NSoC 22: Life in Christ

See Notes on this series...

From the mystery of Christ to the mystery of life in Christ goes Merton in this chapter.

Christ brings together the natures of God and man through the Holy Spirit into what the New Testament calls the "new man." This life in Christ is a two-way street: that which we receive from God by the Spirit we give back to God as we love our brothers through the Spirit.

This life provides an assurance against the temporal things as Merton lists in a litany against fear, loss, and vain striving for pleasure. He says that sin has a crippling contradictory effect on us: we have to war against ourselves to keep away from the things that would do us most harm and we have to make ourselves take the easy and free gifts offered us as though they would do us harm.

Then Merton gives a beautiful metaphor of the soul as "wax waiting for a seal." If the wax is allowed to be softened by the heat of God's will, then God's stamp will be easily received. However, if the wax is not allowed to soften, it will not accept the stamp; indeed it will be crushed "into powder."

He then speaks of the mystery of the cross and the idea of sacrifice, a mystery he says is perpetuated by the Mass, and the nature of the bread and the wine.

Quaff:
I love the wax metaphor. Consider it filed away for future reference.

Merton presents a Catholic view of the Eucharist, as one would expect. I've had to deal with what the sacrament of the Lord's Supper means to me in the switch from SBC to AMiA. Baptists deemphasize the supper, in my opinion, for fear of appearing "Catholic." I've never belonged to a Baptist church that observed the supper more than two or three times a year, and now I belong to a church that observes it weekly. I like that much better. I need it. Though I may not attach the same "presence" to it that Merton did, I revere it just as much, in my Anglican-"via media" way.

Query:

• Am I soft wax awaiting imprint or hard wax prone to crumble?
• How can "life in Christ" alleviate my fears and strivings?
• How can I make sure the weekly observance of the bread and wine remain a revolutionary tradition in my life?