Michael Ramsey, in his book on the Transfiguration, distinguishes between archaism (yearning for the golden past), futurism (lost in a fantasy unrelated to reality), escapism (which scarcely needs an explanation), and transfiguration – the faith whereby “we bring the total situation as we ourselves participate in it, into a larger context which gives it new meaning.”
Think about change in your life – the many changes, large and small and ask whether as a rule, you appreciate change. Do you pray for changes in your circumstances or in your attitude?
How hard is it for you to see the need for change in attitude? Can you pray for such a change? Can you see how you might “stay as you are” simply because it’s familiar, safe and that you are in control?
Who/what would you like to change in the world/church? Notice your hopes and dreams – and how you feel as you get in touch with your hopes and the reality of what you are contemplating. Does this exercise engage your passions? How could you let the seemingly negative feelings of anger, disappointment, disillusionment and frustration energise you towards choice and action?
Do you believe change is possible? Who or what changes? What stops or prevents change? What tiny step could you take today towards changing our world?
What does God want you to do with the rest of your life? What changes do you need to make in your life so that you might more and more fulfil Jesus’ teachings of love and compassion?
Merton poured his whole being out, transparently, in writings on prayer and spirituality [“I have renounced spirituality in order to find God”], Zen, nonviolence, race relations, and nuclear war. His correspondence with leaders , intellectuals and writers around the world was voluminous.
He who attempts to act and do thinks for others or for the world without deepening his own understanding, freedom, integrity and capacity to love, will not have anything to give others. He will communicate to them nothing but the contagion of his own obsessions, his aggressiveness, his ego-centered ambitions, his delusions about ends and means, his doctrinaire prejudices and ideas.
To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything is to succumb to violence. More than that, it is co-operation in violence.
Thomas Merton
Come in, all of you, so that you may be happy and be able to say, I’ve seen him on the cross, the one who loves me.
Teach me, Father, to love you, praise you and pray to you.
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