similar to the wisdom of the Sufi Saint Rabia wish to do away with "Heaven" and "Hell" which Paul shared last week: "perfect joy is possible only when we have completely forgotten ourselves... we are free to serve God in perfection for His own sake alone..." Merton goes further by saying: "Be content that you are not yet a saint, even though you realize that the only thing worth living for is sanctity. Then you will be satisfied to let God lead you to sanctity by paths you cannot understand... That who have gone this way have found that sanctity is in everything and God is all around them."

One of the group shared that though there is a different path to sanctity for each of us, a common method can be used to attain it: "We must deny ourselves and in some sense make ourselves nothing in order that we may live not so much in ourselves but in Him. We must live by a power and al light that seem not to be there. We must live by the strength of an apparent emptiness that is always truly empty and yet never fails to support us in every moment."

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Pray for Your Own Discovery - Chapter 6

4/28/2015

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Our last Thomas Merton session covered a difficult chapter for many of us. As the evening started, I was struck by how different the moods of people were as expressed by the word or phrase they shared with the group after our time of silence. The mood of those attending ranged in feelings from being unsure and confused to grateful and appreciative. Yet, despite how varied it was that we came to the evening, we were able to engage in dialogue and share meaningfully with one another. It was also wonderful to see some folks who had so far been primarily listening, open up to the group and begin to share as a deeper sense caring and safety of community continues to develop. Finally, several folks shared the sense of being in sacred mystery that they are experiencing they open more deeply into contemplative living. I was particularly touched by one of our members who has opened up deeply to listening, trying to still his own thoughts and focusing on a presence to the lessons found in the world around him; the sacred mystery in which we are immersed.

As we began to explore Chapter 2, What Contemplation Is Not, I was moved by the realization that, though Merton uses many words to describe his experience of what Contemplation is and is not, that one of our group had a profound frustration with "Words, Words, Words" and through this, opened up to a deeper appreciation of Contemplation which cannot be expressed through words. This appeared to relate closely to an observation made by another member that Merton was a poet in his use of words. It has been my experience reading Merton, that it is not so much the contents of what he writes but the phrasing read with a certain cadence and pace that reveals his deep experience and equally deep realizations. Read that way, it may change how someone experiences what Merton writes about.

As we discussed Chapter 6, an observation was shared that Merton can (and should) be read at different levels:

As someone who has advanced deeply along the spiritual journey and has profound realizations to share that are broadly applicable to anyone looking for more intimacy with God.
As a man experiencing his own unique spiritual journey and sharing that with us. His unique journey reflects and is influenced by his own life experiences and my express a healing and awakening which is unique to Thomas Merton.
As a monk, Thomas Merton is living a vocation dedicated to a pursuit of intimacy with God. There are certain aspects of his writing that are dedicated to those who have taken on a similar vocation.

For me, approaching Merton's writings aware of all these aspects adds a flavor to absorbing his writings that helps me better appreciate and apply them to my own life situation and the relationship with God I feel called to develop.

Though much was shared about Chapter 6, the notion that "We become contemplatives when God discovers Himself in us." was particularly meaningfully to me. We discussed that to really "know God" requires an emptying of ourselves (the shedding of our false self) in (a true self) humility that finally realizes that we don't have the capacity to know God in our humanity. That it is only the part of God that dwells in us that has the capacity to discover and know God. Any attempt to rely upon our (false) self to know God will be "like a stone knows the ground upon which it rests in its inertia."

Finally, let me share a poem by Rumi, the Sufi mystic, which, to me summarizes this chapter to me. It speaks to consent, awareness and openness to God as we wait for Him to discover Himself in us. Perhaps the cynic is our own false self? The inexplicable longing is our desire for God which is God's longing in ourselves to discover Himself:

Love Dogs
One night a man was crying,
Allah! Allah!
His lips grew sweet with the praising,
until a cynic said, "So! I have heard you
calling out, but have you ever gotten any response?"

The man had no answer to that.
He quit praying and fell into a confused sleep.

He dreamed he saw Khidr, the guide of souls,
in a thick, green foliage.
"Why did you stop praising?"
"Because I've never heard anything back."
"This longing you express is the return message."

The grief you cry out from draws you toward union.

