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Love and Living
A posthumously published collection of Merton’s essays and meditations centering on the need for love in learning to live. “Love is the revelation of our deepest personal meaning, value, and identity.” Edited by Naomi Burton Stone and Brother Patrick Hart.
240 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1979
About the author
Thomas Merton
591 books1,965 followersThomas Merton, religious name M. Louis, was an American Trappist monk, writer, theologian, mystic, poet, social activist and scholar of comparative religion. In December 1941 he entered the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani and in May 1949 he was ordained to priesthood. He was a member of the convent of the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, near Bardstown, Kentucky, living there from 1941 to his death.
Merton wrote more than 50 books in a period of 27 years, mostly on spirituality, social justice and a quiet pacifism, as well as scores of essays and reviews. Among Merton's most enduring works is his bestselling autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain (1948). His account of his spiritual journey inspired scores of World War II veterans, students, and teenagers to explore offerings of monasteries across the US. It is on National Review's list of the 100 best nonfiction books of the century.
Merton became a keen proponent of interfaith understanding, exploring Eastern religions through his study of mystic practice. His interfaith conversation, which preserved both Protestant and Catholic theological positions, helped to build mutual respect via their shared experiences at a period of heightened hostility. He is particularly known for having pioneered dialogue with prominent Asian spiritual figures, including the Dalai Lama XIV; Japanese writer D.T. Suzuki; Thai Buddhist monk Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, and Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. He traveled extensively in the course of meeting with them and attending international conferences on religion. In addition, he wrote books on Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism, and how Christianity is related to them. This was highly unusual at the time in the United States, particularly within the religious orders.
Merton wrote more than 50 books in a period of 27 years, mostly on spirituality, social justice and a quiet pacifism, as well as scores of essays and reviews. Among Merton's most enduring works is his bestselling autobiography The Seven Storey Mountain (1948). His account of his spiritual journey inspired scores of World War II veterans, students, and teenagers to explore offerings of monasteries across the US. It is on National Review's list of the 100 best nonfiction books of the century.
Merton became a keen proponent of interfaith understanding, exploring Eastern religions through his study of mystic practice. His interfaith conversation, which preserved both Protestant and Catholic theological positions, helped to build mutual respect via their shared experiences at a period of heightened hostility. He is particularly known for having pioneered dialogue with prominent Asian spiritual figures, including the Dalai Lama XIV; Japanese writer D.T. Suzuki; Thai Buddhist monk Buddhadasa Bhikkhu, and Vietnamese monk Thich Nhat Hanh. He traveled extensively in the course of meeting with them and attending international conferences on religion. In addition, he wrote books on Zen Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism, and how Christianity is related to them. This was highly unusual at the time in the United States, particularly within the religious orders.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
December 21, 2007
my favorite book of his. his insights transcend dogma and move into mysticism
April 19, 2022
I’m realizing how much I love Thomas Merton. This is the third book I’ve read by him (in addition to “The Life You Save May Not Be Your Own”).
His theology and writing ultimately get to experience: an experience of love and mercy, of quiet and inner communion with God. That doesn’t mean his writing is removed from “theology” or “scripture” but rather on personal experience of scripture.
This series of essays centers on love and knowing God and others (for they are the same!). I was most moved by the messages of forgiveness and mercy; of the need for men to forgive and commune with one another! I also loved the idea that we all need one another and cannot live apart from human beings. For this is part of what it means to be made in the divine image.
His theology and writing ultimately get to experience: an experience of love and mercy, of quiet and inner communion with God. That doesn’t mean his writing is removed from “theology” or “scripture” but rather on personal experience of scripture.
This series of essays centers on love and knowing God and others (for they are the same!). I was most moved by the messages of forgiveness and mercy; of the need for men to forgive and commune with one another! I also loved the idea that we all need one another and cannot live apart from human beings. For this is part of what it means to be made in the divine image.
