Thomas Merton: Contemplative Prayer

Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton, lived a contemplative life for 25 years as a Trappist monk at the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky. Merton wrote prolifically, particularly on contemplative prayer. He describes contemplation as "seeking God. It should be clear that this seeking is unlike any other that we undertake.

We may seek for something we have lost or we may seek to meet a person we have never met before. Seeking in such context always means the quest for something that is not present. Clearly, this is not the meaning of seeking God, for God is everywhere. God is present to and in and for everything that exists. In fact, all else exists only because it receives its existence from God and is sustained ins existence by God.  

Contemplation, therefore, is becoming aware of something that already is: our oneness with God at the deepest level of our being. Merton is fond of using the term "awareness" to describe this experience. "Contemplation is the highest expression of man's intellectual and spiritual life. It is that life itself fully awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive...It is gratitude for life, for awareness and for being."

"Contemplation" pg 81, 83 in "The Thomas Merton Enclyclopedia" by Shannon, Bochen and O'Connell (Orbis Books, 2002)

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Posted by Debra Classen at 1/21/2009 3:17 PM
Categories: Contemplative Prayer
 

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