Your pure sadness that wants help is the secret cup.

Listen to the moan of a dog for its master.
That whining is the connection.

There are love dogs no one knows the names of.

Give your life to be one of them.
― Rumi

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Things In Their Identity - Chapter 5

4/14/2015

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As we completed our reflection on Contemplation in Chapter 1, we discussed how "Contemplation" is the root of all man's intellectual and spiritual life but is beyond what we can understand; it can only be deeply experienced. Contemplation is a gift of God to us. At its core, Contemplation is an awareness, realization and experience of what Christians believe: "It is now no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me." (Galatians 2:20). It is poor in concepts, poorer still in reasoning, but able, by its very poverty and purity to follow the Word "wherever He may go."

In our discussions of Chapter 5 we talked about the great diversity of created things from the smallest organisms (bacteria) to the largest (trees and mountains.) The individuality found in diversity is not an imperfection but part of God's design and perhaps a reflection of His infinite nature. For the created things, like trees and animals, their very being is a natural expression of God's will, and as such, they are "saints" sanctified by being just what God created them to be.

By giving humans free will, God gives us the freedom to be whatever we like. Because we have our will, holiness is more than humanity, our vocation is to work together with God in the creation of our own life, our own identity our own destiny. To work out our own identity in God, which the Bible calls "working out our salvation" (Philippians 2:12-13) is a labor that requires sacrifice and anguish, risk and many tears. It demands close attention to reality at every moment and great fidelity to God as He reveals Himself, obscurely, in the mystery of each new situation.

In this Chapter Merton continues to discuss the false self. To say that I was born in sin is to say that I came into the world with a false self. I was born with a mask... thus I came into existence and nonexistence at the same time because from the very start I was something that I was not. He further writes that the false self cannot exist because it exists outside of God's will and God's love - outside of reality and outside of life.

Merton also introduces True Self in this chapter which is finding out who I am. The secret of my identity (True Self) is hidden in the love and the mercy of God. But whatever is in God is really identical with Him for His infinite simplicity admits no division and no distinction. Therefore I cannot hope to find myself anywhere except in Him. Therefore, there is only on problem on which all my existence, my peace and my happiness depend: to discover myself in discovering God. If I find Him I will find myself and if I find my True Self I will find Him. This is something that no (hu)man can do alone. The only one who can teach me to find God is God, Himself, Alone.

I recommend two additional sources that talk about the false self and True Self. They are: The Human Condition: Contemplation and Transformation by Fr. Thomas Keating and Immortal Diamond: The Search for our True Self by Fr. Richard Rohr. Either of these can be purchased at your favorite bookseller or you can download The Human Condition by clicking on the linked title above.

Finally, there were two important points made in our evening's discussions: (1) Did God make all things for good? If a Tree gives glory to God by being a Tree, does something like Cancer give glory to God by being Cancer? This is something we all need to personally ponder but, like Job regarding suffering, I am coming to an understanding that there a limit to our understanding regarding how God works. Our false self looks to try to explain all mystery, especially those that appear threatening to us. Those of the Christian tradition may consider reading Job:38-42. (2) Did Jesus suffer during his death on the cross, after all if he had Divine knowledge he must have foreseen his own resurrection? The point made during our evening discussion was that knowledge does not necessarily alleviate human physical pain, anguish and suffering. The important implication relating back to True Self is that even if we operate out of the place of True Self, we will still experience discomfort, pain and physical suffering, but we may be better able to cope, accept and understand it.

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Everything That Is, Is Holy - Chapter 4

3/28/2015

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It's only our second night and already our community of open Contemplative Living and Sharing is beginning to take form. As folks reflected on their last two weeks comments were shared regarding how folks were focused on becoming more conscious of being more present to themselves and to life in general. A new member of the group shared how, as part of her job, she works with folks who have done some horrible things in their past but continues to be amazed at how she is able to see the core of goodness come out of these people in spite of their backgrounds. This was a testament to God's presence at the heart of all of us.

As we continued to open up Chapter 1, What is Contemplation, we settled in on the "I AM" experience. Several people shared how being immersed in nature allowed folks to "just be" in the moment. It was also mentioned how Silence was a wonderful way to experience the simplicity of being.

