Starting at 7:22 of the portion on Thomas Merton, it says that he had an "epiphany" where Merton, himself, says he saw that the world was transparent and that God was shining through everything." I had the exact same experience when I was walking down a dirt road in the country and I was living with a group of people that I describe 2 ways depending on who I am talking to. Each way is 100% true just as a glass of water can be equally 1/2 full and 1/2 empty at the same time and both are 100% true and accurate. I tell Catholics that I was living with a group of Catholics that was an informal Catholic Contemplative group but we were not completely informal as we were associated with the Carmelite Monastery at Holy Hill Wisconsin and we had a lay brother from the monastery that was a liaison between us. I add that we also did Eastern things. I tell some people who would not be offended by it that I was living in a Jnana Yoga Ashram but that we also did Christian things and that we were required to obey everything in the Bible.I'm not sure why I added all of the details except to give myself some credibility because the purpose of this comment is to confirm that what Thomas Merton said about his experience at that time is 100% true and accurate. There is another description of this experience in a Protestant "Praise song" which can be found on U tube and I'm sorry that I don't remember the exact title but some of the words are, "When all things become shadows in the light of you, I worship You I worship You, the reason I live is to worship You." , so I hope you can find it.Although I say that the purpose of this comment is to confirm Thomas Merton's experience, it is more accurate to say that my purpose is to confirm that Merton's experience is literally true and accurate about God. Included in my experience was an extreme sense of the Love of God for all of us. I am not comparing myself with Thomas Merton! He is so far above me that there is no comparison. I was 26 or so at the time of that experience I had and now I am 72 y/o I have fallen off the path and committed many sins. I am trying to return to the path but find it extremely difficult; but that is neither here nor there for you. I remember where I was and I remember that that higher level of Spiritual experience is not for the rare few but for almost everyone. When God called me He said, "I am not doing this for any worth of your own for you have none. You are proud and stiff necked. I am doing this for all of the evil in the world." I apologize for being so verbose. God bless you all and guide you Life Eternal with Him.
I think you should "stick with it" because you seem to have a clear sense of the path that lies before you, even if you stray from it at times. Those of us who have had a transcendent experience where our awareness was dramatically altered are the more fortunate ones, but that initial connection with Higher Reality does not guarantee us staying in the beam of the Light. The effort you make, or more accurately the intention you keep alive is very important. Go with gentle persistence.
Thank you, Noe, for your encouragement! I am now 75 y/o and experienced many ups and downs. What is supremely important is that when I say, "I have experienced --" I am talking about this lump of a flesh body which is not my True Self. My True Self is Christ who is shining through this thin veneer of the shadow of matter that we call, reality. Merton's experience is supremely important because among other things it explains what Jesus meant when He said, "He who believes in me though he die, yet he shall live. He who lives and believes in me, shall never die." If we believe that our True Self is ONE with the Christ, then when we see the body die, we know that our True Self lives. If we "both" believe and experience that our True Self is ONE with Christ, we will never die. @@rr7firefly
For me, it's helpful to remember that the feeling experience of God is not God, it's a feeling. God is always here. We don't have to be on the mountaintop. It's very hard not to cling to a beautiful spiritual experience, especially if we are wounded (which most of us are.) Somewhere in Merton's writings (in the 60s) he says consolation is no more important than the buzz you can get from a beer. That's very freeing. I still meditate/pray and find it very valuable, but it doesn't measure God's presence (or absence). It's more like letting gravity move us down the path.
The talk on Thomas Merton is only the first ten minutes of the show. The only negative part about it is James Martin's claiming that Merton had an affair with a nurse when he was at the hospital in 1966. James Martin has made the same bold claim in other video:s but others have said that it is not truly known if that is true. One described it as an affair of the heart but he maintained his Chastity. What is known is that he returned to the Abbey after he left the hospital. When God forgives someone according to their confession, He forgets it and does not continue reminding a person about it in such a way, so as to suggest that the person was not forgiven. But motormouth human gossips never stop. That is what Pope Gregory caused for St Mary Magdalene.
The terrible truth is most ppl cannot decipher the difference between a true spiritual calling and simply’hearing’ ones own inner voice they label ‘god.’ It’s not. It’s just you. Unless you can know the distinct difference you’re really only living in self deception.
The guy who says his friend was shot on campus, therefore we shouldn't have peace activism is copping out. Wow. He's the embodiment of cognitive dissonance. Spirituality should never be an excuse for dropping out of the concerns of the wider society.
from The Gospel of 2020 - www.thegospelof2020.org "Those who are lost in the socially constructed world are so concerned with transient assets and ephemeral technologies that they have forgotten about the eternal being of The Beloved. However, when we enter into a sanctified relationship with Divine Charity, we are no longer slaves to societal conditioning and our own egotistical wishes."
