Merton prepares for his Trappist retreat . . .
There were still about three weeks left until Easter. Thinking more and more about the Trappist monastery where I was going to spend Holy Week, I went to the library one day and took down the Catholic Encyclopaedia to read about the Trappists. I found out that the Trappists were Cistercians, and then, in looking up Cistercians, I also came across the Carthusians, and a great big picture of the hermitages of the Camaldolese.
What I saw on those pages pierced me to the heart like a knife.
What wonderful happiness there was, then, in the world! There were still men on this miserable, noisy, cruel earth, who tasted the marvelous joy of silence and solitude, who dwelt in forgotten mountain cells, in secluded monasteries, where the news and desires and appetites and conflicts of the world no longer reached them.
They were free from the burden of the flesh’s tyranny, and their clear vision, clean of the world’s smoke and of its bitter sting, were raised to heaven and penetrated into the deeps of heaven’s infinite and healing light.
They were poor, they had nothing, and therefore they were free and possessed everything, and everything they touched struck off something ofthe fire of divinity. And they worked with their hands, silently ploughing and harrowing the earth, and sowing seed in obscurity, and reaping their small harvests to feed themselves and the other poor. They built their own houses and made, with their own hands, their own furniture and their own coarse clothing, and everything around them was simple and primitive and poor, because they were the least and the last of men, they had made themselves outcasts, seeking, outside the walls of the world, Christ poor and rejected of men.
Above all, they had found Christ, and they knew the power and the sweetness and the depth and the infinity of His love, living and working in them. In Him, hidden in Him, they had become the “Poor Brothers of God.” And for His love, they had thrown away everything, and concealed themselves in the Secret of His Face. Yet because they had nothing, they were the richest men in the world, possessing everything: because in proportion as grace emptied their hearts of created desire, the Spirit of God entered in and filled the place that had been made for God. And the Poor Brothers of God, in their cells, they tasted within them the secret glory, the hidden manna, the infinite nourishment and strength of the Presence of God. They tasted the sweet exultancy of the fear of God, which is the first intimate touch of the reality of God, known and experienced on earth, the beginning of heaven. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of heaven. And all day long, God spoke to them: the clean voice of God, in His tremendous peacefulness, spending truth within them as simply and directly as water wells up in a spring. And grace was in them, suddenly, always in more and more abundance, they knew not from where, and the coming of this grace to them occupied them altogether, and filled them with love, and with freedom.
And grace, overflowing in all their acts and movements, made everything they did an act of love, glorifying God not by drama, not by gesture, not by outward show, but by the very simplicity and economy of utter perfection, so utter that it escapes notice entirely.
I want to believe that this kind of perfection is possible in the world. That it's possible to empty oneself of all worries and troubles that plague the human race, and pour grace into the empty vessels of our bodies. Out with the bad, in with the good. And Thomas Merton is painting a pretty idealized vision of the Trappist way of life, devoted completely to the glory of God.
I'm a little too jaded to buy completely Merton's Edenic portrait. Trappist monks are, above all, human beings. As such, they pretty much have the same struggles as each one of us. Granted, living in a cloistered monastery makes it a little easier to avoid the normal pitfalls of the world like lust or greed or envy. Yet, these impulses can't be entirely erased. Maybe they can be muffled a little. But they still exist.
Perfection does not exist because we live in a broken world where terrible things happen. I think that you can STRIVE to be perfect, and it's in the striving where grace can enter in. You have to make room in yourself for things like generosity and self-sacrifice, because they go against all of the normal selfish impulses that everyone feels. If you aren't able to wave that white flag, then grace will remain on the bench and never come up to bat. (Yes, I just used a sports metaphor. Don't judge me.)
It has been a long seven or eight days. I've been having a difficult time not focusing on my problems. Forget about emptying myself out to make room for grace. That's not going to happen. However, this is not going to be one of THOSE posts where I depress all my loyal disciples out there with some kind of poetic meditation on loss and anger and grief. I've been treading water in that pool for about a week now. (Yes, I just used another sports metaphor. Blame it on the fact that I'm watching the Tokyo Olympics as I'm writing this post.)
So, what is this post about then? It's about perseverance. Not giving up when every part of you--body, mind, and spirit--wants to pull the blanket over your head and never get out of bed again. As I said, I've been watching the Tokyo Olympics since they began last Friday, and I'm constantly inspired by the athletes. But not the ones with gold, silver, or bronze medals hanging around their necks. Nope. It's the athletes who come in dead last. Who know they have no chance of winning anything, but still persist. Finish the race. Or the game. Or the match. Who give it their all--against great odds, sometimes. The ones who are only battling themselves.
For me, those athletes are the true heroes of the Olympics. I grew up in a small town in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan where everyone lives and eats and breathes sports. The entire town convoys downstate when a team makes it to the finals. And they return home, honking their horns, escorted by firetrucks with sirens blaring, at one or two o'clock in the morning. I have never been a part of that scene, as a student or adult.
I think that's why I enjoy endurance sports. Marathons. Triathlons. In high school. the only sport I participated in was cross country. Never won a race. Never even came close to winning. It was just about finishing. Here's my favorite Olympic moment ever:
Gabriela Andersen-Schiess from Switzerland running the inaugural women's marathon in the 1984 Los Angeles summer Olympics. The day was brutally hot--90 degrees. Andersen-Schiess was in trouble. Suffering from dehydration. Stumbling into the stadium at the end of the race. She was dragging her legs, weaving along the track unsteadily. But she never gave up. When she finally crossed the finish line, she collapsed into the arms of the doctors waiting for her. She was carried off the track as the crowd gave her a standing ovation.
That is what I'm talking about. Perseverance. Getting out of bed. Facing an impossible day. Stumbling across that finish line despite everything that's against you. That's real courage. Real grace.
Saint Marty is running a marathon right now. He's not coming in gold or silver or bronze. He's just looking to finish.
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