“I have my own way to walk and for some reason or other Zen is right in the middle of it wherever… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
You must realize that it is the ordinary way of God's dealings with us that our ideas do not work out speedily… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
I refuse to be misled by any kind of a mirage about any alleged success of what I write. Those things are… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
It seems to me that the darkness that has troubled you ... comes from one very serious source. Without wanting to be… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me...you will lead… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We refuse love, and reject society, in so far as it seems, in our own perverse imagination, to imply some obscure kind… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
By my monastic life and vows I am saying no to all the concentration camps, the aerial bombardments, the staged political trials,… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
One of the first things to learn if you want to be a contemplative is to mind your own business. Nothing is… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We know when we are following our vocation when our soul is set free from preoccupation with itself and is able to… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
No matter how ruined man and his world may seem to be, and no matter how terrible man's despair may become, as… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
And it is in this darkness, when there is nothing left in us that can please or comfort our own minds, when… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
“Let no one hope to find in contemplation an escape from conflict, from anguish or from doubt. On the contrary, the deep, inexpressible certitude… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God we must… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We are not perfectly free until we live in pure hope. For when our hope is pure, it no longer trusts exclusively in human… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The desire to kill is like the desire to attack another with an ingot of red -hot iron: I have to pick up the… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
To enter into the realm of contemplation one must in a certain sense die: but this death is in fact the entrance to a… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The mission of Christian humility in social life is not merely to edify, but to keep minds open to many alternatives. The rigidity of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Peace cannot be built on exclusivism, absolutism, and intolerance. But neither can it be built on vague liberal slogans and pious programs gestated in… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Things that are good are good, and if one is responding to that goodness one is in contact with a truth from which one… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The logic of worldly success rests on a fallacy: the strange error that our perfection depends on the thoughts and opinions and applause of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
“The wisdom of the flesh is a judgement that the ordinary ends of our natural appetites are the goods to which the whole of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