Armstrong mentioned 4 things she "thought she'd be doing as a nun". Of the 4, none of them was prayer. It's a "compassion fest", but still without Jesus. Lessons in Missing the Point 101. Still all over the place trying to explain it all away, when it's so simple to submit to the Holy Spirit +
I must admit to "Lapsing into silence," every time I heard Karen Armstrong talk. Her supposed wisdom produces "Stupid, stupider, stupidest, from my crap detector! That there are ineffable attributes about God is clear. But that each religious worldview is making truth claims about where we came from, where we are going when we die, how should we live our life, and how do we get meaning out of life, and further that these are all concrete truth claims that are not only effable but also falsifiable! The Buddha claims the suffering comes from desire. That this world is illusory. That god is impersonal. That evil and good are also illusory. However, an impersonal God (or force) would have created a universe as a function of being not choice. Like a gas motor produces exhaust. Why would we have a universe that is only 13.7 Billion years old on Buddhism? Why is ridding the world of suffering important to an impersonal God who by nature has nothing they consider to be right or wrong including suffering. Think about impersonal beings. They have no ideas about right or wrong, the way things "ought" to be or not. This is why the eastern religions are incomprehensible. Their foundation is unable to account for a finite universe, or objective moral values, logic, human souls (desire is a product of soulishness).
+Uber “Genius” Genie .... "The suffering come from desire" means when you have no desire/hope/want there will be no suffering = teaching of surrender. If you want to be reach, but you are poor , so there is gap between what you want and reality, you can suffer inside because of the gap.
To understand who to be God and religion, we have to understand The limitless of multi-dimension universe. So religion can not be separated from science. Since only intellectual human who live with religions, not animals, therefore like or not religions have to make sense, can be accepted by logic. Space has no limit so with time, has no limit too. According to scientist age of universe has reach about 14 billions years, age of earth about 4 t0 5 billion years, and humanoid civilization has reach millions years of age. There are questions leading to the way how we figure out Religion and God: 1. Are we (human) the only one intelligent and intellectual creature in universe? According to science earth is one among billions planet in universe. 2. There were many religions with different perception in ancient time, before common recent religions(Jews, Christianity, Islam Hinduism, Budha ... ) . Were they wrong religions? 3. is human generation of Adam the only human on earth, was there no human generation before Adam and will there be no other religions in next thousand years, in case there will be any other human generation after our human generation meets its end? 4. If the human form looks like frog, would we think that God looks like frog? 5. Was it possible that God coming out from (sorry to say) vagina? Can we get rational answer for the questions above?
This is nothing but gobbledygook! Person says the limitless of multi-dimension Universe." How does this person know Universe is limitless? It is a vacuous claim nothing else. Says time is also limited. He doesn't know that there is no such thing as time in ultimate Reality. Time is a useful concept that only exists in the human Mind. In ultimate Reality, the Present is all there is. This person is the ultimate pseudo scientist. Knows nothing about what he is talking about and expects to impr4ess people who less than him but people who know more than him, laugh!
+Hammett175 Wake up ... Age of human civilization has reach millions years of age, Jesus was born only about 2 thousand years ago. Jesus too late, there were many religions before Jesus, there were also many sons God before Jesus. It is a kind of same human story. So with cross and sun symbol there was exist and used as religion symbol thousand years before Jesus. Catholic from the view point of human civilization story is not a new religion of Jesus Christ but modification of ancient religion. Am I right to say that 25 December is not the date of birth of Jesus, but the date of birth of Son of the Sun, it's another adoption from ancient religion.
You've bought the modern lies but fancy yourself a free-thinker. It is only the free-thinkers today that can turn to Christ since everyone is brainwashed and propagandized against it.
i think it is you that fancy yourself as the free-thinker, yet you are the one telling someone if they do not turn to christ they are brainwashed when in fact you are the one who sounds brainwashed and the furthest away from free-thinking, let people think for themselves and you do the same we all come to our own conclusions.....
