And so asking how to realize the true self is much like facing a large field covered with snow that has not yet been walked on and asking, “Where is the path?” The answer is to walk across it and there will be a path. One cannot find out how to realize the true self and then set out to reach the clearly visualized goal. Rather, one must walk on in faith and as one goes on, the goal appears–not before, nor within, nor beyond us, but it does appear.
James Finley, Merton’s Palace of Nowhere
When I was young, I was taught that the center of the Christian life was to “walk by the Spirit” (Galatians 5:16), a verse which was interpreted to mean that the Christian life is to learn the voice of the Spirit and then to obey. The problem: in the most-of-the-time when God isn’t speaking, then what do you do? One answer: do nothing.
Since then I have learned that the Christian tradition has developed precise language for this. The dynamic of waiting and only waiting I experienced then and which I tend toward now is what the Christian tradition has named Quietism, and the pole opposite Quietism is Activism. Both poles are problematic, Quietism being disembodied and solitary (and therefore anti-) Christianity and Activism being Peter cutting off Malchus’ ear at the arrest of Jesus.
The contemplative life springs from the conviction that there is a way to be grounded in God and to navigate between those two poles. Yes, we do work out our own salvation, but we never forget that we do so with fear and trembling.
Mostly Consolation 