One focus of our Chapter reflections were on the notion of saints "not judging sin because they do not know sin, they know the mercy of God." We discussed that saints are fully human and as such they "sin" (or miss the mark). So, although these folks experience "sin", they open themselves to experience God's merciful forgiveness. As such they focus on expressing that forgiveness to themselves and therefore to others.

We spent time on the discussion of the false self which is the first time this concept has been introduced in this program. Both the false self and the True Self will reoccur in future chapters and we will surely revisit it in future discussions. In tonight's session we discussed the false self, also called our private or separate self, as the thing that causes us to excessively focus on ourselves as the center of the universe and that aspect of ourselves which "alienates ourselves from reality and from God. It is then the false self that is a god of our own making.

One member of our group spoke about Fr. Thomas Keating, one of the founders of the modern Christian Contemplation method of Centering Prayer. Fr. Keating relates the false self to unmet psychological needs in this way: "The False Self system is deeply ingrained in our unconscious. Our emotional programs for happiness formed in early childhood and fossilized into energy centers as a source of motivation for our thoughts, feelings, reactions and behavior, manifest themselves at every level of our human functioning. They manifest themselves in desires for the symbols of whatever our particular emotional program is, as crystallized in our culture".

The following video provides a brief overview of Fr. Keatings ideas of the false self as a result of the Human Condition:

I have recently become aware of Michael Brown, who similarly relates our behaviors to the effects of what underlies the false self. I think this is an interesting view of how he believes our experience of Love (i.e. God) is impacted by the emotional constructs of the false self:

Folks shared the following chapter excerpts as those that touched them most deeply regarding the distortions caused by the false self:

The only true joy on earth is to escape from the prison for our own false self, and enter by love into union with the Life Who dwells and sings within the essence of every creature and in the core of our own souls.

In all created things we, who do not yet perfectly love God, can find something that reflects the fulfillment of heaven and something that reflects the anguish of hell... The fulfillment we find in creatures belong to the reality of the created being, a reality that is from God and belongs to God and reflects God. The anguish we find in them belongs to the disorder of our desire which looks for a greater reality in the object of our desire than is actually there; a greater fulfillment than any created thing is capable of giving.

People were also touched by Merton's insight that "the marriage of body and soul in one person is one of the things that makes man the image of God."

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Seeds of Contemplation - Chapter 3

3/13/2015

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We started our 3-month Exploring Contemplative Living with Thomas Merton journey last night. We had a mix of both new and old faces. In the midst of the diversity of this group, it's wonderful to see a community of insight and sharing beginning to form.

As we discussed, Contemplation is not something that can be intellectually understood, it must be experienced with an open heart and by being fully present to the reality of the moment. Only when are able to take a long, loving look at what's real, do we become open to the grace of Contemplation. The primary intention of these 3 month's together is for each of us to grow to become more aware, open and present to this grace.

In our first look at Chapter 1 of New Seeds, we began to explore "What is Contemplation." For Merton: Contemplation is beyond understanding, it is the depth of sacredness found in the experience of being fully alive in this very moment and connected to the Source of all life! By reflecting on our lives, each of us will find moments of Contemplative experience. Last night, some of us shared a time when we felt fully awake, alive and connected to the present moment. The experiences we shared were very different from each other but each one completely absorbed us with a sense of wholeness and connectedness. These experiences opened us to the sacredness of the ordinary situation we were in, and in some ways helped us to transcend our cares or concerns in that moment. The experiences were powerful enough that they stuck with us for the rest of our lives.

As we explored Chapter 3, the ideas that seemed to strike folks most were:

Every expression of the will of God is in some sense a “word” of God and therefore a “seed” of new life. This gives me access to an uninterrupted dialogue with God.
My willingness to open to God’s will depends upon my image of God. I must realize that the love of God seeks me in every situation, and seeks my good.
The contemplative must be detached, but he can never allow himself to become insensible (cultivated indifference) to true human values.

Though God may seem silent, if we open to the will of God in our lives (the moments of our lives that touch us deeply) we open to a dialogue with Him. Many of us shared moments from our lives that touched us deeply, from the impact of an aunt who was a nun on a young boy, the joy and connectedness to Jesus at first Communion or at the end of a drive-in movie,connection to the lives of others and all of creation or the deep love and joy at the birth of a child. These all planted seeds of truth, joy and love that has impacted our lives.

