Merton starts entertaining the notion of becoming a priest . . .
I went to Father Moore after the sermon on hell and said that I hoped he was going to baptize me really soon. He laughed, and said that it would not be much longer. By now, it was the beginning of November.
Meanwhile, there had been another thought, half forming itself in the back of my mind—an obscure desire to become a priest. This was something which I tended to hold separate from the thought of my conversion, and I was doing my best to keep it in the background. I did not mention it either to Father Ford or Father Moore, for the chief reason that in my mind it constituted a kind of admission that I was taking the thought more seriously than I wanted to—it almost amounted to a first step towards application for admission to a seminary.
However, it is a strange thing: there was also in my mind a kind of half-formed conviction that there was one other person I should consult about becoming a priest before I took the matter to the rectory. This man was a layman, and someone I had never yet seen, and it was altogether strange that I should be inclined so spontaneously to put the matter up to him, as if he were the only logical one to give me advice. In the end, he was the one I first consulted—I mean, the one from whom I first seriously asked advice, for I had long been talking about it to my friends, before I came around to him.
This man was Daniel Walsh, about whom I had heard a great deal from Lax and Gerdy. Gerdy had taken his course on St. Thomas Aquinas in the graduate school of Philosophy: and now as the new school year began, my attention centered upon this one course. It had nothing directly to do with my preparation for the exams for the M.A. degree in January. By now degrees and everything else to do with a university career had become very unimportant in comparison with the one big thing that occupied my mind and all my desires.
I registered for the course, and Dan Walsh turned out to be another one of those destined in a providential way to shape and direct my vocation. For it was he who pointed out my way to the place where I now am.
When I was writing about Columbia and its professors, I was not thinking of Dan Walsh: and he really did not belong to Columbia at all. He was on the faculty of the Sacred Heart College at Manhattanville, and came to Columbia twice a week to lecture on St. Thomas and Duns Scotus. His class was a small one and was, as far as Columbia was concerned, pretty much of an academic bypath. And that was in a sense an additional recommendation—it was off that broad and noisy highway of pragmatism which leads between its banks of artificial flowers to the gates of despair.
Walsh himself had nothing of the supercilious self-assurance of the ordinary professor: he did not need this frail and artificial armor for his own insufficiency. He did not need to hide behind tricks and vanities any more than Mark Van Doren did; he never even needed to be brilliant. In his smiling simplicity he used to efface himself entirely in the solid and powerful mind of St. Thomas. Whatever brilliance he allowed himself to show forth in his lectures was all thrown back upon its source, the Angel of the Schools.
Dan Walsh had been a student and collaborator of Gilson’s and knew Gilson and Maritain well. In fact, later on he introduced me to Maritain at the Catholic Book Club, where this most saintly philosopher had been giving a talk on Catholic Action. I only spoke a few conventional words to Maritain, but the impression you got from this gentle, stooping Frenchman with much grey hair, was one of tremendous kindness and simplicity and godliness. And that was enough: you did not need to talk to him. I came away feeling very comforted that there was such a person in the world, and confident that he would include me in some way in his prayers.
But Dan himself had caught a tremendous amount of this simplicity and gentleness and godliness too: and perhaps the impression that he made was all the more forceful because his square jaw had a kind of potential toughness about it. Yet no: there he sat, this little, stocky man, who had something of the appearance of a good-natured prize fighter, smiling and talking with the most childlike delight and cherubic simplicity about the Summa Theologica.
His voice was low and, as he spoke, he half apologetically searched the faces of his hearers for signs of understanding and, when he found it, he seemed surprised and delighted.
Merton is contemplating two life-changing decisions. First, he wants to convert to Catholicism. Being a cradle Catholic myself, I didn't have to wrestle with this decision. My parents made it for me. I was baptized by Bishop Joseph Breitenbeck of Detroit. According to my mother, because I was baptized by a bishop< I was supposed to become a priest myself. Instead, I became a blogger saint.
Second, somewhere in the back of his mind, Merton feels the nudge to become a priest. It's not something that he's fully admitted to anybody. Yet. He writes that ". . . in my mind it constituted a kind of admission that I was taking the thought more seriously than I wanted to . . ." Words, spoken concretely, make an idea or notion tangible. Once uttered with breath and vibrating vocal cords, a thought becomes real.
This second day of 2021, I have set no goals for myself. Given voice to no resolutions. I don't believe in making life-changing decisions at the stroke of midnight on December 31st. That act has failure written all over it. Certainly, I have notions of things I would like to accomplish. Poems to write. Manuscripts to polish and send to potential publishers. Programs to organize for the library. Nothing, however, that I want to discuss in this post. Because, 365 days from now, I don't want to face a laundry list of disappointments.
Having goals is important. Almost as important as having dreams. The word "goals" implies something within reach. A goal is something like, "I'm planning to drink less alcohol" or "I plan to send out poems to publishers." Both of those are attainable. Drinking one less glass of wine at dinner is possible (unless you're an alcoholic, and then you will probably need the help of a 12-step program). Submitting poems to literary magazines for consideration is also possible (unless you aren't a poet).
The word "dreams" implies fairy tale. Something beyond the scope of reality. I dream of winning a multi-million-dollar lottery jackpot. Writing a Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry collection, a bestselling novel that's adapted into an Academy Award-winning film. Getting a full-time professorship at the university. Being named Poet Laureate of the United States. All circumstances over which I have little-to-no power.
Both "goals" and "dreams," however, have something in common: hope. Some people think hope is a useless emotion, giving a person the belief that the impossible is possible. I hope that the United States will institute universal healthcare. That a cure for cancer will be found in the next month. COVID-19 will vanish from the face of the planet. Donald Trump and his family will end up in prison by February. Hope.
I think hope is a necessary part of life. A primary motivator. Getting me out of bed in the morning. Behind the wheel of my car, driving to work. Writing in my journal. Typing up blog posts. These are all acts of hope, predicated on the possibility of something good happening. A good breakfast. Good interaction with coworkers. Good new poem. Good ideas launched into the world.
So, that is what I give voice to this evening. Goals. Dreams. Small and large. Attainable. Unattainable. Realistic. Fantastic. That is what the opening days of any new year are all about.
Saint Marty went for a walk this morning with his puppy. Everything was covered with a cold white rime. Trees. Cars. Houses. Ponds. It made everything seem clean and new. The world erased of errors and ugliness. Blinding hope all around.
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