True happiness is found in unselfish Love, A love which increases in proportion as it is shared. Thomas Merton More Quotes by Thomas Merton More Quotes From Thomas Merton One of the strange laws of the contemplative life is that in it you do not sit down and solve problems: you bear with them until they somehow solve themselves. Or until life solves them for you. Thomas Merton contemplative-life down-and law When I pray for peace, I pray not only that the enemies of my own country may cease to want war, but above all that my country will cease to do the things that make war inevitable. Thomas Merton war peace country Prayer is not so much a way to find God as a way of resting in him...who loves us, who is near to us. Thomas Merton prayer way There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun. Thomas Merton shining self-esteem people The root of war is fear. Thomas Merton roots war Every breath we draw is a gift of God's love; every moment of existence is a grace. Thomas Merton gratitude moments grace To be risen with Christ means not only that one has a choice and that one may live by a higher law - the law of grace and love - but that one must do so. The first obligation of the Christian is to maintain their freedom from all superstitions, all blind taboos and religious formalities, indeed from all empty forms of legalism. Thomas Merton religious christian mean There were only a few shepherds at the first Bethlehem. The ox and the donkey understood more of the first Christmas than the high priests in Jerusalem. And it is the same today. Thomas Merton shepherds jerusalem christmas Violence is not completely fatal until it ceases to disturb us. Thomas Merton cease violence wisdom A life is either all spiritual or not spiritual at all. No man can serve two masters. Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire. Thomas Merton spiritual god life Perhaps I am stronger than I think. Thomas Merton being-strong confidence strength Do not depend on the hope of results. You may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results, but on the value, the rightness, the truth of the work itself. You gradually struggle less and less for an idea and more and more for specific people. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationship that saves everything. Thomas Merton wisdom struggle reality Reason is in fact the path to faith, and faith takes over when reason can say no more. Thomas Merton wisdom path faith I just remember their kindness and goodness to me, and their peacefulness and their utter simplicity. They inspired real reverence, and I think, in a way, they were certainly saints. And they were saints in that most effective and telling way: sanctified by leading ordinary lives in a completely supernatural manner, sanctified by obscurity, by usual skills, by common tasks, by routine, but skills, tasks, routine which received a supernatural form from grace within. Thomas Merton real kindness thinking There are crimes which no one would commit as an individual which he willingly and bravely commits when acting in the name of his society, because he has been (too easily) convinced that evil is entirely different when it is done 'for the common good.'...one might point to the way in which racial hatreds and even persecution are admitted by people who consider themselves, and perhaps in some sense are, kind, tolerant, civilized and even humane. Thomas Merton evil names people Action is the stream, and contemplation is the spring. Thomas Merton catholic action spring Self-conquest is really self-surrender. Yet before we can surrender ourselves we must become ourselves. For no one can give up what he does not possess. Thomas Merton giving-up self doe The grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference. Thomas Merton gratitude grateful differences A happiness that is sought for ourselves alone can never be found: for a happiness that is diminished by being shared is not big enough to make us happy. Thomas Merton bigs enough happiness You are made in the image of what you desire. Thomas Merton spiritual-awakening made desire
