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McIntosh 1
 Michael D. McIntosh
 Reflection on Thomas Merton
The mystics have always been a tad bit over the edge in mysticism for me. Their phrasesand their terminology, and their disciplines have always been too strange, separate and even tooholy for me be interested. I never doubted that we share the same faith: I just doubted that welived on the same earth. So when I was asked to read one of their works, I wanted the one I couldbest relate to; the one closest to my own spirituality. From our surface reading of other mystics Icame to the conclusion that the women mystics were too cloudy in their writings for me to sink into, and the men were too dated; so I concluded with a contemporary male writer: ThomasMerton. The name was slightly familiar; I think I remembered reading some of his reflectivepieces a few semesters back. Choosing the book was a breeze compared to choosing the author; Iwanted the biggest, baddest book he had out. Which of course is his master piece:
 No man is an Island.
If I had to swim in the foreign waters of the mystics, then I was determined to dive in,head first, eyes open: it was all or nothing. I heard he was a big shot in his era, and that wasenough for the decision. There were however, certain fears that I was somewhat concernedabout. For starters, his writing is a very difficult read, he does not do much explaining, and he isnot concerned about the validity of his points either. I had a hunch of these cautions, butcertainly I did not know they were so precise until I began my reading. Thankfully, with a littletime and patience, the reading began to get much smoother and less lofty. It was as though I
 
McIntosh 2
 became less of Merton’s disciple, and more like a friend to him as th
e book moved along.In my search for some history of Merton I stumbled across an old print of 
The SevenStory Mountain
: his autobiography. It was certainly much too large of a book for me to have readbefore this writing, but surely every paragraph I skimmed across was a sheer delight. Merton was
 born in Prades France. Or as he writes it: “On the last day of January 1915, under the sign of the
Water Bearer, in a year of a great war, and down in the shadow of some French mountains on theborders of Spain,
I came into the world” (Merton 3). Unlike us children born in the late 20
th
andearly 21
st
century, Merton was a kind of war child. His life began in the midst of a great war, and
his life ended not to long after the close of a greater war. Merton’s
lifespan witnessed World War1, and World War ll. His generation was a violent one, and his world was a hostile one. It is not
surprising that “he had left the world with a slam of the door to become a monk” (Forest 47).
From his writing it can be easily noticed that Tom was a keenly reflective man; always lookingabove himself, and always looking within himself. He was a contemplative man. Yet his worldwas a hollow reality.Though the book 
 No Man Is An Island 
is a topical book, there are however many aspects
of Merton’s spirituality reveled through it. As a whole there is an overarching thesis, and within
that arch there are many others which eventually lead to the same major stream of thought. ForMerton there is always an emphasis on the confrontation of truth. This can range from facing the
true image of one’s self, or the true face of one’s motive, or the true face of “Truth” himself. He
is continually calling his readers, and hearers to confront that which is true. One of the first truthsthat he confronts is the truth of paradox. Somehow within our western thought we have come to
 
McIntosh 3embrace an ideological form of truth that is only one-sided. We have even come to believe that if it is really true then it must therefore be one-sided, and anything other than that is self-contradictory, or a lie. However, this is not the mental or spiritual structure of Merton. One of hischief aims within his spiritual character is to embrace all sides of truth, even when it surpasseshis understanding to comprehend it. He is willing to let go of rationale, in order to stay faithful toacknowledging both sides of the same truth. When discussing the difficult aspects of salvation,
Merton writes: “The only effective answer to the problem of salvation must therefore reach out
to embrace both extremes of a contradiction at the same time. Hence that answer must besupernatural. That is why all the answers that are not supernatural are imperfect: for they onlyembrace one of the contradictory terms, and they can always be denied by th
e other” (Merton
xvii) Later on in the book Merton expresses how he believes that there are certain powers thatcan unify such seemingly opposing ideas, these unifiers are powers such as: love, joy, and even
hope. “The mystery of free will and grace, of pr 
edestination and co-operation with God isresolved in hope which effectively co-
ordinates the two in their right relation to one another”
(Merton 22). This idea of reaching out to both extremes is certainly one of the dominant mysticalpractices of Merton. This acceptance of two truths that are seemingly contradictory transcendsunderstanding and therefore must enter into the realm of the mystical.
Like all other mystics, Merton’s places strong emphasis on the union between man and
God, believing that this
is the highest pinnacle of man’s existence both in this life, and the life tocome. “True happiness is not found in any other reward than that of being united with God”
(Merton 54). God for Merton is the chief end to all things, and all things should be done with that
end in mind. This being so, Merton’s greatest happiness is in the union with God. “If I seek some
of 00

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