I suppose it’s after having written that last post, that only one thing could possibly come to mind when I spotted this delightful little Christmas gift idea:
I’ve just got to have the complete set, including the C of E, Methodist and Baptist stunt grannies. Sadly the Maplin catalogue doesn’t seem to list those items.
Today is the 40th anniversary of the untimely death of Thomas Merton, in Bangkok.
Of all his writings, it’s his Seven Storey Mountain which I have loved best, and which has had the greatest influence on me. It was the work which first blew open my rather narrow Evangelicalism and made me love aspects of a Catholic tradition which had long become rather quaint and superseded by Vatican II. (And therefore, some of the more modern aspects too.)
I guess, as with many great Christians, Merton has become an idea which people love, far beyond the actual ideas or influence he stood for. But God uses all of that. A bit like when people quote back to me things they’ve heard in my sermons, which I’m pretty sure I never said.
The Spirit bloweth where it listeth…