Dancing in the Water of Life

by Thomas Merton

  November 20, 1965

  Naomi Burton was here, brought a long New Yorker article by Ved Mehta on the God is dead theologians. I read it hurriedly in one sitting–a useful survey though I think he failed to see Tillich from the “inside,” so to speak. Learned from this article that Tillich died October 22. Naomi and I went over the long manuscript of Conjectures (the title Barth’s Dream is dropped), made changes, cut here and there. Rode down toward Rolling Rock River in her rented Monza, and beyond, in the high lands to the south–woods, long views on the top, along the bushy peneplain. We agreed that I should refuse to write prefaces as far as possible and not do anthologies. Had a good visit with her.

  Letters came from Dan Berrigan, Jim Forest, Dorothy Day. Good letters. I can see that in the trial they have gone through (death of Roger Laporte), there has been much purity of love. Dan is now being shipped out by superiors. A statement on draft card burning by Tom Cornell is lucid. However, I have to clarify my own position since people are identifying me with the card burners. While I respect their conscience, I don’t think this is the most valid or helpful kind of statement at the moment and I will have to give some idea where I stand. This in turn shows that there is a certain incompatibility between my solitary life and active involvement in a movement.

  November 21, 1965. Last Sunday after Pentecost

  Unfortunately there is not that peace on earth. And it is imprudent to argue with pacifists. Again–along with the same question of the telegrams and letters about the Peace Movement and my attempted resignation from the Catholic Peace Fellowship–a long, melodramatic, hectoring letter from [John] Heidbrink of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. The burden of it is that I am a bastard, a traitor, etc.–all couched in Christian language. Also that the dedicated life of those working actively in the world (like himself and Jim Forest) is vastly superior to the life of ease and evasion which I am living in a hermitage “quilted in mist”! The letter was somewhat incredible and in some ways quite funny. But its self-complacency irritated me, especially since that was what he was accusing me of!

  However, it was certainly a mistake to send that telegram. But a salutary one. I am learning from the experience. I am through with any playing with peace movements. It is no game. Remains to be seen what will work out with the Catholic Peace Fellowship. I suppose it is not important to me if they insist on keeping me (for my name). I don’t want to quarrel with them and Jim Forest at least is an excellent and competent person. I think they are doing good work–apart from card-burning which they do not “sponsor”–but Tom Cornell is nevertheless the next most important member of the Catholic Peace Fellowship.

  November 22, 1965

  One of the images in Heidbrink’s letter. Having portrayed my worthless evasion as hermit, he then dangles before me the man I “might become” if, turning from this utter waste, I would marshall all I have led into the cloister and lead them back into the world…back into his world of Bonhoefferish-Robinsonian concern, in which I would be welcomed and appointed a Scoutmaster. He speaks of being a “man for others” (the Robinson Term). His letter evidently manifests what this means to him. To be “for” me means for him to mind my business without understanding it, to propose to me his own fantasies, and get me to harmonize with his own rhetoric. It is the same empty Protestant fussiness that drove me out of Zion Church thirty years ago.

  November 27, 1965

  At midnight I woke up, and there was a great noise of wind and storm. Rain was rolling over the roof of the hermitage heavy as a freight train. The porch was covered with water and there was a lot of lightning. Now at dawn the sky is clean and all is cold again (yesterday warm). Yesterday I read some articles on psychedelics. There is a regular fury of drug-mysticism in this country. I am in a way appalled. Mysticism has finally arrived in a characteristic American mode. One feels that this is certainly it. The definitive turn in the road taken by American religion. The turn I myself will not take (don’t need to!). This leaves my own road a lot quieter and more untroubled I hope. Certainly the great thing as I see it now is to get out of all the traffic: peace movement traffic, political traffic, Church traffic, “consciousness-altering” traffic, Zen traffic, monastic reform traffic. All of it! Big peace protest in Washington (against Viet Nam war) today. I am fasting and praying for them, and offering no hosannas of my own.

