Monday Morning with Merton: A Perfect Fit
gabrielle December 31st, 2007
“It is beautiful to see God’s grace working in people. The most beautiful thing about it is to see how the desires of the soul, inspired by God, so fit in and harmonize with grace that holy things seem natural to the soul, seem to be part of its very self. That is what God wants to create in us - that marvelous spontaneity in which His life becomes perfectly ours and our life His, and it seems inborn in us to act as His children, and to have His light shining out of our eyes.” [From: The Sign of Jonas, 1953]
Wishing you all a very
full of grace!
This was a great one for today’s reflection. Spontaneity! The joy of being gifted with the Spirit and the permission we have to behave as children of God!!! Thank you and Thanks be to God!
Happy New Year!!!
Thank you, Gabrielle… It is wonderful, isn’t it? When we are in Christ we are home at last, and all that he said about easy yokes and light burdens suddenly makes perfect sense! This is such an integral part of what God is showing me at the moment - thank you so much for another tessera in the mosaic!
A perfect fit indeed, Gabrielle. A Happy New Year to you too, filled with grace.
This will initially sound awful, but I keep some Thomas Merton up in the bathroom. It’s where I hide from time to time, and no one’s the wiser.. except I, who instead of reading celeb mags up there, read a holy sage.
I don’t want to make this dusty ol’ self sound anything more than it is, but the Godly adoption (via the Master’s tremendous sacrifice for love) has seemed so real to me, I only know it doesn’t seem so to others when they hope that I will have a joyous spiritual holiday.
If we can but look at everything from the Lord’s view (or rather, try to!), this life which is such a gift, nonetheless is somehow the equivalent of a short drama/sit-com/love story.
I honestly believe that Heaven is a Hands-On championer of each of us. Daily! Heaven is, after all, our Home. That place we thought we had once, and lost. Our true Home is why we love the wild things, here.
Sorry - of course that Anon. was me.
And clarified, “wild things” like oceans and mountains and hummingbirds and gazelles. These are true to God at all times, and this can only remind us of Home, where love has never been skewed..only Crucified and Risen.
Oh, God bless you, my sisters and brothers. Indeed, amen, happy new year full of grace and peace and light and joy and crucified passion and risen love.
Happy New Year folks!
May you have a blessed new year!
G, you’ve received a blessing here. No blushing! I tell you only in case you wish to pass it along.
Thank you all for dropping by to comment, and to offer your New Year’s greetings. We had a lovely “extended-family” day and New Year’s dinner, altogether. Wonderful way to start off 2008!
I think the “natural fit” and the spontaneity Merton describes here is essentially one terrific way of expressing St. Augustine’s “love God and do what you will”, that we were discussing not long ago. When the desires of the soul are in perfect harmony with God’s grace, there’s really no fear of committing grave sin, is there - it’s freedom in Love!
Mike, I had to look up “tessera” (shame on me). But what a great metaphor (maybe it’s the British way of saying piece of the puzzle?)
C.O., it doesn’t sound terrible to me. I have actually told people that if they have no privacy in their own home, to take a couple of throw cushions and lock themselves in the bathroom for at least twenty minutes of contemplative prayer everyday. We gotta do what we gotta do wherever we can find a little nook or cranny…
JustMe, thank you very much, and I will pass it along with pleasure.
Peace & blessings to you throughout 2008 Gabrielle :).
Peace, JOY & Blessings to you:)
Marie
I’ve just re-read Merton’s whole paragraph; it is a description of how we are at Mass, isn’t it — and how we are at certain gatherings involving Christ. It’s not only natural to the soul, once the Holy Spirit sits down in our midst in great percussions of joy, it’s something vastly missable. There was one time when it slipped out of me, “Aw, it’s over? We have to go home now?” Because we know the heart will go on burning for hours and hours, and we’ll likely just have to hide it ’til it burns down and down.
lovely quote! happy new year & blessings to you!
Marie, thank you, and a very Happy New Year to you and Ginny as well. May it be a year of many blessings, especially for good health for both of you.
Thanks, Lucy, and the same to you. I hope you had an excellent time on your vacation break down in the warmer climes. Funny how the water is so attractive, when it’s not in your basement.
C.O., that’s a really good example of when we may be more conscious of feeling the “perfect fit”, isn’t it. But I guess we’d be kidding ourselves if we thought it was the norm. I read on someone’s blog recently (don’t remember where) about them overhearing someone nearby at the end of Mass say, “Good! That’s over for another week!” Makes me sad to think of, now.
Oy.. I worked with a woman who said she prayed the Rosary every day because she’d made a bargain with God years ago: If He’d save her daughter from physically dying at that time, she’d pray the rosary every day for the rest of her life. Indeed, God is big ol’ marionette.. *sigh.. how do we miss the point so consistently, of anything about Him? That it’s always, always, always about love. Even the “Repent!” is about love, and He insists we let that lead to the other half of that: “Rejoice!”