The Collision of East and West

…all modern philosophies are chains which connect and fetter; Christianity is a sword which separates and sets free. No other philosophy makes God actually rejoice in the separation of the universe into living souls.

 Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton

There is so much to concern ourselves with these days. Unfortunately, sometimes our concerns must extend to false beliefs and practices that worm their way into the lives of some fellow Catholics. False teachers and false doctrines have posed a stumbling block to believers since the beginnings of Christianity. Today, perhaps more than ever, the influence of misguided teachers is particularly pronounced. This is even more true when a lie is concealed within fabric pieces of the truth. An online conversation about universalism and the general fusing of Eastern thought and practices within the Catholic tradition prompted this brief examination, because the heresy of universalism requires our full vigilance and understanding. 

Granted, there are some degrees of nuance here. Bishop Barron, for instance, is decidedly not a universalist, although he may be misunderstood. There is an expanse of difference between hoping that no one is in hell and confidently asserting that it is empty. Bishop Barron’s position is one of personal hope and nothing more. (For a deeper explanation of Bishop Barron’s position, see Word on Fire’s FAQ page.) We focus on the heresy of universalism because it is likely one of the most evident symptoms of Eastern thought. Thomas Merton was a proponent of incorporating Eastern philosophy into the renewal of prayer, particularly in the monastic setting; however, his books significantly widened the audience. Seven Storey Mountain by Thomas Merton, arguably a classic described by many as a modern Confessions, held a special place of derision within the online conversation mentioned in the introductory paragraph. The group favored the spiritual bent of the 1960s over that of the 1940s, with 1968 being the year Merton traveled to Asia and met the Dalai Lama and other religious figures. (In December of that year, he was found dead under unusual and possibly suspicious circumstances whilst attending a conference in Thailand.) The Eastern lie and heresy of universalism and Thomas Merton's concept of “universal consciousness” are emblematic of the other serious pitfalls that await the believer in Christ within Eastern philosophy. Father Dwight Longenecker puts it like this in a blog post. 

The effects of universalism on the church are catastrophic. It's not real hard to understand. People aren't dumb. If everyone is going to be saved, then why bother to go to church? If everyone is going to be saved there is no such thing as mortal sin. If everyone is going to be saved there is no need for evangelism. If everyone is going to be saved there is no need to feed the hungry, become a priest, build the church, and become a saint.

In Orthodoxy, a book I gather Merton detested, G.K. Chesterton offers an insightful analysis of Buddhism in relation to the Christian faith.

No two ideals could be more opposite than a Christian saint in a Gothic cathedral and a Buddhist saint in a Chinese temple. The opposition exists at every point; but perhaps the shortest statement of it is that the Buddhist saint always has his eyes shut, while the Christian saint always has them very wide open. The Buddhist saint has a sleek and harmonious body, but his eyes are heavy and sealed with sleep. The medieval saint’s body is wasted to its crazy bones, but his eyes are frightfully alive. There cannot be any real community of spirit between forces that produced symbols so different as that… The Buddhist is looking with a peculiar intentness inwards. The Christian is staring with a frantic intentness outwards… 

Chesterton’s observations are so on-target in light of my sampling of Merton’s later writings that it is shocking. One excellent example of this is the Buddhist prayer mentioned in the introduction to Merton’s book entitled Contemplative Prayer.

May I learn to look at myself with the eyes of understanding and love. May he/she learn to look at him/herself with the eyes of understanding and love. May they learn to look at themselves with the eyes of understanding and love.

Merton, Thomas (2009). Contemplative Prayer. Kindle Edition.

The emphasis is inward; the focus is squarely upon self. Thich Nhat Hanh, the author of the introduction, continues with the following blasphemous assertion concerning the Holy Spirit, which would have us believe that the Third Person of the Holy Trinity is nothing more than a self-help tool to be utilized in achieving a state of mindfulness.

To me, mindfulness is very much like the Holy Spirit. When the energy of the Holy Spirit is in us, we feel truly alive, capable of understanding the suffering of others, and motivated by the desire to help. Mindfulness and the Holy Spirit are both agents of healing. When you touch deep understanding and love, you are healed. “If we pray ‘in the Spirit’ we are certainly not running away from life. … Prayer does not blind us to the world, but it transforms our vision of the world, and makes us see it, all men, and all the history of mankind in the light of God.” I hope you will read the words of this wise visionary slowly and mindfully, in a way that your reading will itself be a contemplation, a meditation, a prayer of the heart. 

Merton, Thomas (2009). Contemplative Prayer. Kindle Edition.