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July 18, 2026Thomas Merton is a brilliant writer and thinker. I loved his sociological essays the most, including “Learning to Live,” “Love and Solitude,” “The Street is for Celebration,” “Symbolism: Communication or Communion?” and “Cargo Cults of the South Pacific.” This last one put me on to a lot of fantastic music and got me considering how in destroying a myth you do not believe in, you conversely participate in confirming its existence and symbolic power. The third section of the book which focuses on Christian Humanism didn’t pull me as much as the first eponymous section or the second one, “Seven Words.” I had a hard time reading so much about Christ…and trying to make myself care when I don’t really believe. That said, I admire Merton, the most radical 20th century Christian monk I am aware of, not only for acknowledging and integrating world religion into his own interpretation of divinity, but also in how he actively embraces leftism. He dares to address taboo subject matter with a frankness that I imagine would make him controversial in Christian spheres (eg. the legacy of Christian-bent colonialism, human sexuality and the pitfalls of suppressing it in the name of religion). I find Merton appealing in how unconventional, existential, and socially-engaged he is.
Learning to Live:
The purpose of education is to show a person how to define himself authentically and spontaneously in relation to his world—not to improve a prefabricated definition of the world, still less an arbitrary definition of the individual himself. The world is made up of the people who are fully alive in it. 3
The function of the university is, then, first of all to help the student to discover himself: to recognize himself, and to identify who it is that chooses. This description will be recognized at once as unconventional and, in fact, monastic. To put it in even more outrageous terms, the function of the university is to help men and women save their souls and, in so doing, to save their society: from what? From the hell of meaninglessness, of obsession, of complex artifice, of systematic lying, of criminal evasions and neglects, of self-destructive futilities. 4
Spiritual nakedness…[sic] is where freedom really begins: the freedom that cannot be guaranteed by the death of somebody else. The point where you become free not to kill, not to exploit, not to destroy, not to compete, because you are no longer afraid of death or the devil or poverty or failure. 5
Both monastery and university came into being in a civilization open to the sacred, that is to say, in a civilization which paid a great deal of attention to what it considered to be its own primordial roots in a mythical and archetypal holy ground, a spiritual creation. 7
Life does not have to be regarded as a game in which scores are kept and somebody wins. If you are too intent on winning, you will never enjoy playing. If you are too obsessed with success, you will forget to life. If you have learned only how to be a success, your life has probably been wasted. If a university concentrates on producing successful people, it is lamentably failing in its obligation to society and to the students themselves. 12
Love and Solitude:
There is One Solitude in which all persons are at once together and alone. But the price of a mathematical, quantitative concept of man (for instance in a positivistic and sociological approach) is that in reducing each individual to his own number it reduces him to nothing: and in making the mass of men simply a total of individual units, it makes of it an enormous statistical void—in which numbers simply proliferate without aim, without value, without meaning, without love. 17
Creative Silence:
There is a silent self within us whose presence is disturbing precisely because it is so silent: it can’t be spoken. It has to remain silent. To articulate it; to verbalize it, is to tamper with it, and in some ways to destroy it. 40
The Street is for Celebration:
We like to be together. We like to dance together. We like to make pretty and amusing things. We like to laugh at what we have made. We like to put bright colors on the walls—more bright colors on ourselves. We like our pictures, they are crazy. Celebration is crazy: the craziness of not submitting even though ‘they,’ ‘the others,’ the ones who make life impossible, seem to have all the power. Celebration is the beginning of confidence, therefore of power…We can be the artisans of a joy they never imagined…They with their gold have turned our lives to rubble. But we with love will set our lives on fire and turn the rubble back into gold. This time the gold will have real worth. It will not be just crap that came out of the earth. It will be the infinite value of human identity flaming up in a heart that is confident in loving. That is the beginning of power. That is the beginning of the transformation. One day, you’ll see! 53
Symbolism: Communication or Communion?:
One cannot apprehend a symbol unless one is able to awaken, in one’s own being, the spiritual resonances which respond to the symbol not only as sign but as “sacrament” and “presence.” 54
Christian Humanism:
Narcissism remains a problem of enormous magnitude, especially in our highly developed modern technological culture, which abounds in its own hidden forms of magic thinking, superstition, ritualism. Our sophisticated modern culture has its taboos, its obsessions, and all that goes into the formation of the neuroses, individual and collective, which so often take the place of formal religion in the minds of men. 146
Rebirth and the New Man in Christianity:
