Thursday, July 19, 2012

rediscovered the night before visiting Gethsemani


My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Thomas Merton

I was already familiar with this prayer but rediscovered it quite by accident tonight in one of my late mother's old computer folders. 

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5 comments:

  1. Geo.July 20, 2012 at 4:06 AM

    I'm most familiar with the King James version of the 23rd Psalm and like how Merton has restored the conversational tone that I suspect it was written with. A rediscovery indeed.

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  2. LauraJuly 20, 2012 at 5:03 AM

    Cool. I like Merton's little book on the Psalms very much.

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  3. sageJuly 23, 2012 at 6:23 AM

    Thanks. Although I have read a little Merton (his book on Contemplative prayer) I don't think I've seen this one.

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  4. LauraJuly 23, 2012 at 4:44 PM

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  5. LauraJuly 23, 2012 at 4:45 PM

    You're welcome. A nice thing happened to me while I was at Gethsemani (one of many, actually)---I was walking around in the garden area below where Merton is buried and a huge yellow tiger swallowtail butterfly flew directly to me and perched for quite some time on my bare forearm. It was a sweet visitation.

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Georgia, United States
I live at the edge of the forest in a little town in the north Georgia mountains. I teach sixth grade Language Arts and am writing a memoir of sorts about family, spirituality, and narrative. I am also exploring a possible writing project having to do with contemporary lay contemplative experience and how it might be informed by the Desert Fathers and Mothers of early Christianity. I am a relatively recent convert to Roman Catholicism and an admirer of Pope Francis, Leonardo Boff, Joan Chittister, and Richard Rohr. I'm a Lay Associate of Our Lady of the Holy Spirit Monastery in Conyers, Georgia. I am interested in indigenous cultures, narratives, and spirituality, especially how these can inform my spirituality as a lay contemplative. I write, read, take pictures, play around with creating ephemera from paper and cloth and other organic things. I cook, hike, watch wildlife, and collect random bits of interesting oddness, both tangible and abstract. I am a seer of smallness and a caretaker of ridiculous minutiae. If you want, e-mail me at riverrun67@gmail.com or lksorrells@hotmail.com.