2. KARL RAHNER (1904 – 1984)
TEILHARD DE CHARDIN (1881
– 1955)
HENRI NOUWEN (1932 – 1996)
THOMAS MERTON

3. THOMAS MERTON
 Born in France
 Autobiography: Seven Storey Mountain
 He met a Hindu Brahmachari during the
World Congress of Religions. He suggested
to him to read „The Imitation of Christ‟ and
„The Confessions‟ of Augustine.
 By profession he was a journalist. Later he
joined the Cistercian order.

4. Spirituality of Thomas Merton

5.  Solitude is a necessity to grow in
compassion. According to him, solitude is a
necessity – a way to compassion.
 He also invites us to rejoice in our
imperfections.
 “My task is to be what I am” - Merton

6.  Self-acceptance is a necessary thing
for self-integration. It is a way to the
real self.
 For him, the moment of self-acceptance
was the moment of healing.
 In his book „The New Man‟ he discusses
about the false self and actual self.
 “Letting go off false self is important to
be in search of the new self.” – Merton

7. False self = Non-acceptance of
one‟s self
True self = Realization of Christ
within oneself.
“The Christ we seek is within us, in
our innermost core.” – Merton

8. “The ability to accept oneself leads
one to accept others.” – Merton.
-According to him, the task of a
Christian is to accept ourselves as
we are in the moments of
difficulties, disloyalties etc.

9. HIS IDEA OF SPIRITUAL DIRECTION
 He was it as the growth in interior freedom.
According to Merton, it is the way to union
with God.
 According to him, Spiritual Direction (S.D) is
a continuous process of formation and
guidance. It is not something merely
psychological.

10. to penetrate beneath the surface of
our lives and to evoke our inner
freedom and truth.
to discern the movements of the
Spirits and to sort out which comes
from the Holy Spirit and which
comes from evil spirit

11.  Peace is the touchstone of spirituality
 He worked for the peace movements. He
vehemently wrote against the second World
War.
 He was very compassionate and peaceful at
his core.
 According to him, the root of war is FEAR.
-His life was a life of non-violent
resistance. He was also influenced by
Gandhian ideas.

12.  Contemplation is seeking God’s Will and
finding God’s mercy. It is something very
basic to Merton.
 -God‟s will is connected with something of
our own identity. So our vocation is to realize
our true self.
 -In his „Contemplative Prayer’, he uses
desert as the image for contemplation.
 -Merton gives importance to the prayer of
Heart. It helps one to be rooted in the
grounded of our being. Prayer of Heart is the
yearning for the simple presence of God.

13.  Our union with God depends on twofold
movements i.e. We enter into ourselves &
We transcend ourselves. That is, we shift
from living out of our isolated ego to the living
out of our liberated true self which is
dependent on others and God in the Spirit.
 Here Merton, as a spiritual guide, leads us
beyond the intellectual and psychological
analysis of our problems to the integrating
acceptance of mystery at the heart of our
lives. So prayer operates at a deeper level –
deeper than our consciousness and psyche.

15. TO SUM UP….
 Thomas Merton speaks to us of
personal integrity to search for God. His
life portrays the necessity of solitude in
nurturing the interiority and enabling us
to live at the core of our being.

16. HENRI NOUWEN (1932 – 1996)
 Born in Holland.
 From 1957 to 1964, he was in Nijmegen and
was educated in Menninger Clinical-Pastoral
education centre. Later he taught at Yale
university and Harvard Divinity School
 Towards the end of his life, he was in L‟Arche
Day Break Community, a community of the
physically and mentally challenged people.
 He is called as the „prophet of conversion‟

17. Five points, spread in his books:
Openness to conversion
Solitude as the place of conversion
Ministry as fostering conversion
A sense of identity
A sense of mission as fruit of
conversion.

18. OPENNESS TO CONVERSION
 In his famous classic „Wounded healer’
he says that it is our unhealed
woundedness that poses a danger to
real conversion. At the same time, our
own woundedness can be a source of
healing to others, if we accept these
very painful wounds in our lives, without
denying or neglecting it.

19.  We need to create a space within ourselves
where we can welcome others as guests in
the home of our hearts. This hospitality
implies self-emptying i.e. our presence is no
more threatening, but inviting.
 When I am open to others, I am open to
myself.

