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Michael D. McIntosh

Reflection on Thomas Merton

The mystics have always been a tad bit over the edge in mysticism for me. Their phrases

and their terminology, and their disciplines have always been too strange, separate and even too

holy for me be interested. I never doubted that we share the same faith: I just doubted that we

lived on the same earth. So when I was asked to read one of their works, I wanted the one I could

best relate to; the one closest to my own spirituality. From our surface reading of other mystics I

came to the conclusion that the women mystics were too cloudy in their writings for me to sink

into, and the men were too dated; so I concluded with a contemporary male writer: Thomas

Merton. The name was slightly familiar; I think I remembered reading some of his reflective

pieces a few semesters back. Choosing the book was a breeze compared to choosing the author; I

wanted the biggest, baddest book he had out. Which of course is his master piece: No man is an

Island. If I had to swim in the foreign waters of the mystics, then I was determined to dive in,

head first, eyes open: it was all or nothing. I heard he was a big shot in his era, and that was

enough for the decision. There were however, certain fears that I was somewhat concerned

about. For starters, his writing is a very difficult read, he does not do much explaining, and he is

not concerned about the validity of his points either. I had a hunch of these cautions, but

certainly I did not know they were so precise until I began my reading. Thankfully, with a little

time and patience, the reading began to get much smoother and less lofty. It was as though I
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became less of Merton’s disciple, and more like a friend to him as the book moved along.

In my search for some history of Merton I stumbled across an old print of The Seven

Story Mountain: his autobiography. It was certainly much too large of a book for me to have read

before this writing, but surely every paragraph I skimmed across was a sheer delight. Merton was

born in Prades France. Or as he writes it: “On the last day of January 1915, under the sign of the

Water Bearer, in a year of a great war, and down in the shadow of some French mountains on the

borders of Spain, I came into the world” (Merton 3). Unlike us children born in the late 20th and

early 21st century, Merton was a kind of war child. His life began in the midst of a great war, and

his life ended not to long after the close of a greater war. Merton’s lifespan witnessed World War

1, and World War ll. His generation was a violent one, and his world was a hostile one. It is not

surprising that “he had left the world with a slam of the door to become a monk” (Forest 47).

From his writing it can be easily noticed that Tom was a keenly reflective man; always looking

above himself, and always looking within himself. He was a contemplative man. Yet his world

was a hollow reality.

Though the book No Man Is An Island is a topical book, there are however many aspects

of Merton’s spirituality reveled through it. As a whole there is an overarching thesis, and within

that arch there are many others which eventually lead to the same major stream of thought. For

Merton there is always an emphasis on the confrontation of truth. This can range from facing the

true image of one’s self, or the true face of one’s motive, or the true face of “Truth” himself. He

is continually calling his readers, and hearers to confront that which is true. One of the first truths

that he confronts is the truth of paradox. Somehow within our western thought we have come to
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embrace an ideological form of truth that is only one-sided. We have even come to believe that if

it is really true then it must therefore be one-sided, and anything other than that is self-

contradictory, or a lie. However, this is not the mental or spiritual structure of Merton. One of his

chief aims within his spiritual character is to embrace all sides of truth, even when it surpasses

his understanding to comprehend it. He is willing to let go of rationale, in order to stay faithful to

acknowledging both sides of the same truth. When discussing the difficult aspects of salvation,

Merton writes: “The only effective answer to the problem of salvation must therefore reach out

to embrace both extremes of a contradiction at the same time. Hence that answer must be

supernatural. That is why all the answers that are not supernatural are imperfect: for they only

embrace one of the contradictory terms, and they can always be denied by the other” (Merton

xvii) Later on in the book Merton expresses how he believes that there are certain powers that

can unify such seemingly opposing ideas, these unifiers are powers such as: love, joy, and even

hope. “The mystery of free will and grace, of predestination and co-operation with God is

resolved in hope which effectively co-ordinates the two in their right relation to one another”

(Merton 22). This idea of reaching out to both extremes is certainly one of the dominant mystical

practices of Merton. This acceptance of two truths that are seemingly contradictory transcends

understanding and therefore must enter into the realm of the mystical.