Man in modern technological society has begun to be callous and disillusioned. He has learned to suspect what claims to be new, to doubt all the latest and everything he’s drawn instinctively to the new and yet he sees in it nothing but the same old sham. The specious glitter of newness, the pretended creativity of a society in which youthfulness is commercialized and the young are old before they are twenty, fills some hearts with utter despair. There seems to be no way to find any real change. 196
Learning to Live:
The purpose of education is to show a person how to define himself authentically and spontaneously in relation to his world—not to improve a prefabricated definition of the world, still less an arbitrary definition of the individual himself. The world is made up of the people who are fully alive in it. 3
The function of the university is, then, first of all to help the student to discover himself: to recognize himself, and to identify who it is that chooses. This description will be recognized at once as unconventional and, in fact, monastic. To put it in even more outrageous terms, the function of the university is to help men and women save their souls and, in so doing, to save their society: from what? From the hell of meaninglessness, of obsession, of complex artifice, of systematic lying, of criminal evasions and neglects, of self-destructive futilities. 4
Spiritual nakedness…[sic] is where freedom really begins: the freedom that cannot be guaranteed by the death of somebody else. The point where you become free not to kill, not to exploit, not to destroy, not to compete, because you are no longer afraid of death or the devil or poverty or failure. 5
Both monastery and university came into being in a civilization open to the sacred, that is to say, in a civilization which paid a great deal of attention to what it considered to be its own primordial roots in a mythical and archetypal holy ground, a spiritual creation. 7
Life does not have to be regarded as a game in which scores are kept and somebody wins. If you are too intent on winning, you will never enjoy playing. If you are too obsessed with success, you will forget to life. If you have learned only how to be a success, your life has probably been wasted. If a university concentrates on producing successful people, it is lamentably failing in its obligation to society and to the students themselves. 12
Love and Solitude:
There is One Solitude in which all persons are at once together and alone. But the price of a mathematical, quantitative concept of man (for instance in a positivistic and sociological approach) is that in reducing each individual to his own number it reduces him to nothing: and in making the mass of men simply a total of individual units, it makes of it an enormous statistical void—in which numbers simply proliferate without aim, without value, without meaning, without love. 17
Creative Silence:
There is a silent self within us whose presence is disturbing precisely because it is so silent: it can’t be spoken. It has to remain silent. To articulate it; to verbalize it, is to tamper with it, and in some ways to destroy it. 40
The Street is for Celebration:
We like to be together. We like to dance together. We like to make pretty and amusing things. We like to laugh at what we have made. We like to put bright colors on the walls—more bright colors on ourselves. We like our pictures, they are crazy. Celebration is crazy: the craziness of not submitting even though ‘they,’ ‘the others,’ the ones who make life impossible, seem to have all the power. Celebration is the beginning of confidence, therefore of power…We can be the artisans of a joy they never imagined…They with their gold have turned our lives to rubble. But we with love will set our lives on fire and turn the rubble back into gold. This time the gold will have real worth. It will not be just crap that came out of the earth. It will be the infinite value of human identity flaming up in a heart that is confident in loving. That is the beginning of power. That is the beginning of the transformation. One day, you’ll see! 53
Symbolism: Communication or Communion?:
One cannot apprehend a symbol unless one is able to awaken, in one’s own being, the spiritual resonances which respond to the symbol not only as sign but as “sacrament” and “presence.” 54
Christian Humanism:
Narcissism remains a problem of enormous magnitude, especially in our highly developed modern technological culture, which abounds in its own hidden forms of magic thinking, superstition, ritualism. Our sophisticated modern culture has its taboos, its obsessions, and all that goes into the formation of the neuroses, individual and collective, which so often take the place of formal religion in the minds of men. 146
Rebirth and the New Man in Christianity:
Man in modern technological society has begun to be callous and disillusioned. He has learned to suspect what claims to be new, to doubt all the latest and everything he’s drawn instinctively to the new and yet he sees in it nothing but the same old sham. The specious glitter of newness, the pretended creativity of a society in which youthfulness is commercialized and the young are old before they are twenty, fills some hearts with utter despair. There seems to be no way to find any real change. 196
July 11, 2019
"If patriotism is approved, chauvinism is not. The Christian is reminded that his allegiance is first of all to the entire human family, and that he must not appeal to Christian principles in order to justify a patriotism which, in fact, is dangerous or harmful to the universal good of the human race."