20. SOLITUDE AS THE PLACE OF CONVERSION
 Nouwen refers to Thomas Merton who found
solitude as the source not only for self-
knowledge but also for experiencing empathy
in their brokenness.
 In „The Way of the Heart’, he speaks of
compulsive ministers. They cannot but serve.
They are afraid of solitude. They constantly
look for affirmation outside of themselves.

21.  He speaks of 4th century desert fathers. For
them, desert was not just a therapeutic
place, but a place of conversion. It can
transform us into loving people. “Charity, not
silence, is the purpose of the spiritual life and
ministry.”
 For him, purpose of solitude is  to discover
the way of the heart. This process of
discovering is simple, yet demanding and
humbling.

22.  For Nouwen, ministry is faith-seeking healing
– both for the ministry and the one who is
served.
 He says that conversion is to move from
professionalism of ministry to spirituality of
ministry. This demands both self-affirmation
and self-sacrifice. In other words, it is a
movement from role-definition to careful and
critical contemplation.

23.  In the „Monk and the Cripples’, he speaks of
powerlessness of the ministers. In such a
situation, we need to be in solidarity with the
powerlessness of the people.
 It means that we need to resist the tendency to
DOMINATE. This approach to ministry is
possible, only if contemplative prayer is seen as
the basis and centre of our ministry. It helps us
see those whom, we serve, reveal to us by their
suffering. It also helps to see God‟s face in the
lives of people. It frees us to let go of our need
to control.

24. SENSE OF IDENTITY AS A FRUIT OF CONVERSION
In „Make All Things New’, he writes
about the sense of identity in God
as the fruit of conversion. Our
spiritual life is real when we live it
out in our joys and sorrows.

25. We need to have a renewed
sense of mission. This gives us
a scope to live like Jesus.
Conversion touches the every
fiber of our being.

27. STAGES OF EVOLUTION ACCORDING TO
TEILHARD
: Evolution of Cosmos.
: Evolution of Life
: Movement of universe to self-
consciousness. According to Teilhard, there
is an element of consciousness in
everything. In human beings, it is fully
present.
: Christ is seen as the organic
and physical centre of the universe in the
further process of evolution.

28. TEILHARD DE CHARDIN’S CONTRIBUTION
TO SPIRITUALITY AND MYSTICISM
 Teihard was basically a mystic.
 His mysticism is the mysticism of action
and satisfaction. We can call him as the
global prophet.

29.  His concept of Christogenesis is something
very original. It is the convergence in a
universal and powerful sense of universal
and Cosmic Christ.
 He advocated „pan-Christian monism‟. In his
book „the Divine Milieu‟ he frequently
discusses of Christ-centered mysticism.

30. To sum it, for him, contemplation is the
perfect integration of outer activities with
inner life.
His basic theological principle: To be is
to be united.

31. He is called as the “Quiet Mover of
the Church.”
The Father of the Catholic Church
in the 20th century.
One of the very prominent
theologians of the Vatican II.

34. FAITH IN GOD: TRUSTING THE MYSTERY
 “To speak of God is to speak of human
person and vice versa.” – Karl Rahner.
 He described God as a mystery in human
experience. God is nothing but the depth
dimension in such experiences as solitude,
friendship, community, death and hope.
 God is not one object among many. He is the
Ultimate Ground..

35. LIVING THE MYSTICISM OF EVERYDAY
LIFE(EXPERIENCE OF GRACE ALL THE TIME)
 To the field of spirituality, his famous
contribution is „EVERYDAY
MYSTICISM‟. I.e. Sanctification of every
moment. It is nothing but finding God in
all things. Here Rahner was inspired by
St. Ignatius.
 Everyday mysticism is responding to the
self-communication of God.

36.  In drinking a cup of coffee, and in
talking with a friend, I should experience
God‟s grace. We are invited to discover
God‟s action in the simple acts of life.
This approach also expands the scope
of religious experience beyond the
practice of daily life.

39. LOVE OF NEIGHBOUR AND LOVE OF GOD: BOTH
ARE SAME.
Loving those, who have done
injustice to us, is important.