X (38)
The truth as it is contained in Christian revelation includes the
cognition that it is neither possible to know the truth fully nor to
avoid the error of pretending that he does. It is recognized that
'grace' always remains in partial contradiction to 'nature' & is
not merely its fulfillment.
In the light of this
Niebuhr passage, this from Merton's private
journal entry of October 20, 1964:
At the same time I am beginning to see that the question of
solitude for me is finally getting to be no longer a question of
desire but of decision. I still do not know what scope for
decision may be given me, but I do know that I must prepare to face a
serious decision and one about which I had more or less given up
thinking and hoping. It seems to be a real encounter with the
Word that I must not evade. Yet as in all such things, I am not too
sure just where the encounter is except that my heart tells me
that in this question of the solitary life there is for me a special
truth to be embraced. A truth which is not capable of fully logical
explanation. A truth which is not rooted in ms own nature or in my own
biography, but is something deeper and something that may also
cut clean through the whole network of my own recent works, ideas,
writing, experiences and so forth... .
[emphasis added]
A Vow of Conversation. Edited & introduced by Naomi
Burton Stone. New York:
Farrar, Straus, Giroux,
1988. p. 88