Like all other mystics, Merton’s places strong emphasis on the union between man and

God, believing that this is the highest pinnacle of man’s existence both in this life, and the life to

come. “True happiness is not found in any other reward than that of being united with God”

(Merton 54). God for Merton is the chief end to all things, and all things should be done with that

end in mind. This being so, Merton’s greatest happiness is in the union with God. “If I seek some
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other reward besides God Himself, I may get my reward but I cannot be happy” (Merton 54). For

Merton this union is not just in the consummation between God and his Church at the close of

the age, this union is something that can be grasped here, in this life. This union begins with a

uniting of the wills; a marriage between what we want, and what God wants. “For sanctity is

union with God... Sanctity does not consist merely in doing the will of God. It consists in willing

the will of God” (Merton 56). Of course, this union produces an overflow of many charitable

acts: love, self-sacrifice, even obedience. And so in the echoes of these words you begin to hear

the title of the book itself begin to surface up again: No man is an island. No man can live a life

where his actions are independent, isolated and unchanged from the world around him. A man is

in his happiest state when all that he is, is desperately dependent on his Maker, and his fellow

brothers.

Everything is spiritual. Like wild gold, Merton believes that all of life’s circumstances

need to be refined, cleansed and consecrated. To him there is no good in anything unless it is

made holy by the one who is undergoing it.”The Christian must not only accept suffering: he

must make it holy...Merely accepted, suffering does nothing for our souls except, perhaps, to

harden them. Endurance alone is no consecration” (Merton 77). This is a practice of presence. In

order for you to consecrate any circumstance, you must first be present within them, and to them.

One of Merton’s close friends commented that he could not scratch his nose without writing an

essay about it (Forest 47). His prolific writing was the overflow of his continual presence with

his day to day events. Had he not taken notice of pains, and the trials of life he would have

nothing to reflect on. But it was by his reflections and writing on life that he was actually present

with them. He noticed the things most of us would look right over. In the 21st comfortable
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century that we live in, it is almost absurd to even think of embracing the moments in which we

suffer. But this is a core practice of Merton; to fully stand, observe, and endure the times when

he is in the most pain: both physically, and emotionally. “Suffering, therefore, must make sense

to us not as a vague universal necessity, but as something demanded by our own personal

destiny. When I see my trials not as the collision of my life with a blind machine called fate, but

as the sacramental gift of Christ’s love...” (Merton 83) He calls suffering a “sacrament”,

believing that there is something mystical to the whole ordeal, as it is with the Eucharist. Just as

Catholics make it their priority to take the Eucharist, so Merton makes it his priority to

acknowledge the holiness of suffering when it is given to him: it is a part of his practice.

Though these practices or spiritual aspects of Merton seem all so distinct, they really are

all so intertwined. Each of them are built on top of each other, and each are dependent on one

another: where one ends, the other begins. Merton’s emphasis on true motive, true self, true

union are all found in the subtle messages in each chapter. One cannot embrace the “sacrament”

of suffering unless he is willing to acknowledge the true face of suffering, and his true identity

while he is in the mist of it. One also cannot see the beauty of the union with God unless he is

first willing to acknowledge the hatred that is still within him toward the will of God. Yet,

without first being united to God, how could one possibly see that he has a will that in some way

still opposed to God. And if one has not experienced the sacrament of suffering, how then could

they possibly be stripped down enough to see their true identity. And so you see that though

these are all separate topics, they in some way all work, and bend, and twist, and built on one

another. We must therefore reach out to all truths and hold fast to them, regardless if we are able

to comprehend how they are all true. It is the holding of the paradox.
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I once heard a quote, it was from Dr. Martin Luther King and it was given to Billy

Graham: “Now Billy, don’t go too far ahead of your people. If you move to far, they won’t be

able to see you.” I think this quote is applicable to all us curious Christians today, who cautiously

search across the writings of the mystics, looking for something deeper than what our present

Christianity offers us. If we go too far with the discovery of our union with God, I think we

might just ascend to the clouds and leave our fellow brothers alone: shut out from us. We

therefore need to walk one step at a time, leaving enough time for our Christian brothers to catch

up with us. But with these steps come a sort of leadership. We need to step forward in the

mystical direction; which is a direction of deeper sincerity, spiritually, and possibly suffering.

Which are all foreign concepts to our big, bold, and shallow American Christianity. This future

movement will be a stepping forward into the ancient ways.

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Works Cited

Forest, Jim. "Mountain man : Thomas Merton, monk for the world." U S Catholic, 74(2): 47-

48(Feb 2009) 74.2 (2009): 47-48. Print.

Merton, Thomas. The Seven Story Mountain. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1948.

Print.