Book Reviews and More: Come into the Silence 30 Days with Thomas Merton - John Kirvan

Let Nothing Disturb You: 30 Days with Thomas Merton

Great Spiritual Teachers

John Kirvan (Editor)

Ave Maria Press

ISBN 9781646800414

eISBN 9781646800421

ASIN B08PJGQDN8

Come into the Silence 30 Days with Thomas Merton - John Kirvan - Great Spiritual Teachers Series

This is the fourth volume in the Great Spiritual Teachers series I have read, last year the first I read was Born to Do This: 30 Days with Joan of Arc by Jaymie Stuart Wolfe, and loved it and the concept of the series. I have read much by and about Merton and was excited to work my way through this volume. I picked this as the fourth in the series to read I have had a mixed history with Merton.

First some background between 1998 and 2006 I read about a dozen volumes by or about Thomas Merton. I had taken courses with Michael W. Higgins and read several of his works on Merton. I even attended the International Thomas Merton Society Conference, at the time the only time it had been held outside the United States. Then when I returned to the church I was on retreat the spiritual director advised against reading any Nouwen or Merton. 19 years later on retreat at the same retreat house a different priest recommend volumes by both. I also waffle in my appreciation for Merton, there are times his works and works speak very clearly to me. And others I struggle with ‘why am I reading this?’ I also struggle with his life, he was overly fond of the drink, which is something now being acknowledged more openly, and from my reading he seems to think he has found his place, and all is right in the world then something new and different captures his attention. And he tries to move on. Some of that restlessness is captured in this volume.

The description of this volume states:

“Come into the Silence is an easy-to-use devotional for all those seeking peace, stillness, and solitude in a busy and noisy world. Part of the bestselling Great Spiritual Teachers series, this book invites you into the contemplative life through the words of Thomas Merton, one of the most popular spiritual masters of the twentieth century.

In his journals, letters, and spiritual writings such as New Seeds of Contemplation, Merton explored the tension between the human longing for both connection and solitude. Merton, a Trappist monk at the Abbey of Gethsemani, offered a model of contemplative life that allowed him to be deeply engaged with pressing issues of the time, including the nonviolent civil rights movement.

Requiring only a few minutes each day, Come into the Silence helps you realize how God sees you and to embrace his divine vision of you and each person you encounter. This devotional also allows you to reflect deeply on the fundamental longings for meaning, belonging, and intimacy as well as the call to service and social justice in your life.”

About the series we are informed:

“Each book in the Great Spiritual Teachers series provides a month of daily readings from one of Christianity's most beloved spiritual guides. For each day there is a brief and accessible morning meditation drawn from the mystic's writings, a simple mantra for use throughout the day, and a night prayer to focus one's thoughts as the day ends. These easy-to-use books are the perfect prayer companion for busy people who want to root their spiritual practice in the solid ground of these great spiritual teachers.”

I believe there are 15 volumes in this series currently in print, and a number that are currently out of print, The oldest I have seen are from the mid 90’s and it looks like they went through a rebranding and format change in the mid 00’s, and they have undergone yet another rebranding in the 2020’s including some new titles available in the series, including the first in the series I read. I must admit I do not recall running across this series prior to that first volume on Joan. I have however added a number of them to my ‘to be read list’. I love the most recent rebranding, and hope Ave Maria completes the rebranding across all volumes, and brings back into print some of the volumes currently not available; specifically the volumes on John of the Cross, Evelyn Underhill, Mother Theresa and others. But back to this work.

While reading this I only highlighted a few passages, they were:

“So too, what we are is to be sought in the invisible depths of our own being, not in our outward reflection in our own acts.”

“Why do we have to spend our lives striving to be something that we would never want to be, if we only knew what we wanted? Why do we waste our time doing things which, if we only stopped to think about them, are just the opposite of what we were made for? We cannot be ourselves unless we know ourselves.”

“Help me find some of Your true solitude today, which I know can be present even when I am busy and with other people.”

