Thomas Merton was truly a one-off character. Neither American, nor English or French, yet he was all and each. A man who could - and did - write as a worldy-wise penman at the forefront of New York literary elites. Yet, he became a Trappist monk. And, in doing so wrote a corpus of books which speak of the heart-worn soul of the century of world wars.
He speaks yet to us today, the inheritors of the bloody conflicts of the past 100+ years. This is his autobiography, but not that of the monk; it is his tale of the long battle to find God’s plan for his self -driven life; a tale of God and Merton struggling together to get hold of the steering wheel. And, as such, it speaks powerfully of our age of spiritual and societal decay which followed the wars of the oh-so-recently dead, our fathers and grandfathers.
I warmly recommend that you buy this, read it, shelve it, then, later, read it again. As I have done.
God bless.
erratum: Morton’s brother died in World War 2, an airman with the British Royal Air Force.
note: the quiet howling on this recording was due to the wild storm blowing outside.
