Mary van Balen

"You're a natural contemplative," a priest/friend once told me in high school. A few months before, I wouldn't have known what he meant. Raised Catholic and having attending Catholic schools from the start, one might have imagined I would have already learned about the rich tradition of contemplative prayer in the the Church. No. Perhaps at that time, such knowledge was deemed unsuitable for the person in the pew. Or perhaps the diocesan clergy were not practicing contemplatives themselves: You can't give what you don't have.

A community of Carmelite nuns, opening their doors to those hungering for something deeper, gifted me with vocabulary and understanding of what I had been drawn to since a child: a quiet way of prayer that was simply part of who I was. They also provided a place where I could come and, well, pray. Sitting in the quiet chapel for a half hour before Mass, just aware of being with others in the Presence of God, was one of the most life-giving times of the week during those years. Read More 

Today I rediscovered this old photograph taken of me by John Howard Griffin on my visit to Thomas Merton's hermitage. I sat and held the photograph and remembered a glorious October day when my sister, Elizabeth, and I traveled to Gethsemani Abbey in Kentucky with friend, Fr. Maurice Flood, to spend a day with John Griffin at Merton's hermitage.

I had long been a fan of Merton's work, having read many of his books on prayer and contemplation as well as his famous autobiography, "The Seven Story Mountain." John Griffin was also familiar to me as the author of "Black Like Me," a book that was required reading in my high school. The book remains an amazing account of Griffin's encounter with racism in the South where he traveled after darkening his skin to pass as black.

When I met him, he was suffering from diabetes and from effects of the chemicals he had taken along with treatments to blacken his skin. Despite his poor health, he was working on a biography of Merton, entering into the prayer and spirituality that filled the place. The hills were full of autumn color: trees, New England asters, tall wispy grasses, and wild flowers. I sang outside, my own song, October Days. John fixed a wonderful dinner (see my blog post A Good Friend) and we shared conversation and song late into the night. Read More