Theological and other musings from Fr. Neo. You might call it ‘Mere Christianity with an edge.’ Vade retro Satana! Nunquam suade mihi vana! Sunt mala quae libas. Ipse venena bibas!
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Posted on August 11th, 2011 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
From Father Christian, the Benedictine monk in the film of gods and men, before being killed by Islamic militarists:
Should it ever befall me, and it could happen today, to be a victim of the terrorism swallowing up all foreigners here, I would like my community, my church, my family, to remember that my life was given to God and to his country. That the Unique Master of all life was no stranger to this brutal departure. And that my death is the same as so many other violent ones, consigned to the apathy of oblivion. I’ve lived enough to know, I am complicit in the evil that, alas, prevails over the world and the evil that will smite me blindly. I could never desire such a death. I could never feel gladdened that these people I love be accused randomly of my murder. I know the contempt felt for the people here, indiscriminately. And I know how Islam is distorted by a certain Islamism. This country, and Islam, for me are something different. They’re a body and a soul. My death, of course, will quickly vindicate those who call me naïve or idealistic, but they must know that I will be freed of a burning curiosity and, God willing, will immerse my gaze in the Father’s and contemplate with him his children of Islam as he sees them. This thank you which encompasses my entire life includes you, of course, friends of yesterday and today, and you too, friend of last minute, who knew not what you were doing. Yes, to you as well I address this thank you and this farewell which you envisaged. May we meet again, happy thieves in Paradise, if it pleases God the Father of us both. Amen. Insha’Allah.
Posted on June 17th, 2011 by fatherneo.
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‘I can think of no more conformist message in liberal [democratic] societies than the idea that students should learn to think for themselves. What must be said is that most students in our society do not have minds well enough trained to think. A central pedagogical task is to tell students that their problem is that they do not have minds worth making up. That is why training is so important, because training involves the formation of the self through submission to authority that will provide people with the virtues necessary to make reasoned judgment.’ (Hauerwas)
Posted on June 10th, 2011 by fatherneo.
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As Christians and Muslims continue to interact and we struggle to find ways to communicate the faith, listen to the words of missionary Frank Laubach from the early 20th century. Laubach was a missionary to Muslim Moros people on the Island of Mindanao.
What right then have I or any other person to come here and change the name of these people from Muslim to Christian, unless I lead them to a life fuller of God than they have now? Clearly, clearly, my job here is not to go to the town plaza and make proselytes, it is to live wrapped in God, trembling to his thoughts, burning with his passion. And, my loved one, that is the best gift you can give to your own town.
Posted on May 27th, 2011 by fatherneo.
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The Black White Achievement Gap: Why Closing it is the Greatest Civil Rights Issue of Our Time. By Rod Paige and Elaine Witty. (American Management Association, 2010)
“In The Black-White Achievement Gap, renowned former U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige and Elaine Witty provide a wake-up call to black leaders and communities, urging the kind of action that is essential if this blight on African American achievement is ever to be defeated.”
Rod Paige, United States Secretary of Education from 2001 to 2005, and Elaine Witty, longtime educator in both childhood and higher education, call the gap in academics between African Americans and their white counterparts ‘the greatest civil rights issue of our time.’ As long as there is an academic achievement gap between African Americans and whites, there is an indispensable component missing in the quest for civil rights and quality of life among African Americans living in a free society. The problem of academic underachievement is the seed of the germinated myth of African American inferiority. It can also lead to poverty, joblessness and/or lower wages (and often lack of health care or inadequate health care), greater risk of incarceration, and even early death.
What is the Black-White achievement gap?
Briefly put, the black-white achievement gap is the disparity in academic performance between African American students and white students. Black children begin their school careers slightly behind but by the time they reach middle school find themselves significantly behind, especially in reading and math. Paige and Witty say, “Only 13% of black 8th graders, compared with 40% of their white peers, were proficient readers in 2007” (32). They continue, “On average, the reading and math proficiency of 8th grade black students in this country is much closer to that of white fourth graders than it is to that of white 8th graders” (36).
