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Merton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to support it.
The inner self is precisely that self which cannot be tricked or manipulated by anyone, even by the devil. He is like a very shy wild animal that never appears at all whenever an alien presence is at hand, and comes out only when all is perfectly peaceful,12 in silence, when he is untroubled and alone. He cannot be lured by anyone or anything, because he responds to no lure except that of the divine freedom.
-The Inner Experience Notes on Contemplation THOMAS MERTON
The message of hope the contemplative offers you, then, brother, is not that you need to find your way through the jungle of language and problems that today surround God: but that whether you understand or not, God loves you, is present in you, lives in you, dwells in you, calls you, saves you, and offers you an understanding and light which are like nothing you ever found in books or heard in sermons. (8.21.67 HGL 157–58)
-The Hidden Ground of Love: The Letters of Thomas Merton on Religious Experience and Social Concerns
5th of March - Seize the birthday!
"A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman’s birthday but never remembers her age.” — Robert Frost
I count gates and numbers, then play the guessing game
It's just the place that changes, the rest is still the same
But I've got memories and travel like gypsies in the night. And a thousand times I've seen this road
A thousand times
No Roots
Song by Alice Merton
“There is one thing I must do here at my woodshed hermitage, Saint Anne’s (and may I one day live here and do it all day long), and it is to prepare for my death. But that means a preparation in gentleness. A gentleness, a silence, a humility that I have never had before—which seems impossible in the community, where even my compassion is tinged with force and strain.
But if I am called to solitude, it is, I think, to unlearn all tension, and get rid of the strain that has always falsified me in the presence of others and put harshness into the words of my mind. If I have needed solitude, it is because I have always so much needed the mercy of Christ and needed His humility and His charity. How can I give love unless I have much more than I have ever had?”
- Thomas Merton from January 14, 1953 Journal III. 28-29
A fairly calm day, but unflat waters are a challenge with a tidal estuary.
Train 934, 26 March 2021, 7008-7132, Merton, SIMT-NZ
Founded in 1264 by Walter de Merton, Lord Chancellor and Bishop of Rochester. It is claimed to be the oldest college in Oxford but is disputed by Balliol and University College.
it is not complicated to lead the spiritual life. But it is difficult. We are blind, and subject to a thousand illusions. We must expect to be making mistakes almost all the time. We must be content to fall repeatedly and to begin again to try to deny ourselves, for the love of God.
-Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas, 235
With the evening weather looking reasonable, 925 looked like it might be worth a short chase south.
As there were quite a few clouds hanging around the sun, I decided to go with the easy pics... and striking some good luck, kept on going, ending up with six locations, all sunny (many clearing literally at the last second).
The revised timetable with this train running a little earlier means the light isn't as good further north at this time of year, but you can chase it further south. A shame there is no 926 to follow back, as it leaves Dunedin several hours later now.
Train 925, DXB 5080 and the last blue mainline diesel, which just hangs on in there - DC 4755, 6 Dec 2018, a composite pic at Merton, SIMT, NZ
Thomas Merton was a well known author of books on mysticism..
He was a Roman Catholic priest.
Dedicated to my friend Mario dns. Ken
A quick day trip to Oxford on a rare sunny day. We hit the book shops and have a meal at the Cow and Creek. I took my camera but pictures were few and far between. Merton Collage is at the end with it's Chapel and Corpus Christie Collage with its open door is on the right. The walking talking catastrophe mad as a box of frogs Liz Truss went to Merton Collage and I often wonder if they have taken her portrait down (we saw it during open house one year) or have left it up.
A good length 934, but Mr Wallace and I get here a bit late to scope out a better shot than this heavily cropped number. The yellow stakes are newly converted log wagons on the back.
8 March, 2019, Merton, SIMT, NZ
700056 forms the 9O26 09:49 Sutton - St Albans via Wimbledon at South Merton. I love the light in this shot and I have a strong emotional attachment as it was the last railway shot I managed to get before COVID took off, so it reminded me of uninhibited care free travel.
This image shows a yard at Merton College at Oxford with a view to 'Sundial Lawn'. I took this HDR to increase the dynamic in the darks of the sky and the details of the building.
The HDR is develped from 5 single shots.
"Many poets are not poets for the same reason that many religious men are not saints: they never succeed in being themselves. They never get around to being the particular poet or the particular monk they are intended to be by God. They never become the man or the artist who is called for by all the circumstances of their individual lives. They waste their years in vain efforts to be some other poet, some other saint...They wear out their minds and bodies in a hopeless endeavor to have somebody else's experiences or write somebody else's poems."
"What we have to be is what we are."
— Thomas Merton