Catholic Info
Traditional Catholic Faith => The Sacred: Catholic Liturgy, Chant, Prayers => Topic started by: CharlesLouis on September 25, 2024, 02:57:12 PM
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The Thomas Merton Prayer (https://www.cingolani.com/MertonPrayer.html)
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Thomas Merton...?
Have you somehow found your way here but not looked around yet?
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The buddhist/catholic hybrid religion that Merton practiced isn't of any use to Traditional Catholics. It's not useful to anyone.
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Thomas Merton apostatized after Vatican 2. I would stay as far away as possible from anything he wrote.
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I live right by the Fr. Thomas Merton Center here in Louisville, Ky. I taught a couple of classes at Bellarmine, otherwise known as St. Robert Bellarmine College. Apparently the Merton Center has the letters that Merton was writing to the salacious nurse he was conversing with. It was well known that Merton would sneak out at night and put on his leather jacket and "let his hair down." Poor, poor Fr. Merton.
I taught a class at Bellarmine titled, "Controversial Views of American History." I ended with 9-11 - that got me canned!
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His death at only age 53 didn't happen the way that any Catholic would hope to leave this mortal life. In what may have been a freak accident, he was electrocuted by a fan while at a conference in Thailand in 1968. Interesting that he corresponded with Ernesto Cardenal, the Nicaraguan founder of liberation theology, who was also briefly was at the same monastary.
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Yes- Merton went new age and was supposedly was having affairs....
But- his first book, "Seven Storey Mountain ", (before he went "south") was one of the greats. I reccomend it.
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Yes- Merton went new age and was supposedly was having affairs....
But- his first book, "Seven Storey Mountain ", (before he went "south") was one of the greats. I reccomend it.
What is so great about it that you would recommend it?
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Pope Francis said:
"Merton was above all a man of prayer, a thinker who challenged the certitudes of his time and opened new horizons for souls and for the Church. He was also a man of dialogue, a promoter of peace between peoples and religions."
... words in an address before US Congress.
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What is so great about it that you would recommend it?
Well , it was his conversion story, and it was written quite well,with great style, almost like a novel.
He was a nihilistic young man , kind of an intellectual wanderer and it was beautiful to see the change in him, and to "witness" his life having grace and meaning. I read this book over 30 years ago so the details are sparse.
(I think I will read it again)
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Pope Francis said:
"Merton was above all a man of prayer, a thinker who challenged the certitudes of his time and opened new horizons for souls and for the Church. He was also a man of dialogue, a promoter of peace between peoples and religions."
... words in an address before US Congress.
What certitudes of his time, exactly, did Thomas Merton challenge? What new horizons did he open up for souls and the Church?
I very much doubt that it had anything to do with him speaking up for the traditional and timeless truths of the Catholic Church. Wasn't he an existentialist? Wasn't it all about spiritual "experiences" for him?