Under the Sign of the Waterbearer: A Life of Thomas Merton

By Dr James T. Baker

Thomas Merton, known in religion as Father Louis, was born in France, in his words "under the sign of the waterbearer," in 1915. He studied at Cambridge in England and at Columbia in New York. As a student he lived what his friends have described as a bawdy life but turned from it to become a devout Roman Catholic. As America entered World War II he entered the abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky, and for 27 years he was a Trappist monk, in the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance. During his early days there he wrote an autobiography which became the third bestselling nonfiction book of the year 1949 and went on to write more than 50 more until in 1968 he at last went back into the world to meet with monastic leaders in Asia.

Apparently Pope Francis read Metron’s works and in his address to the U.S. Congress named Merton, Dorothy Day, Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther King Jr. as people he hoped Americans would emulate. He had entered Gethsemani on December 10, 1941, when he was nearing his twenty-seventh birthday; and on December 10, 1968, as he was nearing his fifty-fourth birthday, he was accidentally electrocuted while attending a religious conference in Bangkok, Thailand. Many in the West consider him a saint and many in the East consider him a manifestation of the Buddha. His autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, has been compared to the Confessions of Saint Augustine No one who reads it or any other of his books is ever the same again.

The author of this play, James Thomas Baker, knew Thomas Merton and wrote the original version of the play soon after Merton's death. This completely revised and rewritten version, done as an expression of love and admiration in 2015, is to commemorate his hundred birthday.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Grave Distractions Publications
• Release date: Sep 10, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311987877

Dr James T. Baker

James Baker developed his passion for history and religion while in high school, during his days as a Bulldog. He is a graduate of Baylor and Florida State Universities and has for many years taught at Western Kentucky University. Throughout his career he has been a prolific writer, authoring 22 books and over 60 articles. His articles have appeared in such places as Christian Century, Commonweal, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and The American Benedictine Review. His creative talents and his unique points of view and insights have also made him a highly sought after speaker. He has delivered addresses and papers in the United States, Italy, Korea, Taiwan, China, and other Asian countries. He often appears in a one person show-presentation of industrialist-philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. In addition to his teaching duties, James directs the Canadian Parliamentary Internship Program.

Book preview

ACT I

SCENE 1

STRANGE ISLANDS

[Words above the Scene]

(From left to right, as the action will flow, we see the abbey Gatehouse, the altar of the chapel, and Father Abbot’s study. Over the door are the words PAX INTRANTIBUS. Tom Merton arrives on the Gatehouse tentatively, rubbing and blowing on his hands. He wears an overcoat and hat. He starts to ring the bell, hesitates, and then turns to address the audience.)

I got this idea, see, I had no clue what I was doing or where I was going, but I said God will show me. The old business, you know, where you close your eyes, open your Bible, put your finger down on the page without looking, and whatever it says there, that’s God’s will, and you do it. A few saints have pulled it off, so I’ve read, and a lot of desperate little old ladies, and I’m neither of those, but I was at a dead end, and I was willing to try anything. So I warned God what I was about to do, and I shut my eyes, opened my Bible, put my finger down, and I opened slowly, afraid of what I would find, afraid it would say, Judas went out and hanged himself, do thou likewise. But to my amazement, there it was, my answer, the one I so wanted to see. Was I to go on teaching sleepy college undergraduates, was I to take the mission job up in Harlem, or... was I to be a Trappist monk? It said, Ecce eris tacens: You will be silent. Luke, chapter one, verse twenty-one, the words of the angel to Zacharias. The words of God to me. I was to shut my loud mouth and be a silent Trappist monk. God’s Word, God’s will, remember?

(He looks up, then shrugs.)

Anyway, I hope so, and here I am.

(He goes up to the gate and rings the bell. He waits but there is no response. He tries again.)

BROTHER PAUL

(From inside, an elderly monk, with a thick German accent.)

Eh, ya, holdja horses there. I’m comin’, I’m comin’.

(He opens the gate and holds a lantern toward Merton.)

Eh? Oh, ya, there you are. Ya, young man, what is it? Who are ya?

MERTON

Me. Tom Merton. A pilgrim. Sorry to wake you.

PAUL

Wake me? You didn’t wake me. I’m up all night on this job. No sleep for the wicked, they say. Sure none for the Night Gatekeeper. Come on in outa the cold, boy.

(He motions him in and holds the lantern up to his face as he passes.)

Hey, wait a minute, I remember you.

(He follows him in.)

You come here once before.

MERTON

At Easter, yes. You have a good memory.

(He offers his hand.)

Tom. Tom Merton.

PAUL

I’m Brother Paul. Here let me take your coat ‘n’ hat, Tom.

MERTON

Uh, no, no thanks, not just yet. I had to help my ride fix a flat on his truck, and it was cold out there. It’s sorta cold even in here. You turn off the heat at night?

PAUL

Turn it off? The heat? No, we don’t turn it off. We never turn it on.

(He throws back his head and laughs, and Tom reluctantly joins in.)

You was here, when, at Easter, y’say?

MERTON

Yes, Easter.

PAUL

Oh, well you don’t know what it’s like here in winter. It’s mild now, just December, dontcha know. You should feel it in February. It’s good for the soul, dontcha know? You go to the chapel when it’s below zero outside and no more than twenty inside. You kneel on that chapel floor to pray and it freezes the very devil outa ya. Your knees knock against the stones, you see your breath as you pray, and you thank God just to be alive.

MERTON

Sounds good.

PAUL

It does? Well, it’s not, believe me, Tom, it’s not.

MERTON

I mean it sounds good to me. The sacrifice. Even the pain. I love it. You’re a lucky man.

PAUL

I am?

MERTON

(He laughs.)

Yes. This is what I hoped I would find. Discomfort, privation, the things that purify the soul.

PAUL

You can say that, Tom, because you don’t have to live here.

MERTON

I don’t have to, but I want to. See, I’ve come to join up, I want to be a Trappist like you.

PAUL

You don’t say.

MERTON

Yes, if you’ll take me.

PAUL

(His reserve melts.)

Well, of course we will.

(He embraces Merton.)

Ya, sure we will. Well, I don’t have final say, but I know Father Abbot will give a nod. How grand. A new brother for Christmas. No, there’ll be two. Another came last week. Oh, but what I was asayin’ you know about the cold and all, don’t take me serious. I wouldn’t be anyplace else, dontcha know. It’s an old man vice, the only one he’s got left, to complain, dontcha know.

MERTON

(Laughs.)

I saw through it.

PAUL

(Laughs too.)

Sure, sure. Come on over, Tom, sit down.

(He leads him to a bench and motions him to sit. He puts down his lantern and sits beside him.)

Sure, I was just foolin’ around, Tom. I’ve been here, let’s see now, 32 years.

MERTON

No joke. Wow. 32 years. You have a vocation, that’s for sure.

PAUL

Ya, ya. My two brothers and me, three of us Krauses, we come over from Bavaria, dontcha know, to be monks at Gethsemani, all the way over the ocean. That was in 1909, before the