Paige and Witty provide data that shows African Americans are behind in many states in reading proficiency, math proficiency, and college readiness. In 1940, 1% of African Americans earned a college degree and in 2006 19% did. While there is some improvement, African Americans still, by and large, do not receive college diplomas and therefore, find themselves once again in the lower tier of society. Many do not finish high school. As Paige and Witty say that 46% of black high school dropouts “don’t have jobs and have stopped looking for them” (52-53).
For Paige and Witty, even a modest closing of the gap—that is a 5% increase–in African Americans simply finishing high school, would significantly shift the quality of life for many African Americans and supply more income into African American households. More modest gains (attending some college and earning Bachelor’s Degrees) would provide radical improvement in African American wages, security and well-being. A 10% improvement in African Americans completion of their Bachelor’s degree would put billions of dollars into African American households.
Why is there a Black-White achievement gap?
Paige and Witty make it clear that unraveling the reasons for the black-white achievement gap is a complex process. They also make it clear that it has nothing to do with African American inferiority to whites. They contradict the Richard Hernstien and Charles Murray’s ‘Bell Curve’ theory which suggested that “blacks score lower than whites on tests (on average) because they are genetically inferior” (14). Paige and Witty believe that there is more at play in this issue.
Paige and Witty do a masterful job of tracing the history of African Americans in the United States. The effects of slavery are far-reaching and cannot be underestimated in any discussion of the black-white achievement gap. What Paige and Witty underscore are not only the physical effects of slavery, but the permeation of slavery rhetoric and the mindset that still lingers.
Under slavery in the South, black illiteracy was enforced under penalty of heavy fines or jail time for any whites who taught their slaves to read. It was not so much the violence that made black slaves vulnerable to the institution of slavery, it was the idea that blacks were ‘abominable mixtures…barbarous…and savage’ (79) unworthy of the dignity that literacy and education provides. Paige and Witty quote French historian Alexis de Tocqueville during his travels in the United States. He said, “The only means by which ancients maintained slavery were the fetters of death…but the Americans of the South of the Union have discovered more intellectual securities for the duration of their power. They have employed their despotism and their violence against the human mind” (82). Paige and Witty then outline the slave owners indoctrination: “Generally, each slave’s indoctrination encompassed at least five areas: strict and immediate discipline, a sense of his own inferiority and of whites’ superiority, an unwavering belief in the master’s superior power, acceptance of the master’s standards, and a deep sense of his own helplessness and dependence” (82).
As Paige and Witty describe, the legacy of slavery only gave birth to reconstruction discrimination after the Civil War and the creation of the Jim Crow laws that segregated and further enslaved the minds of African Americans. ‘Separate but equal’ schooling was constitutional throughout the U.S. and it was not until Brown vs. Board of Education that ‘separate but equal’ was overturned, prompting many African Americans and whites to fight together for civil rights.
Paige and Witty make the case that the African American experience is like that of an immigrant. It takes decades for immigrants to acclimate and adjust to a new culture. What is compelling about Paige and Witty’s argument, is that they place the African American ‘entry point’ into American culture long after the slavery days. They say, “The appropriate entry date [like any immigrant population] for African Americans should be April 1954, when the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Brown vs. Board of Education. Under that scenario, African Americans have been in this country as a free ethnic group for less than a century” (106).
The Civil Rights movement and the advances made in the 1970s and 1980s brought many improvements in African American educational opportunities. The 1990s and the 2000s still showed need for improvement, however. For Paige and Witty, racial discrimination is not as much of a barrier now but what they call ‘racial stigma.’ That is, how African Americans perceive themselves, especially in terms of education. Racial “stigma is about who, at the deepest cognitive level, they are understood to be” (11). Paige and Witty say that this stigma is so powerful that African Americans feel worse about African Americans than whites feel about African Americans. Using researchers Sinderman and Piazza’s survey data in their work The Scar of Race, Paige and Witty say, “A large percentage of African Americans surveyed indicated that they felt that African Americans were more aggressive or violent, boastful, complaining, lazy and irresponsible than whites” (97).