  Rilke stayed at the Eden in Zurich, where we stayed, and he was dying in the Valois when we went through Switzerland in the summer of 1926. “We are members of a world which, producing movement upon movement, force upon force, seems to be plunging irresistibly into a less and less visible state, and we are dependent on that superior visibility of the past if we want to present an image of the muted splendor that still surrounds us.” Rilke. Remarkably true. Note the invisibility of so many American cities–whole sections of Louisville are zero.

  November 29, 1965

  This morning I really opened the door of the Duino Elegies and walked in (previously I have only peeked in through the windows and read fragments here and there). For one thing I got the sound of the German really going, and got the feel of the First Elegy as a whole. (Did this before to a lesser extent with the Eighth.) I think I needed this hill, this silence, this frost, to really understand this great poem, to live in it–as I have also in Four Quartets. These are the two modern poems, long poems, that really have a great deal of meaning for me. Like Lorca (whom I have not read for years–). Others I simply like and agree with. Auden, Spender to some extent. Dylan Thomas in an entirely different way. But the Duino Elegies and Four Quartets talk about my life itself, my own self, my own destiny, my Christianity, my vocation, my relation to the world of my time, my place in it, etc. Perhaps Neruda’s Residence on Earth and of course Vallejo will eventually do this but with Residence I have, once again, only looked through the windows (still I might get with that later and even give talks on it).

  December 1, 1965

  When I got up it was about thirty on the porch and now at dawn it is down to twenty-one. These are the coldest hours–meditation, lectio, and hot tea with lemon and a good fire. I am reading [Paul] Evdokimov [La Femme et le salut du monde, 1958]–after tea–and then the Duino Elegies. The Elegies I am just reading, without comment, especially the German, aloud, to try to get the magnificent substance of sound and to think in the German (it is a language I can’t think in, as I can French and Spanish). I will go over it again for notes later. The Leishman-Spender [James Blair Leishman and Stephen Spender] translation is the best piece of translating done for Rilke. Rilke’s long wait for the Elegies sobers me not a little.

  Meanwhile–down to the ridiculous!–the postulants’ guide, in final proof stage, should be ready for Christmas, and suddenly Brother Ralph in the bookstore is raising objections about the price (comes to about twenty-seven cents a copy) and wanting to get quotations from another printer!! What strange ways of thinking monks have! And this is a level-headed one, too. The other picture book (Peter Geist has done a fine design) will probably meet the same kind of obstacles! What an absurd way to live!

  December 2, 1965

  “La croix est faite faite de nos faiblesses et de nos défaillances, elle est construite par nos ego et surtout par nos ténébres profondes et l’inavouable et complice laideur, bref par toute la complexité qui est à ce moment précis le moi authentique.” [“The cross is made up of our weaknesses and our failures, it is constructed by our ego and above all by our profound gloom and unspeakable and culpable ugliness, in short by all the complexity that is at this time the real I.”]

  I experience the truth of this very real and exact insight of Evdokimov. Still in regard to the Catholic Peace Fellowship–about which nothing is settled, I see how much there was that was inauthentic (i.e., false, spurious) in my own initial enthusiasm for identification with peace activities, the Catholic Worker, etc. It was in reality selfish and naïve at the same time. And I did not foresee that necessarily they and I could hardly go along forever in agreement, l
iving in totally different circumstances. Yet I do agree with their ideal in general–not with all its particular implementations. One could go on analyzing interminably. I must accept this result of my own inner-contradictions and trust God to bring a solution in which His will may be done by me and all of them too. Right now, still informed only by vague snatches of rumor, I am in the painful position of being simply unable to judge one way or another. And I don’t know what to do next–hence I must be content not to act at all, when I would very much like to settle everything in a big sweep.

  Fortunately Brother Ralph changed his mind about the printer and withdrew his objections. That is one less trouble. In solitude these things get magnified beyond all reason. I am too sensitive, too insecure. Absolute need for a more real faith.

