Monday, June 29, 2009
More Wise Words from Merton
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Reading "Contemplative Prayer" I came across this description of life that seems so fitting:
"The curious state of alienation and confusion of man in modern society...underlying all life is the ground of doubt and self-questioning which sooner or later must bring us face to face with the ultimate meaning of our life. This self-questioning can never be without a certain existential 'dread' - a sense of insecurity, of 'lostness,' of exile, of sin. A sense that one has somehow been untrue not so much to abstract moral or social norms but to one's own inmost truth." ... It is the profound awareness that one is capable of ultimate bad faith with himself and with others: that one is living a lie."
This inner uncertainty and awareness of being untrue to oneself is profoundly powerful, and more common than we would like to admit. I know that I have sensed it in myself, and it is a scary place to explore. But the lazy river of American life slowly and naturally drifts me away from deep and real integrity. As he says, "Society itself, institutional life, organization, the 'approved way,' may in fact be encouraging us in falsity and illusion."
Because I resonate with his description of this "inner dread," I also resonate with his description of the solution:
"In order to be true to God and to ourselves we must break with the familiar, established and secure norms and go off into the unknown...the turning to a freedom based no longer on social approval and relative alienation, but on direct dependence on a invisible and inscrutable God, in pure faith...This is the creative and healing work of the monk, accomplished in silence, in nakedness of spirit, in emptiness, in humility. It is a participation in the saving death and resurrection of Christ. Therefore every Christian may, if he so desires, enter into communion with this silence of the praying and meditating Church, which is the Church of the Desert."
There are not many Christians, let alone American churches, advertising this type of faith. It's a difficult call to follow Jesus into the desert, into temptation, into solitude and confusion. But I have found that this is where God's heart lies, not in the easy answers or superficial feel good-ism, but a genuine search from the heart. It doesn't look like the faith that has always been described to me.
But at least it doesn't feel like I'm lying to myself anymore.
"The curious state of alienation and confusion of man in modern society...underlying all life is the ground of doubt and self-questioning which sooner or later must bring us face to face with the ultimate meaning of our life. This self-questioning can never be without a certain existential 'dread' - a sense of insecurity, of 'lostness,' of exile, of sin. A sense that one has somehow been untrue not so much to abstract moral or social norms but to one's own inmost truth." ... It is the profound awareness that one is capable of ultimate bad faith with himself and with others: that one is living a lie."
This inner uncertainty and awareness of being untrue to oneself is profoundly powerful, and more common than we would like to admit. I know that I have sensed it in myself, and it is a scary place to explore. But the lazy river of American life slowly and naturally drifts me away from deep and real integrity. As he says, "Society itself, institutional life, organization, the 'approved way,' may in fact be encouraging us in falsity and illusion."
Because I resonate with his description of this "inner dread," I also resonate with his description of the solution:
"In order to be true to God and to ourselves we must break with the familiar, established and secure norms and go off into the unknown...the turning to a freedom based no longer on social approval and relative alienation, but on direct dependence on a invisible and inscrutable God, in pure faith...This is the creative and healing work of the monk, accomplished in silence, in nakedness of spirit, in emptiness, in humility. It is a participation in the saving death and resurrection of Christ. Therefore every Christian may, if he so desires, enter into communion with this silence of the praying and meditating Church, which is the Church of the Desert."
There are not many Christians, let alone American churches, advertising this type of faith. It's a difficult call to follow Jesus into the desert, into temptation, into solitude and confusion. But I have found that this is where God's heart lies, not in the easy answers or superficial feel good-ism, but a genuine search from the heart. It doesn't look like the faith that has always been described to me.
But at least it doesn't feel like I'm lying to myself anymore.
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