The Myth, the Monk, the Man

When The Seven Storey Mountain was published in 1949 and became an instant classic, Thomas Merton was only thirty-four years old and had been a Trappist monk for just seven years. The book made him the most famous monk in the world, and he would remain both agent and symbol of the rapidly changing face of Catholicism in the twentieth century until his untimely death at the age of fifty-three. On the centenary of his birth, it is appropriate to celebrate the remarkable role he played and the influence he exerted in what was, by any measure, a short life, and to appreciate the complex psychological pressures and spiritual ambitions that made Merton’s life at once painful and creative. I know that others whose lives were touched by Merton will understand if this short essay is as much personal as it is analytic. One of Merton’s gifts as a writer was the ability to insinuate himself into the lives of people he had never met, and remain, even decades after his death, inexplicably a significant and deeply personal presence. That was certainly true for me.