Elias becomes his own wild bird, with God in the center,
His own wide field which nobody owns,
His own pattern, surrounding the Spirit
By which he is himself surrounded:
For the free man’s road has neither beginning nor end.
Elias--Variations on a Theme
The Strange Islands (1952)
non omnis moriar (I shall not altogether die)
I was, initially, drawn to the life and writings of Thomas Merton in the 1970s when I was given a copy of The Seven Story Mountain. I was less taken, at the time, by some of the reactionary content then by the energy, momentum and, obvious, honest searching spirit of the dramatic journey. I had grown weary at the time of a form of philosophy that was hyper-rationalist and left me dry as Ezekiel’s parched bones. I found in Merton’s search a kindred spirit, a pilgrim that reached out his hands, like Virgil, to the furthest shore. There was in Merton a questing and passionate soul who pointed to places I faintly saw yet longed to see in a fuller way.
I was so smitten by Merton that when I did a Master’s Degree in Christian Studies at Regent College (Vancouver, British Columbia), I wrote fifteen essays on Merton. It was Merton’s turn to contemplative theology that held me. I had studied Biblical, historic and systematic
theology, but the more meditative and contemplative approach that the Christian mystics heralded and held high was something that charmed and won me. Merton was, in many ways, my portal and guide into the fullness of the Christian contemplative tradition—I simply followed his many leads, pointers and time tried cairns.
It is virtually impossible to live in the contemporary world without seeing and living into the multiple injustices that wreak havoc in our global village. Merton dared as a monk (and many questioned him for doing so) to face and speak to most of the significant issues of his time: civil rights, 1st Nations, ecological concerns, war and peace, wealth and poverty, the madness of nuclear war, American imperialism. It was the way that Merton deftly and wisely threaded together the contemplative, ecclesial and public that held me---here was an integrated and holistic vision that was worth living into. This does not mean that Merton read all the signs of the times the best or deepest (Merton’s read of the Canadian political election of 1963 was seriously flawed: “Thomas Merton, Leslie Dewart, George Grant and the 1963 Federal Election in Canada”, The Merton seasonal: A Quarterly Review: Vol. 32, No. 4, Winter 2007), but Merton’s public commitment was there and such was the drawing point. Merton did not want to be a guilty bystander, and he certainly wanted to face into Hannah Arendt’s notion of the “banality of evil”. Again, I saw in Merton a modern Elias, a modern Erasmus, enveloped and surrounded by the Spirit.
I had grown up on the lore and legend of the American Beats: Rexroth, Kerouac, Snyder, Ferlinghetti, Corman, Ginsberg (I have a fine letter from Ginsberg in which he discusses Merton and Snyder), Whalen and William Everson (a good essay is yet to be written on Merton and Everson). Many of these writers/activists turned to the Orient in their contemplative journeys---others attempted to synthesize the best and wisest insights of the Western and Eastern contemplative traditions. Again, it was the wild bird, Elias in the flesh, Merton, who corresponded and interacted, in various forms and formats, with the Beats. My interest in Merton and Beats (and the fact I live in the North Cascades where many of the Beats lived in the mid-1950s) meant I could not miss the opportunity of scribbling out a missive on these contemplative poets. Ross Labrie (one of the finest Merton literary scholars) and Jim Forest (friend of Merton’s and a dear friend of mine) wrote “Forewards” to my book, Thomas Merton and the Beats of the North Cascades. I had asked Arnold Shives (one of the best mountain painters of British Columbia) if he would do a painting on Thomas Merton for the book, and he graciously replied with both a painting and many Zen like lookout sketches. The impressionistic painting of Merton graced the Merton Room at Vancouver School of Theology for many a year and the photographed version is on the front cover of the book on Merton and the Beats.
The fact Jim Forest and I have a correspondence that goes back to the 1980s, and Jim had not lectured in Vancouver on Merton meant I suggested to the Thomas Merton Society Canada (TMSC) that we bring Jim to Vancouver in 2004 to celebrate and reflect on the infamous 1964 retreat (a 40th year celebration) Merton led with such worthies as A.J. Muste, J.H. Yoder, Daniel/Philip Berrigan, John Nelson, Tom Cornell, W.H. Ferry, Tony Walsh and Jim Forest at the 1964 retreat—many wild birds at the monastery. Jim joined the TMSC in February 2014, gave two lectures (“Merton, Nouwen and Icons” and “The Spiritual Roots of Protest”) and his lecture, “The Spiritual Roots of Protest” was published as the first in the TMSC’s monograph series in 2004.
My interest in Thomas Merton was substantively enhanced and enriched in the 1980s when I was on staff with Amnesty International. The publication of Michael Mott’s The Seven Mountains of Thomas Merton left the press in 1984, and Michael and I began a correspondence (he was a volunteer with Amnesty at the time) that has continued to this day (many are the letters that accumulate over 30 plus years). Many of the letters between Michael andI ponder the ongoing relevance of Merton.
I mentioned above that I was on staff with Amnesty International in the 1980s-early 1990s. Amnesty had published a report on Nicaragua-Sandinistas-Miskito Indians in the early 1990s and I had to meet with Ernesto Cardenal (who was Minister of Culture with the Sandinistas) to discuss the report. Cardenal had been a novice with Merton at Gethsemani from 1957-1959. Merton had suggested that Cardenal leave the monastery and return to Nicaragua and work with the Sandinistas to bring about a more just and peaceful country—Cardenal did so, and carried Merton’s vision of peacemaking to his people. I sat with Cardenal for about an hour going over the Amnesty report. I listened to his justification for the position of the Sandinistas. I then, meeting over, asked him about Thomas Merton. It was almost impossible to get Cardenal to stop talking about Merton—image and metaphor tumbled over one another in praise of his mentor. When we parted, he gave me a signed copy of his recent book of poetry, The Music of the Spheres—such a meeting, such a gift---another Elias, another wild bird that had flown from Merton’s high perched nest.
I have a certain fondness for celebration/commemoration dates, so in the autumn of 2008 (40 years after Merton’s final retreat at Eagle River in Alaska), Angus Stuart and I did a three day drive from Lower Mainland British Columbia to Eagle River. We were warmly greeted by the Orthodox community in Eagle River which was once, in more primitive days, the convent where Merton led his final full week retreat. Angus and I were given the Merton Room in the Cathedral and spent an evening giving talks on Merton, Lossky and Orthodoxy----all sorts of wild birds in the place with quite a history (for a fuller report read, “In the Footsteps of Thomas Merton: Alaska”, The Merton Seasonal: A Quarterly Review: Vol. 33, No. 4, Winter 2008).
Doug Beardsley (one of our finest Canadian poets and yet another Mertonian northern light) and I, in the autumn of 2013, made a visit to Charles Brandt (the ecological hermit) on Vancouver Island. Brandt thought, in the 1950s-1960s, of becoming a monk at Gethsemani, but Merton warned him against doing so. There is lovely correspondence between Brandt and Merton, and when Doug and I visited Charles, we taped a 2 hour interview with him on his journey and the impact of Merton on his life. Charles is now in his 90s, but his memory is sharp when it comes to Merton---he has even bound (being a bookbinder) many of Merton’s first editions—quite a sight to see---indeed, it was like being with an aging Elias.
Non omnis moriar (I shall not altogether die). Merton was born in 1915 and died in 1968, and he has not altogether died. The life of Merton continues to live in all the Elias like wild birds that bear his plumage, wild birds in which God is their center—such wild birds soar above the wide field and they see roads that have neither a beginning nor end.
Ron Dart
Department of Political Science/Philosophy/Religious Studies
University of the Fraser Valley
Abbotsford British Columbia
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