May 22, 2013
I read this book while on a long bus ride, and I otherwise might have put it down, but it kept me adequately entertained. My favorite essay in it is "The Streets Were Made for Celebrating," which is about communities. The others kind of all blend together and are pretty familiar territory if you know Merton or any modern-ish contemplative writers.
January 14, 2023
These lovely essays show several unusual and even quirky of Merton's explorations. Topics range from his beloved silence to urgent questions about war and economic oppression. Many of his concerns are very relevant in 2023; others are dated.
Merton's musings on the role of Christ in the world are not so much of interest to me because I'm not Christian, but I find them inspiring and intellectually challenging, understanding they are integral to Merton's thought.
He quotes other thinkers judiciously, but leaves out some that I thought he should draw on. How can Merton talk about the power of symbols to integrate the self without mentioning C.G. Jung, or the domination of technology without citing Jacques Elul? Why does Merton try to talk about marriage at all? He did, perhaps anticipate Jane Jacobs in talking about making streets livable.
Merton's musings on the role of Christ in the world are not so much of interest to me because I'm not Christian, but I find them inspiring and intellectually challenging, understanding they are integral to Merton's thought.
He quotes other thinkers judiciously, but leaves out some that I thought he should draw on. How can Merton talk about the power of symbols to integrate the self without mentioning C.G. Jung, or the domination of technology without citing Jacques Elul? Why does Merton try to talk about marriage at all? He did, perhaps anticipate Jane Jacobs in talking about making streets livable.
November 4, 2025
El libro es una recolección de diversos ensayos, que realmente entre ellos tienen poca conexión. A pesar de que Merton es un escritor intuitivo, sus ideas no terminan de cuajar. No sé muy bien por qué esto es así. Tal vez sea el abuso de entimemas en su argumentación, o la recurrencia de lugares comunes sin analizarlos (lugares como "vivimos en una sociedad individualista", "estamos dominados por el Mercado", "la razón científica tiene hoy primacía"). Quizás un libro más consistente hubiera dejado mejores impresiones.
August 26, 2017
I'd heard of Thomas Merton, because one of my pastors had made reference to him in a sermon or two, but I'd never read his work. I picked up this book because a wonderful, spiritual fellow parishioner is giving away her library (she just turned 89). What an amazing writer, deep thinker, and fearless advocate for ideas that were probably unpopular. Sadly, his comments are still current, even though he died decades ago. Well worth the read even if you aren't Catholic (I'm not).
May 25, 2018
ⓒ 1979. 3 1/2 stars. A collection of essays published after Merton's death. I loved his essays on symbolism, solitude, and the cargo cults of the South Pacific. His reflections on Pierre Teilhard's work was great, too. But some essays were so traditional and orthodox there was really nothing new to get from them – I had a hard time paying attention.
December 5, 2021
I love Thomas Merton and this was a great read. The first half of the book was especially good. I admit that I was totally lost in the essays on Teilhard (this was my first exposure to Teilhard and I was having trouble grasping the content). Merton was so prescient, so wise, and his words still hold so much relevance to the world today.