“I want to find my real self, and I know I can only find it in only You.”

“We recognize the need to be at home with ourselves in order that we may go out to meet others, not just with a mask of affability, but with real commitment and authentic love.”

“Show me your love today and this week. Fill me with Your love, and show me where to show that love to others.”

“MY DAY IS ENDING I have only time for eternity, which is to say for love, love, love. . . . Love is pushing me around the monastery, love is kicking me all around like a gong I tell you, love is the only thing that makes it possible for me to continue to tick. . . . To be led and moved by the love of God: indifferent to everything except that. This is the source of the only true joy.”

“My response to Your tremendous love needs to respond to these situations, too, if I am to be Your hands and feet in the world around me. Keep showing me when, and how, and where I am Your love.”

“Dear God, wipe me clean. Make me a glass that shines through for you. Make me empty of all that is vain and meaningless, so that what people see, when they look at me, is You. I know that the more I disappear, the more You will appear, and the more I shine, the less it will be me who is shining but rather Your love living and shining in me. May that happen. Amen.

A sample day is:

“DAY THIRTEEN

MY DAY BEGINS

It is God’s love that warms me in the sun and God’s love

that sends the cold rain. It is God’s love that feeds me in the bread I eat,

and God that feeds me also by hunger and fasting.

It is the love of God that sends the winter days when I am cold and sick

and the hot summer when I labor and my clothes are full of sweat:

but it is God Who breathes on me with light winds off the river

and in the breezes out of the wood.

His love spreads the shade of the sycamore over my head. . . .

It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams;

but also behind the clamor of the city God speaks to me in His judgments,

and all these things are seeds sent to me from His will.

If these seeds would take root in my liberty,

and if His will would grow from my freedom,

I would become the love that He is, and my harvest would be

His glory and my own joy.

(New Seeds of Contemplation, pp. 16–17)

ALL THROUGH THE DAY

Your love is what I need.

MY DAY IS ENDING

Dear God,

When Your love surrounds me, I often feel it like

a warm sun; and when Your love asks me to sacrifice something

that I have to sacrifice, it can feel much less comfortable.

At those times, I admit, divine love can feel like human loss.

But You remind me how all of this—both the warmth and the sacrifice—

is part of Your love for me.

You are my life and my all.

And I am learning, with Your help, to be present with

You in every way that Your love comes down.

Give me strength to do that. Amen.”

The volume ends with a section called ONE FINAL WORD that states:

“This book was created to be nothing more than a gateway—a gateway to the spiritual wisdom of a specific teacher and a gateway opening on your own spiritual way. You may decide that Thomas Merton is someone whose experience of God is one that you wish to follow more closely and deeply, in which case you should get a copy of one of the books quoted in this text and pray it as you have prayed this gateway journey. You may decide that his experience has not helped you. There are many other teachers. Somewhere there is the right teacher for your own, very special, absolutely unique journey of the spirit. You will find your teacher. You will discover your path. We would not be searching, as St. Augustine reminds us, if we had not already been found.”

I think that final word is very important. Having now read 4 volumes in this series I find that some speak to me more than others. With one almost every day was like an eureka moment, others are more work and fewer moments. But I can state I benefited from the month with each person being profiled. And if I went back and did a volume again at a different point or season in life I might interact with it differently. I am thankful I took a chance on this one and engaged with Merton in his own words again. It was sort of like visiting an old friend.

I admit I engaged much more deeply with the first volume I read in this series than the next 2 I read; this one was closer to the first. I have at least a half dozen other books in this series I want to read. I will likely do a volume a month over the next year. I did enjoy this volume. I just did not add any of the prayers to my daily prayers.

This is a good volume, it is one I really enjoyed reading. But Merton is not to all tastes. I can easily recommend this volume from my experience with it, and I look forward to reading others in the series.

Note: This book is part of a series of reviews: 2025 Catholic Reading Plan!