What can be done?
In Paige and Witty’s language, the solution of the problem is to “prove the stereotype wrong” (98). To do this, they make a clarion call for African American leadership to address the issue head on and find ways to close the gap. There are no genetic reasons for failure. Discrimination is not as much of a barrier as it was in the past. They call for not good schools, but great schools; not good teachers, but great teachers. They call for what was aimed at in the No Child Left Behind legislation: “An act to close the achievement gap with accountability, flexibility and choice” (107).
While no district or school system has shown great gains, they provide success stories from individual schools. From a charter boarding school in Washington D.C. to a college preparatory school in Houston. The key on a micro level is to find “an adult with high expectations who [takes] the time to connect to the student. That adult can be a teacher, coach, parent, religious leader, or community leader” (104).
On a wider level, Paige and Witty call for the six most important things authentic African American leaders must do:
1. Understand the issue.
2. Accept leadership responsibility for closing the gap.
3. Develop a sense of urgency about closing the gap.
4. Help constituents understand the issue.
5. Think education before politics.
6. Pay close attention to local school board elections.
Developing point 5, they use Washington D.C. Public school system as an example of a broken system that needs change. In D.C., the charter schools are gaining momentum over and against the public schools while parents are looking for alternatives to public schools that need changing. However, charter schools are difficult to get into and private schools are too expensive. In 2003 there was an opportunity to give parents a voucher choice, enabling them to choose private or parochial schools for their children. The political leadership chose to deny vouchers and school choice and keep the status quo. Paige and Witty said that in effect, they “imprisoned” the primarily low income African American children of D.C. “in schools that were not serving them well” (167). They also state, “Authentic leadership would be open to change…this is not an argument for vouchers. Rather, this is an argument about figuring out which policies and practices are good for African Americans students and having the courage to support them even when they conflict with one’s political agenda” (166).
Closing the gap not only takes place on the leadership level, but also the grassroots level. At the end of the book, Paige and Witty issue a call for service. The scope of the service they envision has these goals:
1. Improving elementary and middle school African American students’ performance in reading.
2. Improving elementary and middle-school African American students’ performance in math.
3. Enhancing African American students’ belief in the value of education and their own role in it.
They then offer five levels of service that African Americans can offer as a part of any community. Below are key points in their plan:
Level One: Personal direct service to children and parents—offering to your child or others mentoring, tutoring, volunteering at schools, help elect high quality individuals to serve on school boards, volunteer at Big Brothers and Big Sisters or a similar organization.
Level Two: Service through African American organizations such as NAACP, National Urban League, etc. and making academic achievement of African American students a priority for the organization.
Level Three: Service through public organizations, agencies, and businesses—monitor and report African American achievement in local schools, facilitate school—community partnerships and promote the development of scholarships.
Level Four: Service through historically black colleges and universities—encourage colleges and universities to direct resources towards the black-white achievement gap; work with public schools to enhance the quality of their reading and math pedagogy.
Level Five: Service through advocacy with schools and education policy makers—become educated in matters of local, state, and national education policy. Also, read the literature on education…express your views to your local representatives through letters, phone calls, op-ed articles, etc. (175-179)
Paige and Witty’s call is a challenge to African Americans leaders and any who wish to see the academic disparity change in our country change and to provide necessary effort and priority this goal deserves. In their words, “The message is clear: we must take effective actions aimed at closing the black-white achievement gap. We are presented with a great opportunity with national significance. By closing the black-white achievement gap, we will be eliminating many disparities between blacks and whites, thereby creating a better America” (184).
Posted on March 28th, 2011 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
1 Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the LORD,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither…
You can’t read this story without marveling at Jesus’ willingness to ignore the propriety of the culture in those days. What is he doing in Samaria in the first place? A Jew didn’t associate with Samaritans because Samaritans were half Assyrian conqueror and half Jewish. Secondly, they worshiped on Mt. Gerazim rather than in Jerusalem. They were unclean because of their mixed blood and mixed religious practice. Not only that, it was unthinkable for a Jewish man to openly talk to a Samaritan woman. A single Jewish man wasn’t supposed to talk to any woman, much less a Samaritan. Not only was it bad enough that he talked to a Samaritan woman, she was a loose Samaritan woman at that. Or at least she was perceived that way. Remember Deuteronomy 24:1 allowed men to divorce their wives ‘if they did not please them.’ She may have been unjustly divorced the first time (or the first two times) and thought, hey, what is there to lose now? I’ve already come this far, there is no redemption for me.