Many of us were able to relate to a struggle to get beyond a God seen as domineering and insensible to a good and gracious God. As Merton wrote, we will only open ourselves to the intimate encounter of God in Contemplation if we come to know God to be Love. Perhaps that is why so many struggle with opening themselves to be present in this way in the first place.

Finally, many people seeking "holiness" seem to go through a period in which they seek to detach themselves from the world and being fully human so they can focus on what they believe are God's ways. Merton fully realized at the time he wrote New Seeds that a cultivated indifference to being fully human vitiates (invalidates) the true path to knowing God. We will see more of this in upcoming chapters.

I'd like to share the quote from Chapter 3 that most touched me:

If I were looking for God, every event and every moment would sow, in my will, grains of God’s life, that would spring up one day in a tremendous harvest. For it is God’s love that warms me in the sun and God’s love that sends the cold rain. It is God’s love that feeds me in the bread I eat and God that feeds me also by hunger and fasting. It is the love of God that sends the winter days when I am cold and sick, and the hot summer when I labor and my clothes are full of sweat: but it is God who breathes on me with light winds off the river and in the breezes out of the wood.’

‘God’s love spreads the shade by the sycamore over my head and sends the water-boy along the edge of the wheat field with a bucket from the spring, while the laborers are resting and the mules stand under the tree. It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams but also behind the clamor of the city God speaks to me in God’s judgments, and all these things are seeds sent to me from God’s will. If they would take root in my liberty, and if God’s will would grow from my freedom, I would become the love that God is, and my harvest would be God’s glory and my own joy. And I would grow together with thousands and millions of other freedoms into the gold of one huge field praising God, loaded with increase, loaded with increase, loaded with corn.’

This reminds me that God's love (His will) is found in every moment of each day, even in the midst of the day's difficulties. When I'm able to detach from my own expectations and judgement, I'm able to see this.

Finally, I'd like to share the following piece that I received from Fr. Bill Barry SJ which is an account of a Contemplative experience that has touched me deeply.

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The Spiritual Discipline Of Solitude - 11/13/2014

11/21/2014

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I was wonderful to hear the reflections at our last group meeting regarding how members of the group could sense a spirit of the group as welcoming, open and supportive where those participating felt invited to share without any pressure to do so. I was touched by folks describing this experience as having shifted the spiritual context in their lives. Truly a testament to this group's members and it's spirit.

As we discussed the Introduction to the evening's texts, we focused on the term "tribes". For us, the tribes we associate with are our families, our communities, our nation, our society. These shape us deeply into who we are; "we learn to love whatever our tribe loves." As we enter into solitude we make ourselves strangers to our "tribes" which allows us to discover our own voice; the true self outside of the forces that have shaped us. This very much seemed to capture the flavor of Matthew 10:29-30: “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and for the sake of the gospel 30 who will not receive a hundred times more now in this present age" It takes courage to let go of the certainty of our tribal knowledge and immerse our the unknown quest for our own voice and trust it even if it differs from that of our tribe.

In looking closely at Merton we discussed how Solitude is an act, a conscious choice that has substance to those who undertake it with purpose. The work of Solitude is the active work of "destroying all fences and throwing away all the disguises, getting down to the naked core of one's inmost desire, which is the desire of liberty-reality". In other words, Solitude opens us up to our desire to be our true selves, and to do this requires that we explore, question and strip away all those identities we inherited or were imposed upon us by our tribes that we find do not resonate with who we are. Once we find out true self in solitude, through discipline we engage in an active life which "keeps body and soul together, harmonizes their powers, brings them into deep resonance, orients the whole being toward the root of being." Without such a discipline, "the active life can be that which is most passive: one is simply driven, carried, batted around, moved. The most desperate illusion and the most common one is to fling oneself into the mass that is in movement and be carried along with it: to be part of the stream of traffic going nowhere but with a great sense of phony purpose."

