What I Found in Merton's The Seven Story Mountain

While I was off from work over the holidays, I had a goal for myself. I was finally going to read The Seven Story Mountain by Thomas Merton. This book was on my reading bucket list for at least a few years.

I had heard this book led many to their vocation of priesthood or religious life and I was admittedly afraid of reading it. I was afraid of being called to this life. In fact, I thought, for certain I would be called to the monastery just like Tom, and I didn’t want that. 

Throughout the book, I related to Tom in many respects, and honestly, it’s the best book I’ve ever read that truly conveys the confusion, frustration, winding roads, and conflicting thoughts, feelings, and movements of the heart that happens when you are discerning a vocation. It made me feel a little less “wandering” and lost in my own search. 

The truth is that many days at work, even though I am dreadfully afraid of religious life, I actually dream of the monastery like Tom did. I dream of it being a safe place, a comfort, and a refuge from the world. Plus, I relish prayer, liturgy, and contemplation. But like Tom discovered, it is sheltered from a hurting world, and that has never sat well with me because the Gospels call us out. My heart always feels drawn to the hurting, afflicted people in the world. The dirty city streets feel like my mission field.  

As I read the book, I mysteriously found myself more drawn to the holy lay people he wrote about briefly. The people who lived in the unsafety, turmoil, insecurity and emptiness of the world — and emulated sanctity. The benefactors supporting the monasteries. The husband and wife who thrived in humble family love. But I was drawn especially to his writing about Catherine de Hueck (Doherty), a woman he met in Harlem.

A few years ago I encountered this woman’s story and was captivated by her. She seems to make her way into my life spontaneously from time to time. Maybe because she has the same first name as me, but probably more because her life similarly unfolded like mine seems to be. 

The way Tom described Catherine in the book deeply spoke to me. She didn’t stray from the world. Instead, she committed herself to working and living alongside the poor, sick, orphans, widows and outcasts -- in the toil of everyday life. She was a companion to them. She was a third order secular Franciscan and embodied the pure ideal of Franciscan life. She embraced poverty. She was a writer. She was a lay inspiration to priests and religious. She was married, divorced, and then married again. She started “Friendship Home.” 

Doors to touching others opened and multiplied for this woman. She had a passionate Spirit for the Lord in her that attracted many.

That is my vocation I thought. That is the vocation unfolding before my eyes with opportunities to companion and serve these groups right in my everyday life. Days before, more opportunities came up to companion afflicted populations. I have so many opportunities, I’m overwhelmed, I thought to myself. There are needs everywhere.

So I did what Tom did when he was trying to confirm his vocation. That night upon reading this part of the book, I opened randomly to the Gospels to see what spoke to me and found the passage in John about Jesus washing the disciples' feet. My eyes landed on the words: He loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end.

There it was - a deep sense of confirmation regarding my vocation: Loving Jesus’ own in the world and loving them to the end. I knew it was confirmation because my heart swelled and tears came to my eyes. It had struck a chord. 

But this also meant no refuge. No safety. Turmoil. Insecurity. And yet, I could hear God say to me in the depths of my heart that I was strong enough to endure those things. You are not made for comfort. You are not made for safety.

Indeed, like many, I confirmed my vocation through the book The Seven Story Mountain -- the vocation I was already living and that was unfolding before my eyes. The vocation I was already attracted to. The vocation I was fit to. The vocation that multiplied my opportunities. The vocation that fostered depth of devotion in me. The vocation that put me amidst the hurting secular world in need of Jesus’ love.

May I love the world and those in the world like Jesus, and may I love them to the end.