Beautiful short documentary thank you for the introduction to these modern masters
Starting at 7:22 of the portion on Thomas Merton, it says that he had an "epiphany" where Merton, himself, says he saw that the world was transparent and that God was shining through everything." I had the exact same experience when I was walking down a dirt road in the country and I was living with a group of people that I describe 2 ways depending on who I am talking to. Each way is 100% true just as a glass of water can be equally 1/2 full and 1/2 empty at the same time and both are 100% true and accurate. I tell Catholics that I was living with a group of Catholics that was an informal Catholic Contemplative group but we were not completely informal as we were associated with the Carmelite Monastery at Holy Hill Wisconsin and we had a lay brother from the monastery that was a liaison between us. I add that we also did Eastern things. I tell some people who would not be offended by it that I was living in a Jnana Yoga Ashram but that we also did Christian things and that we were required to obey everything in the Bible.I'm not sure why I added all of the details except to give myself some credibility because the purpose of this comment is to confirm that what Thomas Merton said about his experience at that time is 100% true and accurate. There is another description of this experience in a Protestant "Praise song" which can be found on U tube and I'm sorry that I don't remember the exact title but some of the words are, "When all things become shadows in the light of you, I worship You I worship You, the reason I live is to worship You." , so I hope you can find it.Although I say that the purpose of this comment is to confirm Thomas Merton's experience, it is more accurate to say that my purpose is to confirm that Merton's experience is literally true and accurate about God. Included in my experience was an extreme sense of the Love of God for all of us. I am not comparing myself with Thomas Merton! He is so far above me that there is no comparison. I was 26 or so at the time of that experience I had and now I am 72 y/o I have fallen off the path and committed many sins. I am trying to return to the path but find it extremely difficult; but that is neither here nor there for you. I remember where I was and I remember that that higher level of Spiritual experience is not for the rare few but for almost everyone. When God called me He said, "I am not doing this for any worth of your own for you have none. You are proud and stiff necked. I am doing this for all of the evil in the world." I apologize for being so verbose. God bless you all and guide you Life Eternal with Him.
I think you should "stick with it" because you seem to have a clear sense of the path that lies before you, even if you stray from it at times. Those of us who have had a transcendent experience where our awareness was dramatically altered are the more fortunate ones, but that initial connection with Higher Reality does not guarantee us staying in the beam of the Light. The effort you make, or more accurately the intention you keep alive is very important. Go with gentle persistence.
Yeah me too! When I saw the clearcuts and the mountain toppings!!!
Thank you, Noe, for your encouragement! I am now 75 y/o and experienced many ups and downs. What is supremely important is that when I say, "I have experienced --" I am talking about this lump of a flesh body which is not my True Self. My True Self is Christ who is shining through this thin veneer of the shadow of matter that we call, reality. Merton's experience is supremely important because among other things it explains what Jesus meant when He said, "He who believes in me though he die, yet he shall live. He who lives and believes in me, shall never die." If we believe that our True Self is ONE with the Christ, then when we see the body die, we know that our True Self lives. If we "both" believe and experience that our True Self is ONE with Christ, we will never die. @@rr7firefly
For me, it's helpful to remember that the feeling experience of God is not God, it's a feeling. God is always here. We don't have to be on the mountaintop. It's very hard not to cling to a beautiful spiritual experience, especially if we are wounded (which most of us are.) Somewhere in Merton's writings (in the 60s) he says consolation is no more important than the buzz you can get from a beer. That's very freeing. I still meditate/pray and find it very valuable, but it doesn't measure God's presence (or absence). It's more like letting gravity move us down the path.
The talk on Thomas Merton is only the first ten minutes of the show. The only negative part about it is James Martin's claiming that Merton had an affair with a nurse when he was at the hospital in 1966. James Martin has made the same bold claim in other video:s but others have said that it is not truly known if that is true. One described it as an affair of the heart but he maintained his Chastity. What is known is that he returned to the Abbey after he left the hospital. When God forgives someone according to their confession, He forgets it and does not continue reminding a person about it in such a way, so as to suggest that the person was not forgiven. But motormouth human gossips never stop. That is what Pope Gregory caused for St Mary Magdalene.
The terrible truth is most ppl cannot decipher the difference between a true spiritual calling and simply’hearing’ ones own inner voice they label ‘god.’ It’s not. It’s just you. Unless you can know the distinct difference you’re really only living in self deception.
77,777 views: Tuesday October 29th 2019 at 2:07 PM. Love All, Hurt None, All One.
I love Karen Armstrong
Jeffrey Moses
It’s not Thomas Mertons fault Fr. James is a priest now
REALIZE THE KRISHNA CONSCIOUSNESS WITHIN
A lot of people speaking out against wars have strange deaths?
So true!
The guy who says his friend was shot on campus, therefore we shouldn't have peace activism is copping out. Wow. He's the embodiment of cognitive dissonance. Spirituality should never be an excuse for dropping out of the concerns of the wider society.
from The Gospel of 2020 - www.thegospelof2020.org
"Those who are lost in the socially constructed world are so concerned with transient assets and ephemeral technologies that they have forgotten about the eternal being of The Beloved. However, when we enter into a sanctified relationship with Divine Charity, we are no longer slaves to societal conditioning and our own egotistical wishes."
Well it’s settled the TH-cam comments section is the sewer.
Grace A day
Armstrong mentioned 4 things she "thought she'd be doing as a nun". Of the 4, none of them was prayer.
It's a "compassion fest", but still without Jesus. Lessons in Missing the Point 101. Still all over the place trying to explain it all away, when it's so simple to submit to the Holy Spirit +
+cabbey31 It's obviously had a profound effect on your life and vocabulary.