Seeing the wolf in sheep’s clothing that is universalism first requires a reflection upon the nature of sin itself. Christians understand that sin separates us: man from man and man from God. Interestingly, there seem to be two distinct views of sin and salvation held by most Catholics, with similar perspectives shared among our separated brethren. Some subscribe to the view that a loving God will never permit anyone to go to hell. There is an old British comedy about an Irish priest, played by Arthur Lowe, called “Bless Me Father.”  One particular episode entitled “Fire and Brimstone” concludes with Arthur Lowe’s character explaining the nature of hell to his new curate. He remarks that hell most certainly exists, but no one but a “raving lunatic” would believe that there is anyone there. An empty hell does seem to be what many good-natured Christians picture, something created (or, perhaps more accurately, a gulf of bitter separation allowed to exist) for reasons of apologetics alone. Yet, if this were indeed the case, why would Christ’s sacrifice have been required at all?  Why would the Son of God have to bleed to death on a tree if the danger of hell was not a real and present danger for all of us?  Christ himself said in Luke 13:24 that we are to “strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.”  Later, in verse 28, He warns that “there [hell] you will weep and gnash your teeth.”  If we say that there is no hell, are we not saying that we know better than the Son of God?

It may be helpful here to read an excerpt from Dr. Zilborg, a Catholic psychoanalyst who spent time with Thomas Merton in July 1956. This excerpt is courtesy of a professor of philosophy living in New South Wales by the name of Dr. Solomon. (His site can be accessed here.) It is interesting for many reasons, but mainly because it shows us a dimension of Merton with which we may not be familiar. It further sheds light on the motivations behind his message. (For a link to letters between these two, click here.)

You are a gadfly to your superiors.
You are very stubborn—you keep coming back until you get what you want.
You are afraid to be an ordinary monk in the community.
You and [another monk in the community] can very easily become a pair of semi-psychotic quacks.
[When you were] talking to Dr Rome (about Zen) you thought only of yourself using him as a source of information and self-aggrandizement. You thought nothing at all of your priesthood, the apostolate, the church, his soul.[5]
You [would] like to be famous; you want to be a big shot; you keep pushing your way out—to publicity. Megalomania and narcissism are your big trends.
Your hermit trend is pathological.
You are a promoter. If you were not in a monastery, you are the type that would clean up on Wall Street one day and lose it all on the horses the next.
It is not intelligence you lack, but affectivity.
It will do you no good to be forbidden to write—you need silence and isolation, but it needs to be prohibited in your heart. If it is merely forbidden, it will not seem prohibited to you…

Why does Eastern thought present such a siren call to many in the first place?  Perhaps it is because people struggle with the mysterious tool we call prayer. They feel they are failing to connect, or that they could do better, and they are drawn to voices like Merton who share a new method. There is an admitted appeal to drawing from different faith traditions to enrich our own, but the challenge is that it requires great care lest we fall into serious doctrinal error. In lending support for something that we may thoroughly understand, it also could potentially pose a stumbling block for a less mature Christian. As C.S. Lewis and G.K. Chesterton both demonstrated with the argument for Christ known as a trilemma, we can’t say Christ was simply a great teacher, one among many. We must declare that He is “the way, the truth, and the life,” as found in John 14. There is no other path to God than through Christ. (We can debate whether a noble savage character, as described in Lewis’ final book in the Chronicles of Narnia, might be saved through a Christ whom he did not know by name but only by heart. Ultimately, this is made possible through God’s grace and love. Perhaps these are among the few possible exceptions to the rule.) One of the most notable Catholic resources on this topic is arguably the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s “Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of Christian Meditation.”  I see no better way to conclude this essay than with this letter’s own eloquent conclusion.

31. The love of God, the sole object of Christian contemplation, is a reality which cannot be "mastered" by any method or technique. On the contrary, we must always have our sights fixed on Jesus Christ, in whom God's love went to the cross for us and there assumed even the condition of estrangement from the Father (cf. Mk 13:34). We therefore should allow God to decide the way he wishes to have us participate in his love. But we can never, in any way, seek to place ourselves on the same level as the object of our contemplation, the free love of God; not even when, through the mercy of God the Father and the Holy Spirit sent into our hearts, we receive in Christ the gracious gift of a sensible reflection of that divine love and we feel drawn by the truth and beauty and goodness of the Lord.

The more a creature is permitted to draw near to God, the greater his reverence before the thrice-holy God. One then understands those words of St. Augustine: "You can call me friend; I recognize myself a servant."36 Or the words which are even more familiar to us, spoken by her who was rewarded with the highest degree of intimacy with God: "He has looked upon his servant in her lowliness" (Lk 1:48).

The Supreme Pontiff, John Paul II, in an audience granted to the undersigned Cardinal Prefect, gave his approval to this letter, drawn up in a plenary session of this Congregation, and ordered its publication.