It is significant that she comes at noon. No one came to a well at noon. Noon was the heat of the day. Noon was a time to be inside resting. The community of women would come first thing or when it was cooler. This woman came because she did not want to be seen. For shame and cultural propriety. 5 times married. Jesus went out of his way to ignore the religious and cultural barriers to offer her living water. The woman was probably confused at first and may have even thought Jesus was looking for a date. A well was a common place to meet people. Don’t forget Jacob himself found his wife at this very well. And when Jesus asked about her husband, and she said, ‘I have no husband,’ she may have been giving him an invitation. But that was not Jesus intent. He broke all rules of the religiously correct to reach into this woman’s world and heal her. His intent was to change her life—to bring her freedom.
Jacob’s well was an important place. It was the well that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. It represented the calling of Israel for Jacob’s name was changed to Israel. It was a tie to holy and ancient past. It was a well that had been there as a reminder of God’s care for his people. It was almost like a shrine of God’s pouring out of the waters of his blessing. What does Jesus offer immediately to this woman? Living water, water that when you drink it, you never thirst again.
A few reflections. First, where is Samaria to you? What part of the world, the country, what part of the city? Why is that place or that people off limits to you?
In a meeting the other day I was reminded of an acronym saying that works well in our neighborhood: NIMBY
What is NIMBY?
Not in my backyard!
Often we know where ‘Samaria’ is not so much by where we would or wouldn’t go, but what we want around us. Or do not want around us. Some NIMBY’s are valid but many just reveal the sinfulness of our hearts.
Little Italy or China town or mini Juarez are a nice place to visit, but when the neighborhood becomes 12% or more of a certain kind of people then, well it’s time to move on.
Lent is a great time to visit your own Samaria’s and NIMBY’s and then ask yourself what the Lord would do with your NIMBY. He went far to search for this woman. He leaves the 99 to find the one lost sheep—what about you? Remember your baptismal vows:
Will you proclaim by word and example the Good
News of God in Christ?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving
your neighbor as yourself?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you strive for justice and peace among all
people, and respect the dignity of every human
being?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you do these things? I think the baptismal vows are more important than our HOA rules don’t you?
Where is Samaria for you? Your NIMBY?
Second, what is your version of living water?
Look at the wonderful contrast between Nicodemus and this Samaritan woman. Though neither of them wanted to be seen, Nicodemus comes at night and the woman by day. This is a contrast that John wishes to underscore.
Also, both throw some distracting theological questions Jesus’ way, but one walks away confused and the other walks away changed. One does not drink the living water (yet) and the other leaves behind the earthly water for the heavenly. ‘Come and see the one who told me everything I have ever done.’ Paraphrase, come and see the one who knows everything about me, but loves me anyway!
It is instructive that the educated theologian walks away scratching his head and the Samaritan sinner walks away with perfect clarity.
The broken understand their brokenness the satisfied do not.
What for you is living water? Is it Christ or is it something else?
Entertainment? Comfort? Retirement? Money?
Are you your own living water?
A self-help book from the 1980s says it well. What You Think of Me is None of My Business.
We took that title seriously didn’t we?
You remember Whitney Houston’s song The Greatest Love of All? You know what the greatest love of all is? ‘Learning to love yourself, it is the greatest love of all.’
We shouldn’t feel bad about ourselves of course, but a couple of decades of ‘me,’ shows us the fruit of our thinking.
Interestingly, the woman at the well repents simply by walking away from her lifestyle and towards Jesus. She doesn’t call herself a ‘worm’ or call attention to her grief over her sin. She simply walks in a different direction.