  Meanwhile I woke up in the night thinking of the name: Wera Ouckama Knoop!

  December 3, 1965

  I discovered that the storm last Friday night (see November 27th) really tore up Lawrenceburg, which is not far from here. It took off roofs, killed three people, tore off the side of a whiskey store house.

  Today decided I would remain a sponsor of Catholic Peace Fellowship–i.e., let them use my name–if it were made clear that I do not automatically support each new political move they make. I think they will see that this is in the press. I certainly want to support their professed aims–education, information, help of Conscientious Objectors, etc., but not necessarily their bids for publicity and political action. It is to me clear that these repeated manifestos, agitations, picketings, card burnings, meetings, etc. are getting to be in many respects a meaningless routine. There is an atmosphere of fuss and fury, perhaps also much that is valid and alive for some who are in it. For me it would be merely an exercise in naïveté to pretend to keep up with it all and be involved in it. Hence I am from now on disengaged from immediate action–or at least from identification with any special program or movement. If any special action is required of me I will take it personally, and not in a parade.

  A great event–a new presence! Arrival of a lovely Byzantine ikon (from Salonika–?) about 1700. The most beautiful I have ever seen (except in photos of course). The Holy Mother and child and then on panels that open out, St. Nicholas and St. George, St. Demetrius and St. Charlandros–whoever that is. It was sent as a gift by Marco Pallis and I was moved, bouleversé [disturbed], by its arrival. How magnificent it is in its simplicity. I never tire of gazing at it. It will change my whole attitude. Already after supper instead of continuing with light reading (Raïssa Maritain), I got out the Greek New Testament!! Beautiful letter from Marco Pallis with it.

  December 4, 1965

  Hardware in space. There are about 180 capsules whirling around the earth out of 375 which have so far been put in orbit by the U.S. and U.S.S.R. Thirteen more orbiting around the sun, seven smashed up on the moon. And now one little French capsule whirling around too, saying nothing in any language, but “adding prestige.”

  December 5, 1965. Second Sunday of Advent

  The bells from the Abbey are all absurd. Angelus at 3:45–a bell for an office at 5:45, etc. The darkness is alive with inappropriate bells. Probably due to the abolition of Prime–they have doubtless moved Lauds. I will find out when I go down for concelebration.

  Last evening at supper I began [Jacques] Ellul’s L’Illusion politique. It is some comfort to find someone who agrees with my position. I must be resolutely non-political, provided I remain ready to speak out when it is needed. However, I think this book too may turn out insufficient and naïve (philosophically weak perhaps. I am not far into it). But he is basically right in attacking the modern superstition that “what has no political value has no value at all”–“A man who does not read the newspapers is not a man.” And to be apolitical is to be excommunicated as a sorcerer. That the deepest communion of man with man is in political dedication.

  December 7, 1965

  In the midst of the trials and distractions–(the trouble with Catholic Peace Fellowship, then the letter of Joel Orent demanding to see me to talk about his dissertation, etc., etc.)–I realize dimly that there is something else trying to break through into my awareness. Clearly all this fussing about defining my position on this or that contemporary issue is secondary (what I held in regard to ends is clear. As to immediate political means I am in no position to judge!). It has its place–but I see how foolish it would be to become involved in it as if it were of primary importance.

  What is primary? God’s revelation of Himself to me in Christ and my response of faith. In the concrete, this means, for me, my present life in solitude, acceptance of its true perspectives and demands, and the work of slow reorientation that goes on. Each day, a little, I realize that my old life is breaking loose and will eventually fall off, in pieces, gradually. What then? My solitude is not like Rilke’s ordered to a poetic explosion. Nor is it a mere deepening of religious consciousness. What is it then? What has been so far only a theological conception, or an image, has to be sought and loved. “Union with God!” So mysterious that in the end man would perhaps do anything to evade it, once he realizes it means the end of his own Ego-self-realization, once for all. Am I ready? Of course not. Yet the course of my life is set in this direction.

