Thomas Merton Quotes - Page 2

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• Every breath we draw is a gift of God's love; every moment of existence is a grace.

  Thomas Merton

  Gratitude, Grace, Moments

  74 Copy quote

• 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

  30 Copy quote

• To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that love is the reason for my existence, for God is love. Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name.

  Thomas Merton

  Love, Life, Wisdom

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, p.60, New Directions Publishing

  54 Copy quote

• 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

  Country, Peace, War

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, p.121, New Directions Publishing

  49 Copy quote

• It is my belief, that we should not be too sure of having found Christ in ourselves until we have found him also in that part of humanity that is most remote from our own.

  Thomas Merton

  Humanity, Belief, Awareness

  104 Copy quote

• The purpose of our lives is to find the purpose of our lives.

  Thomas Merton

  Purpose, Life Is, Our Lives

  35 Copy quote

• The sky is my prayer, the birds are my prayer, the wind in the trees is my prayer, for God is all in all.

  Thomas Merton

  Prayer, Wind, Sky

  Thomas Merton (2011). “Thoughts In Solitude”, p.107, Macmillan

  22 Copy quote

• Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.

  Thomas Merton

  Inspirational, Wisdom, Fake People

  Thomas Merton (2005). “No Man is an Island”, p.119, Shambhala Publications

  80 Copy quote

• Do not be too quick to condemn the man who no longer believes in God: for it is perhaps your own coldness and avarice and mediocrity and materialism and selfishness that have chilled his faith.

  Thomas Merton

  Selfish, Believe, Men

  38 Copy quote

• Gratitude takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder.

  Thomas Merton

  Thank You, Gratitude, Awakening

  Thomas Merton (2011). “Thoughts In Solitude”, p.48, Macmillan

  57 Copy quote

• Here is an unspeakable secret: paradise is all around us and we do not understand.

  Thomas Merton

  Secret, Paradise, Unspeakable

  Thomas Merton (2009). “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander”, p.128, Image

  34 Copy quote

• We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are valued not for what they are but for what they do or what they have - for their usefulness.

  Thomas Merton

  Inspirational, Courage, Men

  Thomas Merton (2009). “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander”, p.312, Image

  49 Copy quote

• Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.

  Thomas Merton

  Art, Fools Day, Finding Yourself

  Thomas Merton (2005). “No Man is an Island”, p.35, Shambhala Publications

  119 Copy quote

• We live on the brink of disaster because we do not know how to let life alone. We do not respect the living and fruitful contradictions and paradoxes of which true life is full.

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, True Life, Life Is

  Thomas Merton (2008). “Choosing to Love the World: On Contemplation”, p.35, Sounds True

  67 Copy quote

• If you yourself are at peace, then there is at least some peace in the world.

  Thomas Merton

  Peace, World, Ifs

  22 Copy quote

• We are living in a world that is absolutely transparent and God is shining through it all the time. God manifests Himself everywhere, in everything - in people and in things and in nature and in events ... The only thing is we don't see it ... I have no program for this seeing. It is only given. But the gate of heaven is everywhere.

  Thomas Merton

  People, Shining, Heaven

  27 Copy quote

• We live in a society whose whole policy is to excite every nerve in the human body and keep it at the highest pitch of artificial tension, to strain every human desire to the limit and to create as many new desires and synthetic passions as possible, in order to cater to them with the products of our factories and printing presses and movie studios and all the rest.

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, Passion, Order

  Thomas Merton (1998). “The Seven Storey Mountain”, p.173, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  33 Copy quote

• Do not be too quick to assume your enemy is a savage just because he is your enemy. Perhaps he is your enemy because he thinks you are a savage. Or perhaps he is afraid of you because he feels that you are afraid of him. And perhaps if he believed you are capable of loving him he would no longer be your enemy.

  Thomas Merton

  Life, Thinking, Political

  Thomas Merton (2002). “Seeds”

  48 Copy quote

• We are not at peace with others because we are not at peace with ourselves, and we are not at peace with ourselves because we are not at peace with God

  Thomas Merton

  Peace, Catholic, Humanity

  Thomas Merton (1994). “Ascent To Truth”, p.246, Bloomsbury Publishing

  38 Copy quote

• ‎"Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.

  Thomas Merton

  Jobs, Stopping, Worthy

  Thomas Merton (1976). “Disputed Questions”, p.143, Macmillan

  182 Copy quote

• The most dangerous man in the world is the contemplative who is guided by nobody. He trusts his own visions. He obeys the attractions of an interior voice but will not listen to other men. He identifies the will of God with anything that makes him feel, within his own heart, a big, warm, sweet interior glow. The sweeter and the warmer the feeling is, the more he is convinced of his own infallibility.

  Thomas Merton

  Sweet, Heart, Men

  Thomas Merton (1962). “Seeds of contemplation”

  80 Copy quote

• The more you try to avoid suffering, the more you suffer, because smaller and more insignificant things begin to torture you, in proportion to your fear of being hurt. The one who does most to avoid suffering is, in the end, the one who suffers most.

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, Hurt, Insignificant Things

  Thomas Merton (1998). “The Seven Storey Mountain”, p.116, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  60 Copy quote

• Our idea of God tells us more about ourselves than about Him.

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, Ideas

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, p.15, New Directions Publishing

  48 Copy quote

• How can I be sincere if I am constantly changing my mind to conform with the shadow of what I think others expect of me?

  Thomas Merton

  Thinking, Mind, Shadow

  Thomas Merton (2005). “No Man is an Island”, p.206, Shambhala Publications

  50 Copy quote

• The man who sweats under his mask, whose role makes him itch with discomfort, who hates the division in himself, is already beginning to be free.

  Thomas Merton

  Hate, Men, Sweat

  Thomas Merton, Robert Inchausti (2007). “Echoing Silence: Thomas Merton on the Vocation of Writing”, p.72, Shambhala Publications

  25 Copy quote

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