THE FALSE SELF AND THE TRUE SELF-3

This is the third of eleven reflections on Thomas Merton’s teaching on the True Self/False Self dynamic. This conflictual but enlightening relationship permeates Merton’s huge quantity of writing on the spiritual life. The basic point of the conflict is the individual’s pull toward and away from God, one’ true and ultimate destiny. Merton’s exposure of the consequences of original sin is ruthless in its intensity. This is the task of the False Self. At the same time, the pull of the True Self, the ever-present call of God’s personal and passionate love, is even more powerful. The human heart is the battlefield of this seemingly endless confrontation.

Thomas Merton’s teachings on the True Self and False Self are very helpful in understanding the spiritual life. They offer great insights on how we experience God. Theses insights are evident in the Gospel stories and parables.

It is clear that Jesus is the perfect expression of the True Self, a total and complete openness to God’s will. The Blessed Mother was protected from the False Self in her Immaculate Conception.

Other individuals portrayed in the Gospels offer us the opportunity to see the basic conflict of good and evil, the weeds and the wheat take place in several different ways.

We have very positive expressions of the True Self in the Good Samaritan and the father of the two problematic sons. We have moments of significant choice for the True Self in the persons of the widow and her generous offering (Lk 21:1-4), in Zacchaeus (Lk19:1-10), in the Gentile woman (Mt 15:21-28) and her faith and determination to challenge Jesus for her daughter’s freedom. Then there was the woman with the twelve year hemorrhage (Mt 9:20-2), the grateful leper (Lk 17:11-17), the many other individuals who turned to Jesus for healing and plentiful other examples. All of these individuals offer a clear example of the True Self holding sway. No doubt, they all shared in the normal lifetime struggle between the True Self and the False Self that characterizes the human experience.

The False Self clearly prevails in the rich young man (Mt 19:16-25), the two sons in the parable (Lk15:11-32), the negative characters in most of the parables, and especially, in the leaders of the Jews who maneuvered the circumstances leading to the Passion and Death.

Then we have the story of the Apostles who display a genuinely revealing struggle with ambivalence. They reveal a heart in the fundamental struggle to make a definitive choice for Jesus. Their experience with the miracle-worker Jesus was an easy option. As the threatening darkness of the Road to Jerusalem rose to front and center, they were engulfed in doubt and confusion. This radical turn of events was frightening and extremely disturbing.

Peter offers a treasure trove of insights to this wavering between a yes and a no to Jesus, between the True Self and the False Self. In the Gospels’ description of Peter, we have a glorious display of our battle with the pull of God’s grace and love in the True Self, ever in the tension of the heart’s hesitation in the very human response of “not yet Lord!”. This is the best-loved phrase of the False Self.

One of the first encounters with Peter is the powerful declaration. “Depart from me Lord, for I am a sinful person.” (Lk 5:8) Yet, in the first of many contradictions, he turns around and leaves his boat, nets and “all” to follow Jesus. After witnessing the multiplication of the loaves and fishes and numerous other miracles, we have a clear demonstration of Peter’s ambivalence. While walking on the water towards Jesus, he surrenders to fear and begins to sink only to be saved by Jesus. (Mt 14:28-30).

In John’s magnificent chapter six on the Eucharist, we have another example of faith by Peter. He states, “Master, to whom shall we go. You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and our convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” (Jn 6:68-69)

We then have the road to Jerusalem section of Mark that is as clear a portrait as possible of Peter and the other Apostles’ wavering from the True Self to the darkness of the False Self (Mk 8:22-10:52).

Then, at the Last Supper, we have Peter rejecting the washing of his feet only to turn around making a whole body commitment to accepting Jesus’ invitation to the symbolic cleansing. This is followed by truly contradicting statements of “Master, why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.” (Jn 13: 37). A few hours later we have Peter’s denial: “You are not one of his disciples are you? He denied it and said “I am not.” (Jn 18:25)

Then we have the Resurrection stories. These show the journey away from heartbreaking incongruities of the final days before and including Calvary. The Peter of The Acts of the Apostles is the Peter dominated by the True Self. Here we have a picture of a person passionately committed to walking with Jesus in service and love. Ultimately, he surrendered his life generously in witness to Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

These examples from the New Testament have a great message for us on our pilgrimage to God. First and foremost, the message of Jesus comes to us in stages over our lifetime.

Our journey is not straight forward. Our deliverance from the ambivalence of the False Self is a back and forth movement until the end. It is normal to think we are safe and committed to Jesus. In reality, however, our heart is most often dominated by false and hidden values of conventional wisdom.

• We only experience the message and call of Jesus in stages. We think we have it. Then we experience a fresh encounter calling us forward into new and welcoming horizons of life and light.

• We only achieve the full power of the True Self in contemplation or death. For most of our life, we live with the struggle between good and evil in the symbols of the True Self and False Self.

• Humility, our acceptance of the truth of our human condition, will help us to gradually see the pervasiveness of the consequences of Original Sin. Awareness of our sinfulness and brokenness is a moment of freedom that helps us turn to our merciful God. This is the essential task of the True Self: knowledge of our merciful and saving God and of our sinful but loved and forgiven condition as a child of God.

• Life is a struggle to be open to God’s call to live the True Self and to reject the inordinate pull of the False Self. This is a clear description for us of what it means to take up our cross and to walk with Jesus.

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THE FALSE SELF AND THE TRUE SELF-2

Introduction 

This is the second of eleven reflections on Thomas Merton’s teaching on the True Self/False Self dynamic. This conflictual but enlightening relationship permeates Merton’s huge quantity of writing on the spiritual life. The basic point of the conflict is the individual’s pull toward and away from God, one’ true and ultimate destiny. Merton’s exposure of the consequences of original sin is ruthless in its intensity. This is the task of the False Self. At the same time, the pull of the True Self, the ever-present call of God’s personal and passionate love, is even more powerful. The human heart is the battlefield of this seemingly endless confrontation.
Merton’s teaching on the dynamic of the True Self/False Self is a truly marvelous gift for our spiritual journey. However, it demands some basic understanding of our true goal in life. First and foremost, we must realize that our rightful destiny is union with God. To clarify this goal, which most often we distort by our talk of heaven, we need to appreciate several basic points.

• We are imbedded with a fierce pull to selfishness and sin by our heritage of Original Sin.

• We are in need of a purification and transformation to break loose of our sinful condition.

• The call of the gospel message of Jesus is a constant movement away from the fallacies of the False Self to the saving freedom of the True Self.

• The true destiny of our spiritual life is embracing this struggle of breaking loose from the bondage of the False Self. This means I was born with a mask if not a series of masks. The movement to the truth involves the shattering of the masks and accepting my true identity.

• We only achieve the final and total victory of the True Self in either contemplation or death. Most of the positive victories in our life are at best partial and incomplete in their movement away from the power of the False Self.

In many ways, Merton anticipated the incarnational approach to spirituality called for by Vatican II. He emphasized human experience as the source and location of our experience of God. He saw God’s will in the concrete demands of daily life. God is seeking us in every circumstance of our life. On God’s part, it is always a call to love. It may be the alarm clock in the morning, the thrill of a little league game, a moment of crisis in the emergency room, the joy of a Thanksgiving dinner or the pain and joy of an empty nest. God is present with a call to life and love in every moment and circumstance. All of life is grace and a summoning into the True Self.

According to Merton, when we speak of the “I” we are most often referring to the superficial, empirical and external values of the False Self. All of the many characteristics of the False Self are deceitful because they are contingent. This means that they will pass away at death. This is a long, hard lesson for us to accept. A wonderful example to this truth is Jesus’ story of the man who had to build his new barns so he could pursue the illusionary freedom of his new security while, in fact, he had only hours to live. (Lk 16:15-21)

This transient “I” which holds center place in our consciousness is, at best, a mask disguising the abyss between the False Self and the True Self. Merton says this deeply rooted deception that permeates our life is going to pass away as smoke flowing out of a chimney.

The true task in our life is in a growing awareness of what is real. It demands breaking loose of the conventional wisdom that is a singular stumbling block to the freeing power of the gospel. We live in a darkness that we think is light. It is an extensive and challenging road that leads to Jesus, the Light of the World.

Almost everything in our consumer-driven society speaks of values contrary to the message of Jesus. We need to shatter the constraints of the mindset that sees security in our possessions, a constant desire to look younger, a pull to an endless search for the right medicine and stock portfolio that will all but assure us of immortality. The battle of the True Self and False Self will lead to a recognition of the desperate need for a self-knowledge and a stunning transformation of consciousness leading us to see our reality through the eyes of the gospel.

These changes will open Pandora’s Box for us. Our deeply held prejudices will surface into the light of day much to our dismay. Slowly, we will learn that all the idols were not limited only in the Old Testament. The idols of our self-deception that make us the center of reality are many and ever-present in our life. They even show up in the “respectable” practice of religion. We slowly learn that our faith journey is often a matter of convenience rather than conviction.

Breaking loose from the conventional wisdom of a comfortable religion, we are shocked to learn that being a “good Christian” is truly a Road to Jerusalem. Like the early disciples, we will need to travel in a faith that must face misunderstanding, confusion and doubt. The true Jesus is evolving out of the caricature of him that we have treasured for so long. Our long-cherished hopes and ambitions are disintegrating right before our eyes. The precious desires of respectability and recognition, security and acceptance, slowly will fade from our perspective. We begin to recognize our God in the weakness, rejection and total devastation of the Crucified Christ. The passage from the False Self to the True Self is a truly shattering experience.

This passage is a moment of deep transition in our life. Pleasure, success, health, money and. even life itself, all take on a sense of lesser values. Eventually, we will have to transcend pain, suffering and death. This all leads to the embrace of God’s loving call to life that is without end.

This victory is possible because, in spite of the pervasive consequences of Original Sin, God’s grace is more powerful, more universal and more overwhelming. God wants nothing more than that we accept God’s love and mercy as the full blossoming of the True Self.

Conclusion

In the beginning, it was stated how important it is to clearly understand that our final, non-negotiable goal is union with God, a calling that is eternal. Our life must be a constant quest to live the values of truth justice, mercy and love. This is God’s will for us. Our spiritual growth will unveil God’s presence in our daily lives. We will eventually see the utter importance of our daily responsibilities and relationships. They hold the gold of God’s will in the concrete. They will be a constant call away from selfishness; away from the dominance of the False Self. These commitments to our daily call to love and service will be a growing invitation away from the fluff of life to the substance of the gospel. God’s love and mercy become the means to our acceptance of the True Self. All of this search for life and truth is enhanced by a commitment to deep personal prayer.

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THE FALSE SELF AND THE TRUE SELF-1

Merton’s Gift Leading To Deep Personal Prayer 

Recently, I had the opportunity to read, reflect on and pray with some of the many wonderful books of Thomas Merton. He was definitely a person of prominence as a wisdom and prophetic figure in 20th century America.

Most of his writings deal with a more advanced spirituality. I am always on the search to gather information to help people in the beginning of the journey of deep personal prayer. Two items popped out to me as truly fitting the message for my blogs on the first stages of prayer.

These two items are Merton’s definition prayer, and his teaching on the False Self and the True Self. In both of these subjects, Merton points to their importance in achieving the final goal of prayer, contemplation. I would like to offer a series of reflections on these important insights of Merton. The two Merton items are remarkably helpful in the early stages of the quest for deep personal prayer.

In a brief analysis of the two items, I hope to describe how they connect to some of the most significant factors that support growth in deep personal prayer.

Merton’s Definition of Prayer

From the beginning of my writings on deep personal prayer, which began almost ten years ago, I have used Merton’s definition of prayer. Prayer is yearning for the awareness of the presence of God, a personal understanding of God’s word, knowledge of God’s will and the capacity to hear and obey.

There are some immediate consequences that flow from this approach to prayer.

1. It centers on God and not ourselves.
2. It is about our personal transformation flowing from God’s word and will.
3. It centers on a hunger in our heart for God rather than on our personal needs.
4. These three initial insights offer a great beginning of a spirituality that will support a continual growth in prayer leading to a life rooted in gospel vales.

False Self and True Self

Merton gives extensive treatment to this fundamental teaching about the spiritual journey. Most of it is related to the need to pursue the final stage of prayer, contemplation. In fact, his conception is that the True Self is only totally achieved in contemplation or at the moment of death.

I believe his teachings on the topic also offer great guidance and highlight the meaningful implications for those in the beginning stages of the prayer journey.

In treating the False Self, Merton begins by pointing out that we are dominated by false values that ultimately, not only deceive us, but lead us nowhere. Merton has a long list of adjectives that at various times he uses in place of his main describing word, false. They are: superficial, empirical, outward, contingent, private, shadow, illusory, fictitious, smoke, petty and external. These all contribute to his principal message: to describe the consequences of Original Sin in the daily human experience.

The True Self offers a goal of freedom and transformation, and in our search for God, a return to our original innocence. It happens as we live the gospel values. Its final expression is when we reach our goal, union with God.

Along the way, there are several helpful activities that facilitate this movement from an all-engrossing selfishness to walking with Jesus. These contributing elements are self-knowledge, transformation of consciousness, detachment, elimination of addiction, humility and a growing focus on Jesus and his message.

These are all indicators and facilitators of the transition from the False Self to the True Self. Deep personal prayer is central to this activity which is the basic stuff of the spiritual life.

I hope to flesh out these positive contributions to our Christian life in search of the gospel in a series of blog reflections. In particular, I would like to connect several of the gospel stories, characters and parables to our personal passage from the dominance of our False Self to the life-giving pursuit of our True Self. In the process we are basically seeking to share Paul’s reality: “Yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives within me.” (Gal 2:20)

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THE FALSE SELF AND THE TRUE SELF

Introduction

I am going to offer the following eleven reflections on Thomas Merton’s teaching on the True Self/False Self dynamic. This conflictual but enlightening relationship permeates Merton’s huge quantity of writing on the spiritual life. The basic point of the conflict is the individual’s pull toward and away from God, one’ true and ultimate destiny. Merton’s exposure of the consequences of original sin is ruthless in its intensity. This is the task of the False Self. At the same time, the pull of the True Self, the ever-present call of God’s personal and passionate love, is even more powerful. The human heart is the battlefield of this seemingly endless confrontation.

Merton portrays the True Self as an ever-present invitation into a glorious future that is never achieved with the exception of an effective purification of contemplation or the experience of death. Nevertheless, it is a driving force in the definitive human endeavor to seek God.

This powerful attraction of the True Self calls us into the depths of our being where God dwells. The foundation of the Christian life is this. To truly embrace the True Self in God, one has to leave oneself and give it to others in love. This is almost always a partial and incomplete effort for most of us. The True Self’s clash with the False Self is always an experience calling us into a new future. The grace for us is in the seemingly endless struggle to choose the True Self and to forsake the False Self’s plea for indulgence, self-enhancement and glorification of our bondage to self-centeredness. This is the battle of the spiritual life. This is the breaking loose of the affliction of our self-absorption to be free walk with Jesus.

Merton’s approach to spirituality is very human and down-to-earth. For Merton, the true relevance of the True Self/False Self dynamic flows from an authentic spirituality that affects every level of life. It responds to life as experienced by ordinary people. In contrast, most distorted spiritualities usually end up in fanaticism or elitism far removed from the common experience of most individuals.

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