  It turned into a rough day. I have had to drink buttermilk to restore the bacteria to my intestines but the buttermilk itself finally knocked me out with a terrible attack of diarrhea that laid me out for the morning and left me sagging for the rest of the day (it is a fast day anyway!).

  December 11, 1965

  Wednesday the Council closed. Nothing has been read about it yet in refectory, but I have heard various things. Everything was finished. The Schema on the Church and the World finally passed with the part on conscientious objection weakened, but the strong statement against total war unmitigated in spite of the efforts of Cardinal Spellman and Archbishop Hannon. Really this Council has been a great thing. Now we will really begin to see what it has meant for the Church! As far as I am concerned the document I like best is the Constitution (Decree?) on Revelation–and the one on the Church. Have not seen the one on the Church and the World, but am already busy on “Redeeming the Time” (the section on it in the book for Burns Oates). I am repeatedly thankful for this Council, for having lived at this time, for having learned so much from it. Certainly my own attitude to “the world” will have to be modified. I have too easily and unthinkingly used the old contemptus mundi line as an evasion. However, this does not mean I do not remain a hermit. But it changes my attitude, anyway. Rightly so.

  De Gaulle was not elected on the first vote, there will be a second. General surprise! Serious situation in Africa since last month where Rhodesian white racists have taken over and broken off from England to run a little racist state of their own. Shocking appeal to values of “Christian civilization.” Good protest by Rhodesian bishops read in refectory today. Otherwise I have not heard much about it.

  Letter from Dorothy Day today. We agree. Dan Berrigan is, I discover, the center of a political storm–has been sent to South America by the superiors. Evidently they want to get him away from the Peace Movement. But they deny this. Hot and loud protest.

  In addition to all that–more news, no less interesting but probably less accurate–from Andy Boone.

  1. That some woods near here were set alight by sparks from a flying meteorite which landed in Pennsylvania and came from “the comet.”

  2. That two deer have been found dead around here, not shot, but just dead. Poisoned by chemicals?

  3. That the white oaks are being devoured by worms that are not being devoured by birds, because “they ain’t no more birds.”

  4. That all the streams are poisoned by fallout.

  5. That sycamores are dying all over the country. This he got from Father Arnold.

  December 13, 1965

  I do not yet have the text of the Decree on the Church and the World, but I am reading and thinking and marking time on the manuscript of “Redee
ming the Time.” It is fruitful. A grace of the Council for me will have been this beginning of a change from a radically negative anti-science and anti-technology attitude to something more open and humane. For example when the big SAC B52 flew low over the hermitage under the low ceiling of clouds it was possible for me to think of it as part of my own world, not just as “their damn plane.” Although that does not imply approval of the bomb, still, it is my world that builds the planes and flies them and there is something admirable about all that: it has at least good possibilities.

  December 16, 1965

  Yesterday–went in town. (First time in four months, since hospital.) Rainy, misty day. Early Mass (served by Brother Denis). Read an article by Van der Leeuw in an Eranos Jahrbuch in University of Louisville library–and some Prose Poems of Baudelaire. Lunch with Jim Wygal at Cunningham’s, then went out to his place in Anchorage (he did 100 m.p.h. in his new Impala on the new Interstate parkway). Then, watched on TV the meeting in space of Gemini 7 and Gemini 6. Actually what was shown was a series of maps and “simulations” but I was watching at the time when 6 began catching up to 7 over the Indian Ocean and got within a few feet of 7 beyond Hawaii. They were orbiting together over Brazil when I left. A fantastic thing! The only live stuff were occasional unintelligible voices of astronauts talking to Houston, Texas. All this I went into as a deliberate exercise of the new “worldliness”–in other words to be able to see these things without defensiveness and criticism, though also without ga-ga optimism. This is the world I live in and I am part of it. Why act as if I had a better world of my own to offer as an alternative? Apparently the reason for the blackout in the Eastern States last month was a failure in a computer. There was another blackout in Texas for the same reason. So the machines are not infallible either.