Thoughts in Solitude
November 08, 2008, 13:42
Things to do:
Watch the German Film Festival
13.11. Cherry Blossoms Hanami 11.20pm
15.11. The Wave 11.20pm
16.11. Rabbit Without Ears 9.15pm
Dinner with Fai/Sarah/Shaun/Hana at Nasi Padang Place on Thursday, 13 Nov 08
Dinner with Joel/Pam/Hana at Baba King on Sun, 16 Nov 08
From Thomas Merton's New Seeds of Contemplation
"contemplative prayer is a deep and simplified spiritual activity in which the mind and will rest in a unified and simple concentration upon God, turned to Him, intent upon Him and absorbed in His own light, with a simple gaze which is perfect adoration because it silently tells God that we have left everything else and desire even to leave our own selves for His sake, and that He alone is important to us, He alone is our desire and our life, and nothing else can give us any joy" (p. 243). "Contemplation is the highest expression of man's intellectual and spiritual life," he writes. "It is that life itself, fully awake, fully alive, fully aware that it is alive. It is spiritual wonder" (p. 1).
"every moment and every event of every man's life on earth plants something in his soul" (p. 14). Pale dogwood flowers, for instance, and little yellow flowers that nobody notices by the side of the road "are saints looking up into the face of God." "The leaf has its own texture and its own pattern of veins and its own holy shape" (p. 30). Working out our own salvation "demands close attention to reality at every moment, and great fidelity to God as He reveals Himself, obscurely, in the mystery of each new situation" (p. 32). "Our vocation is not simply to be, but to work together with God in the creation of our own life, our own identity, our own destiny" (p. 32).
"Do everything you can," he advises us, "to avoid the noise and the business of men. Keep as far away as you can from the places they gather to cheat and insult one another, to exploit one another, to laugh at one another, or to mock one another with their false gestures of friendship. Be glad if you can keep beyond the reach of their radios. Do not bother with their unearthly songs. Do not read their advertisements" (p. 84). "If you have to live in a city and work among machines and ride in subways and eat in a place where the radio makes you deaf with spurious news and where the food destroys your life and the sentiments of those around you poison your heart with boredom, do not be impatient, but accept it as the love of God and as a seed of solitude planted in your soul" (pp. 86-7).
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