She knows her own brokenness and chooses to walk towards Jesus. This is repentance. It takes the realization that we are sinners but it really isn’t that complicated. Just walk in the direction of Christ. And away from our own selfishness.
A reflection from Fr. Albert Holz is instructive. His book is on his pilgrimage around the holy sites of Europe. He writes of a church in Toledo Spain that is interesting. It is the monastery church San Juan de los Reyes. This part of Spain was under Turkish rule for 360 years. Toledo was one site where Christians were sold into slavery. In the plaza around the church, ‘High up on an outside wall, hanging in neat rows…are ankle chains taken off Christian slaves freed from the [Turks] by the victorious Spaniards in 1492. I stare at these grisly reminders of slavery, and try to hear the story they tell of slaves being set free from captivity and returning joyfully to their homes and families. It strikes me that the side of a church is a perfect place to display the broken chains of Christians who were once held captive. Our God is, after all, in the business of breaking chains. We believe that the Word became flesh, suffered, died, and rose again to free us from the chains of sin and death.’
The Samaritan woman was set free. Do you need to be set free?
Posted on October 12th, 2010 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
‘The workshop where we are to toil faithfully at all these tasks is the enclosure of the monastery and stability of the community.’—Rule of Benedict 4:78.
‘[A monk] should not annoy his brothers. If any brother happens to make an unreasonable demand of him, he should not reject him with disdain and cause him distress, but reasonably and humbly deny the improper request.’—Rule of Benedict 31:1-7
‘If you have a disagreement with someone, make peace with them before the sun goes down.’—Rule 4:70-74.
This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: “Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.” (Jeremiah 29:4-7)
“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry.” (Ephesians 4:26)
“The true city, the holy one, allows us, in the words of Paul Philibert, an alternative ‘vision of human relationships where beauty is more desirable than financial profit, friendship more precious than advantage, and solidarity in a common vision of human dignity more compelling than self-fulfillment.’”—Kathleen Norris.
“I have abandoned my life in the town as the occasion of endless troubles, but I have not managed to get rid of myself.”—St. Basil the Great.
‘There comes a day when this job, this home, this town, this family all seem irritating and deficient beyond the bearable. There comes a period in life when I regret every major decision I’ve ever made. That is precisely the time when the spirituality of stability offers its greatest gifts.’ –Joan Chittister.
Why are at your current job? Why are you at your current church? Why are you in relationship with the people you are in relationship with?
What ‘rule’ (or rules) undergirds your job, church, and relationships?
What do we have to lose when we do not ‘stick it out?’
Posted on September 3rd, 2010 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
Listen carefully, my son, to the master’s instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart. This is advice from a father who loves you; welcome it, and faithfully put it into practice. The labor of obedience will bring you back to him from whom you had drifted through the sloth of disobedience…Let us open our eyes to the light that comes from God, and our ears to the voice from heaven that every day calls out…(Rule of Benedict, Prologue)
“Into the midst of all this indistinguishable cacophony of life, the bell tower of every Benedictine monastery rings ‘listen.’ Listen with the heart of Christ. Listen with the lover’s ear. Listen for the voice of God. Listen in your own heart for the sound of truth, the kind that comes when a piece of quality crystal is struck by a medal rod…[Modern life] does not prepare us for the slow and tedious task of listening and learning, over and over, day after day, until we can finally hear the people we love and love the people we’ve learned to dislike and grow to understand how holiness is here and now for us” (Joan Chittister, Wisdom Distilled, 23, 26).
Listening (intently) and Obedience go hand in hand. See what factors this week cause you to be distracted and inattentive to God’s voice, your friend’s and family’s voices, and your own desire for Christ’s presence.
Make note of these distractions then ask the tough question, ‘why am I distracted by this?’ Reflect also on times when you most attentive to God and to others. How can you integrate those times into everyday life?
Posted on September 1st, 2010 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
France has mandated by law the Muslim Burqa offensive to French culture. It is now illegal for a woman to don the traditional Muslim dress in France. If they are caught they must pay a fine and take a ‘cultural awareness’ class. We all know the uproar over the Mosque and cultural center being planned two blocks from Ground Zero in New York.
Beyond Western sensibilities and patriotism, it is interesting to hear arguments against Muslim practice based on either so-called American Christian culture or so-called American Christian beliefs. Islam is not Christian. I am not Muslim. In discussion with Muslim friends we have sharp disagreements over truth and, mostly, over the identity of Jesus.
However, Burqas and Mosques are a good thing for Christians. For one, in a radically secular culture that values universal human rights and pluralism above anything else, religious freedom for one will ensure religious liberty for the other. But the key issue is one of visible, and audible piety. Should we be offended when a Muslim hears the call of prayer on our soil and prays five times per day? Should we be intimidated by women in black burqas? Certainly not on the basis of Western democracy.
What burqas and Mosques should do for the Christian is to provide a deep challenge and a sense of shame that we have a faith that few actually follow. Would a Christian risk occupation to pray at the set hours of the day (ancient Christians prayed seven times per day)? No, ‘we can pray anytime’ is the usual argument we hear.
The Adhan is not offensive, only a reminder that Muslims pray and American Christians use excuses not to. The burqa is not offensive because it is a reminder that Christians have little visible presence in our culture, save scandals and politics.
Receive the challenge of Islam. And pray. And be salt and light.
Posted on August 6th, 2010 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
The vice of personal ownership must by all means be cut out in the monastery by the very root…let no one all or take to himself anything as his own (cf. Acts 4:32). Rule of Benedict Ch. XXXIII
We have been brainwashed to believe that bigger houses…more luxurious gadgets, are worthy goals in life. As a result, we are caught in an absurd, materialistic spiral. The more we make, the more we think we need in order to live decently and respectably. Somehow we have to break this cycle because it makes us sin against our needy brothers and sisters and, therefore, against our Lord. And it destroys us. Sharing with others is the way to real joy. Ron Sider, Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger.
…the rich man…who held his things lightly and who did not let them nestle in his heart, who was a channel and not a cistern, who was ever and always forsaking his money—this rich man starts (in heaven) side by side with the man who accepted, not hated, his poverty. Each will say, “I am free.” George MacDonald.
(From Benedict’s Way, Lonni Collins Pratt and Fr. Daniel Homan, O.S.B, pg 98-99.)
St. Francis of Assisi said, “If we had any possessions we should need weapons and laws to defend them.”. Also, Francis reasoned, “what could you do to a man who owns nothing? You can’t starve a fasting man, you can’t steal from someone who has no money, you can’t ruin someone who hates prestige. They are truly free.”
Benedictine harmony and Benedictine balance demand a simpler approach to life, not for the sake of false asceticism but for the sake of human freedom. The gods we have made for ourselves take so much more adoration time than any human being has to give. Joan Chittister, O.S.B.
Jesus said to his disciples, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Luke 12:32-33.
“Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.” Luke 12:27.
Part of dealing with how possessions effect our lives, is to be aware of how we spend and what certain material things mean to us. Do we buy things to fill a need? To keep us company? To help us avoid our own brokenness? Do we buy for status?
Posted on March 12th, 2010 by fatherneo.
Categories: Uncategorized.
There was nothing perfect about Thomas Merton. He is a man with flaws and misgivings. The center of his life though, I believe, was his passionate relationship with Jesus. It was Christ that called him in his rebellious times, it was Christ that made him a monk and priest, it was Christ that gave him the skill and wisdom to write and it was Christ who forgave him when he fell. I believe it was his confidence in the orthodox faith that allowed him to get close to some in the religious East. It was Jesus who gave him the restlessness of another country, a restlessness that never left him. Two final reflections, first, it was his Christ-centeredness that made his visits to Asia important and second, it was Jesus who undergirded his desire for compassion and justice.First, Christ brought Merton to Asia. Merton writes, “I may be interested in Oriental religions, etc, but there can be no obscuring the essential difference—this personal communion with Christ at the center and heart of reality as a source of grace and life.”[1] Merton saw the way the West had struck militarily against the East and how that had damaged and broken the world. He saw in himself the opportunity to be Christ to them. He did not proselytize, but in his silence he was able to have an impact. A nun in China asked why the Catholics were not evangelizing more in their context and Merton replied, “What we are asked to do at present is not so much to speak of Christ as to let him live in us so that people may find him by feeling how he lives in us.”[2]For Merton there was no agenda, no approach, no strategy to convince Buddhists and Hindus of the truth of Christianity; only an appreciation of them and what they had to offer the world. He saw the West lacking what they possessed. He writes, “We need the religious genius of Asia and Asian culture to inject a fresh dimension of depth into our aimless thrashing about. I would almost say an element of heart, of bhakti, of love.”[3] This was not a capitulation to Eastern religions but an acknowledgment of beauty and truth wherever it may be found. Merton may have gone further than many Christians would be comfortable but in the end the Dali Lama said of Merton, “Whenever someone speaks to me about Jesus Christ, I think of Thomas Merton.”[4] As an important aside, Merton felt even more passionate about unity with the Christian East, who though divided from Catholics and Protestants, still share the same faith. Merton’s beautiful quote is one I hope to emulate in my own life. He writes, “If I can unite in myself the thought and the devotion of Eastern and Western Christendom, the Greek and the Latin Fathers, the Russian with the Spanish mystics, I can prepare in myself the reunion of divided Christians. From that secret and unspoken unity in myself can eventually come a visible and manifest unity of all Christians…We must contain all the divided worlds in ourselves and transcend them in Christ.”[5] Lastly, it was Jesus who brought Merton to a place of non-violence and a longing for justice in his own heart. Merton spent time in a Catholic community in Harlem and also met and corresponded with Dorothy Day. He saw the need for peace internationally but also in race-divided America. Vatican II was happening towards the end of Merton’s life and with it theological and liturgical reform, not all of which Merton thought was a good thing. The validity of monasticism itself was in question. He sought to bring healing in the world, not through innovation but through a ‘living tradition’ and through the peaceful presence of Jesus himself.In fact, he disdained much of the liberal theology that had become avant garde. He was attacked verbally by some ‘progressed Catholics’ on a number of occasions. He says of some of the liberal theologians, “there is no uglier species on the face of the earth…mean, frivolous, ungainly, inarticulate, venomous, and bursting at the seams with progress into the secular cities and…subways. The [conservative Cardinals] are bad, but these are infinitely worse. You wait and see.”[6] For Merton, peace came through a mining of tradition, not an abandoning of it. Monastic Christianity and orthodox Christianity, as he saw it, was the eschatological witness the world needed. He writes, “The monastery is not an ‘escape’ from the world. On the contrary, by being in the monastery I take my true part in all the struggles and sufferings of the world.”[7] He would say not to run from tradition in seeking peace and justice, but “go further with the examination of tradition”[8] to seek change. Merton’s life was a Christ-centered life. “Christ is the principle and end of absolutely everything that a Trappist does, right down to breathing.” Jesus drew him to do what he did and to be what he was. From the time he was drawn to the Icons in Rome even in his rebellious times to the time he drew his last breath, Christ was his companion on the way. To conclude, I close with the words of Jim Forest, “Perhaps part of what draws so many of us to Merton is how this astonishingly gifted writer opens a door to a deeper spiritual life without pretending he is far ahead of us on the ladder to heaven. We recognize in him someone whose struggles with various demons (success, fame, sensual pleasures, the quest for greener pastures) are not hugely different from our own…Like us, he was a product of the modern world with all its attraction and distractions. But in the end, by an amazing working of grace, he was able to maintain is search for true wisdom. He attracts us because he is more than a gifted theologian and brilliant writer. He is a brother in Christ who was—and through his writing still is—able to show us the way.”[9]
[1]Jim Forest, Living with Wisdom, 215.
[2] Ibid., 240.
[3] Ibid., 230.
[4] Ibid., 243.
[5] Ibid., 129.
[6] Ibid., 206.
[7] Ibid., 133.
[8] Ibid., 223.
[9] Ibid., 245.