As we looked at Another Voice, an excerpt from When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron, we were struck by what it means to be fully alive to the messiness (and excitement) of life's experience: "Seeking security or perfection, rejoicing in feeling confirmed and whole, self-contained and comfortable, is some kind of death... We are killing the moment by controlling our experience. Doing this is setting ourselves up for failure, because sooner or later, we're going to have an experience we can't control...The essence of life is that it's challenging.... From an awakened perspective, trying to tie up all the loose ends and finally get it together is death, because it involves rejecting a lot of your basic experience. To be fully alive, fully human and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest. To live fully is to be always in no-man's land, to experience each moment as completely new and fresh. To live is to be willing to die over and over again. From the awakened point of view, that's life." Living this way takes courage, but provides us true freedom in our willingness to accept what comes and trust that it is for our own benefit. Rumi's Poem - The Guest House speaks to living this attitude:

A book recommended by one of our group members for dealing with the difficult realities of life was: The Other Side of Chaos by Margret Silf. I would also recommend Pema Chodron's books, they provide wonderful insights on how to develop the courage to live life and fully experience it.

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Inner Work and The Struggle to Live Contemplatively - 10/30/2014

10/31/2014

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Holy Listening was again wonderful at this Thursday's session. It was amazing how the single common thread of "Oneness with another" came out of the different encounters we shared. It seems that in what we shared, we lived an aspect of last session's Merton's Voice from New Seeds of Contemplation: "one cannot enter into the deepest center of oneself and pass through that center into God unless one is able to pass entirely out of oneself and empty oneself and give oneself to other people in the purity of selfless love" and "we shall love one another and God with the same Love with which He loves us and Himself. This love is God Himself..." It seems to that each of us experienced the very thing we read about. I am grateful for the gifts of insight each of you shared with me and will reflect on them in the upcoming days.

In reflecting on our lived experience of the past week, there was a beautiful "sharing of the season" which spoke to becoming "doors and windows through which God shines back into His own house." The sharing was inspired by a story which likens us to Pumpkins who God turns into Jack O Lanterns. God washes us, cleans us out from the inside, carves windows (eyes, ears, mouth) into us and then places in us his light for all to see. We also talked about forgiveness as grounded in our ability to have compassion for others and ourselves. When we are able to forgive ourselves and have compassion for our "ugliness", then we will be better able to do this for others. The scriptural notion of forgiving 70 x 7 times came up and was related to the small opportunities for forgiving we have in the everyday, ordinary events of our daily lives. By opening ourselves to forgive others in small annoyances, we prepare to forgive others for larger things. As I reflect on this, I would also add that we need to include ourselves as well, so that we don't hang onto our own failings to tightly.

Because of the richness and depth of this week's readings we focused mainly on Merton's Voice. Although it seemed like there was much more to be shared, we were drawn to a few specific parts of the Introduction to the Text and the Merton's Voice passage:

We started by commenting on the lines from the Introduction that dealt with our state of being fractured: "We often regard our spirituality or religious observances as just another room we enter from time to time, a socially required pause as we rush between the rooms of our private and individual selves. We need to integrate the walled-off, non-communicating dimensions of our daily living. Becoming an integrated person is the inner work or contemplative living." As we discussed and related to this text we reached a consensus that the work of integration of the walled-off areas of our daily life consists of a gentle, healing process which is the spirit of the Contemplative way. This process is akin to gradual assimilation, pulling back a curtain, or transformation rather than a violent process of breaking down walls.

We talked about the traditional definition of Wisdom as seeking Truth (for its own sake), Goodness (intuition of the very ground of all being) and Beauty (fullness of being). We discussed how living the Way of Wisdom (living contemplatively) "does not withdraw from the fire (living in the world). It is in the very heart of the fire, yet remains cool, because it has the gentleness and humility that come from self-abandonment and hence does not seek to assert the illusion of the exterior self." This was related to living an integrated life, in which we are able to balance action and contemplation. We affirmed that a balance of both activity and stillness, community and solitude, are required for a healthy human life. It is when we are out of balance that we live out of a state of being fractured.

