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To be truly Catholic is not merely to be correct according to an abstractly universal standard of truth, but also and above all to be able to enter into the problems and the joys of all, to understand all, to be all things to all.

Thomas Merton

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Thomas Merton
Age: 53 †
Born: 1915
Born: January 15
Died: 1968
Died: December 10
Autobiographer
Catholic Priest
Essayist
Journalist
Peace Activist
Poet
Theologian
Trappist Cistercian Monk
Writer
Thomas Feverel Merton
Father Louis
Joy
Enter
Understand
According
Truth
Catholic
Also
Merely
Problem
Standards
Abstractly
Able
Universal
Joys
Things
Truly
Standard
Problems
Correct

More quotes by Thomas Merton

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Love is...like a spring coming up out of the ground of our own depths. I am gift. All that I am is something that's given, and given freely. Being doesn't cost anything. There's no price tag, no strings attached.
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If a man is to live, he must be all alive, body, soul, mind, heart, spirit.
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A life that is without problems may literally be more hopeless, than one that always verges on despair.
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Do not be one of those who, rather than risk failure, never attempts anything.
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To be grateful is to recognize the love of God in everything.
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The meaning of life is found in openness to being and being present in full awareness.
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The problem today is that there are no deserts, only dude ranches.
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Contemplation is not and cannot be a function of this external self. There is an irreducible opposition between the deep transcendent self that awakens only in contemplation, and the superficial, external self which we commonly identify with the first person singular.
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The only true liberty is in the service of that which is beyond all limits, beyond all definitions, beyond all human appreciation: that which is All, and which therefore is no limited or individual thing: The All is no-thing, for if it were to be a single thing separated from all other things, it would not be All.
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The purpose of our lives is to find the purpose of our lives.
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What do I mean by loving ourselves properly? I mean first of all, desiring to live, accepting life as a very great gift and a great good, not because of what it gives us, but because of what it enables us to give to others.
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May we all grow in grace and peace and not neglect the silence that is printed in the center of our being. It will not fail us.
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While some men see ordinary happenings, others see divine light and guidance.
Thomas Merton
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We are not converted only once in our lives but many times and this endless series of conversions and inner revolutions leads to our transformation.
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Cupidity...takes created things for ends in themselves, which they are not. The will that seeks rest in creatures for their own sake stops on the way to its true end, terminates in a value which does not exist, and thus frustrates all its deepest capacities for happiness and peace.
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Show us your Christ, Lady, after this our exile, yes: but show Him to us also now, show Him to us here, while we are still wanderers.
Thomas Merton
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Zen insight is not our awareness, but Being's awareness of itself in us.
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The geographical pilgrimage is the symbolic acting out an inner journey. The inner journey is the interpolation of the meanings and signs of the outer pilgrimage. One can have one without the other. It is best to have both.
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Love is our true destiny.
Thomas Merton
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Actions are the doors and windows of being. Unless we act, we have no way of knowing what we are.
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