The Merton part is excellent.
Exactamundo.
I must admit to "Lapsing into silence," every time I heard Karen Armstrong talk. Her supposed wisdom produces "Stupid, stupider, stupidest, from my crap detector!
That there are ineffable attributes about God is clear. But that each religious worldview is making truth claims about where we came from, where we are going when we die, how should we live our life, and how do we get meaning out of life, and further that these are all concrete truth claims that are not only effable but also falsifiable!
The Buddha claims the suffering comes from desire. That this world is illusory. That god is impersonal. That evil and good are also illusory. However, an impersonal God (or force) would have created a universe as a function of being not choice. Like a gas motor produces exhaust. Why would we have a universe that is only 13.7 Billion years old on Buddhism?
Why is ridding the world of suffering important to an impersonal God who by nature has nothing they consider to be right or wrong including suffering. Think about impersonal beings. They have no ideas about right or wrong, the way things "ought" to be or not. This is why the eastern religions are incomprehensible.
Their foundation is unable to account for a finite universe, or objective moral values, logic, human souls (desire is a product of soulishness).
+Uber “Genius” Genie .... "The suffering come from desire" means when you have no desire/hope/want there will be no suffering = teaching of surrender. If you want to be reach, but you are poor , so there is gap between what you want and reality, you can suffer inside because of the gap.
I think (despite other claims), that Thomas Merton agreed with you on Bhudda. I have read Merton wrote that from his start the Bhudda was a pessimist.
LOL. Aw well. Whats it hurt? Im sure not much. Any try is better than none. Yeah?:
Thomas Merton might still be a saint, even though he’s responsible for James Martin becoming a Jesuit!
Nonsense to say that theology is poetry which cannot be expressed in logical prose. Tell this to Thomas Aquinas. A lot of post-modern mumbo-jumbo.
And Thomas Aquinas, on his death bed, said all his writing was "as straw." Expressing theology as logical prose makes God quite small, indeed.
Lol. Like Bhagavan said... “ be quiet”.
To understand who to be God and religion, we have to understand The limitless of multi-dimension universe. So religion can not be separated from science. Since only intellectual human who live with religions, not animals, therefore like or not religions have to make sense, can be accepted by logic.
Space has no limit so with time, has no limit too. According to scientist age of universe has reach about 14 billions years, age of earth about 4 t0 5 billion years, and humanoid civilization has reach millions years of age.
There are questions leading to the way how we figure out Religion and God:
1. Are we (human) the only one intelligent and intellectual creature in universe? According to science earth is one among billions planet in universe.
2. There were many religions with different perception in ancient time, before common recent religions(Jews, Christianity, Islam Hinduism, Budha ... ) . Were they wrong religions?
3. is human generation of Adam the only human on earth, was there no human generation before Adam and will there be no other religions in next thousand years, in case there will be any other human generation after our human generation meets its end?
4. If the human form looks like frog, would we think that God looks like frog?
5. Was it possible that God coming out from (sorry to say) vagina?
Can we get rational answer for the questions above?
This is nothing but gobbledygook! Person says the limitless of multi-dimension Universe." How does this person know Universe is limitless? It is a vacuous claim nothing else. Says time is also limited. He doesn't know that there is no such thing as time in ultimate Reality. Time is a useful concept that only exists in the human Mind. In ultimate Reality, the Present is all there is. This person is the ultimate pseudo scientist. Knows nothing about what he is talking about and expects to impr4ess people who less than him but people who know more than him, laugh!
Merton was murdered
Theology is not "poetry". The Catholic Faith is true. There is no non-Catholic "theology". Beyond that, everything else is just everything else.
+Hammett175 Wake up ... Age of human civilization has reach millions years of age, Jesus was born only about 2 thousand years ago. Jesus too late, there were many religions before Jesus, there were also many sons God before Jesus. It is a kind of same human story. So with cross and sun symbol there was exist and used as religion symbol thousand years before Jesus. Catholic from the view point of human civilization story is not a new religion of Jesus Christ but modification of ancient religion. Am I right to say that 25 December is not the date of birth of Jesus, but the date of birth of Son of the Sun, it's another adoption from ancient religion.
You've bought the modern lies but fancy yourself a free-thinker. It is only the free-thinkers today that can turn to Christ since everyone is brainwashed and propagandized against it.
i think it is you that fancy yourself as the free-thinker, yet you are the one telling someone if they do not turn to christ they are brainwashed when in fact you are the one who sounds brainwashed and the furthest away from free-thinking, let people think for themselves and you do the same we all come to our own conclusions.....
Hammett175 your argument is fallacious
Thomas Merton is probably another FTM transman with female skeletal feature .