Our discussion proceeded to how modern society over-values activity and what is achieved as a result of that activity: "we believe that for us there can be no peace except in a life filled up with movement and activity, with speech, news, communication, recreation, distraction. We seek the meaning of our life in activity for its own sake, activity without objective, efficacy without fruit,... The life of frantic activity is invested with the noblest of qualities as if it were the whole end and happiness of man or rather as if the life of man has no inherent meaning whatever and that it had to be given a meaning from some external source,from a society engaged in a gigantic communal effort to raise us above ourselves." This led us into discussing how society seems to make us obsessed with proving or establishing our worthiness. That, unless we achieve something of external significance, we are somehow less worthy or valuable. A significant point was made that we can even get caught up in excess study or activity associated with our spiritual lives, in which we seek to become more worthy for God. This business of and our involvement in efforts of excessive study (trying to find God in words or ideas) and activity (looking to find God in our action) actually closes us to being in God's presence.

We ended our evening talking about the Inner Work/Struggle to live contemplatively and remain free from getting caught up in endless distraction. We shared how distractions result from society's expectation that we be busy but also from our own hesitancy to be present to and alone with ourselves. Facing ourselves, it can be difficult to admit who we are; not only our failings and shortcomings, but also our own goodness which is sometimes more easily recognized by others around us. It seems to me that the result of inner work may be to accept ourselves just as we truly are; a complex mixture of feelings, motivations, actions and thoughts and for us to realize that God loves us anyway. It seem that the degree to which we accept ourselves and God's love for us, is the degree with which we can return that love to God and to others.

I'll end by sharing the short quote from Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault's Wisdom Jesus which I read at our 10/23 session and which I believe remains applicable to all we have been discussing:

There is nothing to be renounced or resisted.
Everything can be embraced, but the catch is to cling to nothing.
You let it go. You go through life like a knife goes through a done cake, picking up nothing, clinging to nothing, sticking to nothing.
And grounded in that fundamental chastity of your being, you can then throw yourself out, pour yourself out, being able to give it all back, even giving back life itself.
Very, very simple. It only costs everything.

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Contemplative Living And Community - 10/23/2014

10/26/2014

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It was wonderful to have a full Holy Listening group prior to our formal Contemplative Living and Community session. The opening prayer one of our members shared was wonderful in spontaneity, depth and in the way it captured the spirit of Holy Listening. The prayer deeply moved me. I find myself enriched by Holy Listening in 3 ways, in sharing the ordinary life event that touched me, being inspired by what I heard in other's sharing their events and by receiving the gifts of everyone else's inspirations. As I reflect and ponder on the messages I received from others, it amazed me how well they echo the things that need further focus and attention in my own journey. There is no mistake the Spirit was present among us.

Throughout this past session I felt the group more deeply moving at a contemplative pace. The group embraced a natural pace (what Merton has called a "human pace") with which we shared, absorbed each other's reflections, and responded. As a group and as individuals we are becoming at peace with "the silence between thoughts".

An idea we spent some time exploring was of being open and present to God in the ordinary events of life and to His continual, gentle offer of love to us. With attention, presence and openness we transcend the superficial concerns that we tend to get caught up in and allow ourselves to experience oneness with all that is around us. By deeply experiencing that oneness in nature or the oneness in community we become aware of our oneness with all in God. This was the notion that a number of us were able to relate back to Merton's words: "So we all become doors and windows through which God shines back into His own house."

Some of us were captured by the phrase "birth canals to more compassionate living." We related how discomforts of life experience lead us to new spiritual birth. In particular, many shared how situations of extraordinary vulnerability (age, personal experiences, health issues) lead us to abandon or forget ourselves and find God. We could relate to the grace of aging and how the dependence on others allows us to progressively acknowledge and surrender to dependence on God.

Finally we spent time on a line from Another Voice: "All holiness on earth is the fragrance of God present in and with all of us." We talked about how fragrances elicit whole body reactions and how they can bring us back to precious moments or memories in our life. In this vein, "justice, goodness, mercy, understanding, compassion" impact us deeply and bring us back to the truth that lies at our center, our True Self, which is God.

I conclude this reflection with two items. The first is a reference to the book by Sr. Miriam Therese Winter, Eucharist With a Small e, which several people felt spoke about the experience of finding God in community and in life. The second item is both the introduction to and the prayer by Thomas Merton that we shared at the end of our session. Merton offered the following words and spontaneous prayer at the conclusion of the first spiritual summit in Calcutta, a gathering of Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus, and Muslims which occurred in October 1968, a few months before his death:

I will ask you to stand and all join hands in a little while. But first, we realize that we are going to have to create a new language of prayer. And this new language of prayer has to come out of something which transcends all our traditions, and comes out of the immediacy of love. We have to part now, aware of the love that unites us, the love that unites us in spite of real differences, real emotional friction ...