March 29, 2023
The best collection I’ve read from Merton thus far. Favorite chapters include:
- Love and Need: Is Love a Package or a Message?
- Symbolism: Communication or Communion?
- Cargo Cults of the South Pacific
- Christian Humanism
- Rebirth and the New Man in Christianity
- Love and Need: Is Love a Package or a Message?
- Symbolism: Communication or Communion?
- Cargo Cults of the South Pacific
- Christian Humanism
- Rebirth and the New Man in Christianity
March 3, 2026
Rather disappointed in this collection of articles, essays, and presentations gathered from throughout Merton's life. If not for the fact that I was reading with a group, I might have put the book aside. As an intro to Merton, I would recommend instead Seven Storey Mountain.
January 18, 2019
A lot of good insight and thought provoking wisdom about love and life, one of my favorites!
February 23, 2021
This book is quintessential Merton - bringing together philosophy, theology and issues of the day
February 8, 2023
“Love is in fact, an intensification of life, a completeness, a fullness, a wholeness of life.”❤️
May 17, 2024
The Love and Living essays were fantastic but I’ll skip the Seven Words and Christian Humanism sections entirely if I re-read it.
January 11, 2026
Published eleven years after Thomas Merton's death, this is a collection of essays edited by his friend Naomi Burton Stone and Brother Patrick Hart, his last secretary. As with many essay collections, the quality varies greatly, and for at least one I doubted the wisdom of publishing it. (The Street is for Celebration - did we really need these dated ramblings, and references to "the fuzz"?) Some of the essays on love are difficult to read, given what we know about his relationship with a young woman during his last years. But there is much more that is interesting and powerful, enough to remind of us of what was lost when Merton left us. The long middle section, 7 Words, is Merton at his best, acting as interlocutor between Catholic moral/ethical teaching and modern psychological man. The essay on the cargo cults is genius; and his exposition of some of the documents of Vatican II should be required reading for those misguided souls who lament it ever happened. There is a moving essay on the importance of mercy, and a discussion of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, acknowledging his genius and importance while also accepting that some of his work is beyond understanding, and perhaps just nonsense. The great essays make the whole book worth reading.
April 15, 2008
Some favorite Merton quotes...
"Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone-we find it with another." -- Thomas Merton
"Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real." --
Thomas Merton
"The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another." -- Thomas Merton
"Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone-we find it with another." -- Thomas Merton
"Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real." --
Thomas Merton
"The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another." -- Thomas Merton
March 4, 2016
As is common in academic writing, Thomas Merton seems to use a lot of words to say few things. There are some highlight-worthy quotes, but I found this collection of reflections to be slow plodding. The essays varied in interest level and quality. “Love and Need” gave me the most food for thought. “The Street Is for Celebration” struck me as poetic. But other essays, such as the one on “Symbolism: Communication or Communion” seemed to me too esoteric.
October 15, 2008
it was pretty good although in retrospect i wouldn't have picked a book published posthumously since it was piecing together separate essays he wrote. it makes me want to read more of his works, ones that are meant to be in a book together. particularly good are the chapters on love and mercy. some other stuff was a little heady for me.
May 28, 2010
The essays in this book were really hit or miss and never formed a cohesive whole like the essays from his other books. It seemed like a bit of a stretch to force them all into one book - clearly pulled together posthumously in a way I doubt Merton intended, but worthwhile reading nonetheless.
December 8, 2014
This is a wonderful book that concisely sums up the center of the Christian life. Smoother reading and less obtuse than some of Merton's other books, this is well done and worth the read.
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December 31, 2015Picked up and put down more than once - another one for the donation pile. I typically have a hard time ploughing through collections of nonfiction essays that are all by one author.
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May 15, 2026Gladly checked out that he was a Cambridge man after all my persistence.
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February 10, 20193.5/5
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews