Thomas Merton

Love it and return to it as soon as you can.

And do not be too quick to change it for another.

City churches are sometimes quiet and peaceful solitudes.

Caves of silence where a person can seek refuge from the intolerable arrogance of the business world.

One can be more alone sometimes in church

than in a room in one's own house.

At home, one can always be routed out and disturbed.

And one should not resent this, for love sometimes demands it.

But in these quiet churches,

One remains nameless, undisturbed in the shadows.

Let there always be quiet, dark churches in which people can take refuge.

Places where they can kneel in silence.

Houses of God filled with a silent presence.

There, even when they do not know how to pray at least they can be still and breathe easily.

Let there be a place somewhere in which you can breathe naturally, quietly

and not have to take your breath in continuous short gasps.

A place where your mind can be idle and forget its concerns.

Descend into silence and worship the sacred in secret.

There can be no contemplation where there is no secret.

We have said that the solitude that is important to a contemplative is above all an interior and spiritual thing.