While doing some reading for a colloquium I attend, I had the occasion to read a quotation from Thomas Merton. Of course, he is my favorite monk. Most of all, he is my favorite because he is a man of my own time and culture. He was older than I am, but had he not died in a tragic accident in 1968, he still could be living. And I know some people who knew him, so that always makes it feel like you knew him, too.
The article I was reading was talking about Merton’s move out of his monastery in Kentucky to a little hermitage. A hermitage is a small place (his was two rooms). It was only a half-mile or so from the monastery. But it was his alone. It put him out on his own.
In the hermitage he would still continue to live as a monk. His quest was still to seek and soak in God’s Presence. But he would do it without community---without that corporate support system. I must admit, I can feel the lure of that and I can experience the terror it must incite.
Then I came to these words which the article quotes, but which I know come from Merton’s journal. Merton says, “I am beginning to feel the lightness, the strangeness, the desertedness of being really alone. It was far different when the ties had not been cut…Now that everything is here, the work of loneliness really begins, and I feel it.” Those words arrest me.
Merton is talking about moving down the lane only a half-mile. But literally, he is moving to a new world. He is moving from community---in his days perhaps 200 or more men---to a hut all his own. He could, and usually daily did, walk that half-mile to participate in some worship. But he was alone.
I am fascinated by his descriptions of being alone. He tells us he feels its lightness. There is no doubt that he found living in the monastic community quite “heavy” at times. Most of us probably feel the same way in our own families, circles at work, or in our common residencies if we are already in a retirement complex.
He felt the strangeness of moving into his hermitage. I can well imagine that. And most powerfully, he felt the desertedness of being really alone. Somehow that word, desertedness, is a super-loaded word. I can’t imagine too many of us saying, “sure, I would like to be deserted!” There are times I want to be left alone, but I don’t want to be deserted.
But that is precisely what the hermit intends. He or she intends to leave society as we know it and “go it alone.” The hermit’s quest---his or her bet---is that going it alone really is a gamble that God exists, that God can be known, and that God’s living Presence can be discovered and be the source of delight.
And then comes that poignant phrase which gets me: “the work of loneliness really begins.” I know I have dabbled in that work of loneliness. I have toyed with it for short periods of times. It is not the same thing as being sick, when I actually want to be alone.
That work of physical and spiritual loneliness is choosing to put yourself in the context where you say to God, “ok, it is just you and me. And I have no guarantee that you are there, that you care, that you will come to be part of my life in such a way that I will be alone, but not lonely.” That is the risk---the hermit’s risk.
I can breathe easy because I have no plans to be a hermit. But that does not get me off the spiritual hook. Actually, I am convinced we all have the work of loneliness to do. I can put it off; I can avoid it---temporarily. But ultimately, I have to do the work of loneliness.
The work of loneliness is the spiritual quest. It is the work of finding myself in the Divine Self. If Merton can do it, I can do it, too. Let the work begin.
The article I was reading was talking about Merton’s move out of his monastery in Kentucky to a little hermitage. A hermitage is a small place (his was two rooms). It was only a half-mile or so from the monastery. But it was his alone. It put him out on his own.
In the hermitage he would still continue to live as a monk. His quest was still to seek and soak in God’s Presence. But he would do it without community---without that corporate support system. I must admit, I can feel the lure of that and I can experience the terror it must incite.
Then I came to these words which the article quotes, but which I know come from Merton’s journal. Merton says, “I am beginning to feel the lightness, the strangeness, the desertedness of being really alone. It was far different when the ties had not been cut…Now that everything is here, the work of loneliness really begins, and I feel it.” Those words arrest me.
Merton is talking about moving down the lane only a half-mile. But literally, he is moving to a new world. He is moving from community---in his days perhaps 200 or more men---to a hut all his own. He could, and usually daily did, walk that half-mile to participate in some worship. But he was alone.
I am fascinated by his descriptions of being alone. He tells us he feels its lightness. There is no doubt that he found living in the monastic community quite “heavy” at times. Most of us probably feel the same way in our own families, circles at work, or in our common residencies if we are already in a retirement complex.
He felt the strangeness of moving into his hermitage. I can well imagine that. And most powerfully, he felt the desertedness of being really alone. Somehow that word, desertedness, is a super-loaded word. I can’t imagine too many of us saying, “sure, I would like to be deserted!” There are times I want to be left alone, but I don’t want to be deserted.
But that is precisely what the hermit intends. He or she intends to leave society as we know it and “go it alone.” The hermit’s quest---his or her bet---is that going it alone really is a gamble that God exists, that God can be known, and that God’s living Presence can be discovered and be the source of delight.
And then comes that poignant phrase which gets me: “the work of loneliness really begins.” I know I have dabbled in that work of loneliness. I have toyed with it for short periods of times. It is not the same thing as being sick, when I actually want to be alone.
That work of physical and spiritual loneliness is choosing to put yourself in the context where you say to God, “ok, it is just you and me. And I have no guarantee that you are there, that you care, that you will come to be part of my life in such a way that I will be alone, but not lonely.” That is the risk---the hermit’s risk.
I can breathe easy because I have no plans to be a hermit. But that does not get me off the spiritual hook. Actually, I am convinced we all have the work of loneliness to do. I can put it off; I can avoid it---temporarily. But ultimately, I have to do the work of loneliness.
The work of loneliness is the spiritual quest. It is the work of finding myself in the Divine Self. If Merton can do it, I can do it, too. Let the work begin.
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