The things that are on the surface are nothing, what is deep is the Real. We are creatures of love. Let us therefore join hands as we did before, and I will try to say something that comes out of the depths of our hearts. I ask you to concentrate on the love that is in you, that is in us all. I have no idea what I am going to say. I am going to be silent a minute, and then I will say something . . .

Oh God, we are one with You. You have made us one with You. You have taught us that if we are open to one another, You dwell in us. Help us to preserve this openness and to fight for it with all our hearts. Help us to realize that there can be no understanding where there is mutual rejection.
Oh God, in accepting one another wholeheartedly, fully, completely, we accept You, and we thank You, and we adore You, and we love You with our whole being, because our being is in Your being, our spirit is rooted in Your spirit.
Fill us then with love, and let us be bound together with love as we go our diverse ways, united in this one spirit which makes You present in the world, and which makes You witness to the ultimate reality that is love.
Love has overcome. Love is victorious. Amen.

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Contemplative Prayer and Prayer of the Heart - 10/9/2014

10/13/2014

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Nature resonated throughout the evening's discussions. It started in Holy Listening with my expressing the experience of peace and joy I got from having my attention captured by a dog in a car that was stopped at a red light next to me. I was captured by how the dog was completely present to and delighted by the sights, sounds and smells of nature around him. The attention to nature continued in the reflections of how some folks had been working in their gardens to pull out old tomato plants, which, when composted, would become the fertilizer for subsequent generations. This became an analogy for the love and lessons we pass down to others to help them grow. We talked about the beauty and simplicity found in God's creation. How in the midst of their just being, God appears to sustain the things of nature. Humanity and society has created a tremendous amount of complexity which requires a good bit of doing on our part which tends to distract us from simply being. As we talked about prayer, many reflected on their deepest experience of (Contemplative) prayer as being in nature and connected to God through it or to working in a garden and aware of the presence of God. This evening's sentiments were reminiscent of Session 4 from the Spring 2014 Merton Contemplative Living Series entitled 'Living in Solitude and In Silence." One participant in that session was particularly moved by the following lines from Another Voice written by David Steindl-Rast - Thomas Merton/Monk: A Monastic Tribute:

When I remember my last visit with Thomas Merton I see him standing in the forest, listening to the rain. Much later, when he began to talk, he was not breaking the silence, he was letting it come to word. And he continued to listen. “Talking is not the principal thing” he said.

This participant used the phrase the liturgy of nature to describe the image invoked by these words. It was as if the way Merton observed and spoke was in harmony (letting silence come to word) with the great mystery of nature which he had become a part of and which was in full and natural reverence to God's presence.

We also spent time talking about the real difficulty in simplifying our lives is letting go of our attachments (to fears, to memories/sentiments, to other things that define us). We made the comparison to Contemplative prayer which requires us to let go of our attachments to doing (actively praying) and simply allowing ourselves to be in God's presence. We discussed that the grace God gives us as we age is that we are forced to simplify more and more as we ultimately come to the state of just being. At the end of our lives our attachments to the things of our lives and to the activity of our prayers are let go and we are left in a state of just being before God.

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Paul Uccello and I have been facilitating the Bridges to Contemplative Living with Thomas Merton program at the Spiritual Life Center in West Hartford CT since the Spring of 2013. I've begun posting reflections from these workshops here starting in Fall 2014.

We Are One Man - CHAPTER 9, A Body Of Broken Bones - CHAPTER 10

Union and Division - Chapter 7, Solitude Is Not Separation - Chapter 8

Pray for Your Own Discovery - Chapter 6

Things In Their Identity - Chapter 5

Everything That Is, Is Holy - Chapter 4

Seeds of Contemplation - Chapter 3

The Spiritual Discipline Of Solitude - 11/13/2014

Inner Work and The Struggle to Live Contemplatively - 10/30/2014

Contemplative Living And Community - 10/23/2014

Contemplative Prayer and Prayer of the Heart - 10/9/2014

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