Interesting article: Borgmann on Merton - Exploring the Possibility of Contemplation in a Technological Age

[Beunos]

The article can be found in the latest issue of Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought & Culture. Here’s a quote from Merton in it:

What was on TV? I have watched TV twice in my life. Certainly
I do not pretend that by simply refusing to keep up
with the latest news I am therefore unaffected by what goes
on, or free of it all. . . . Nine tenths of the news, as printed in
the papers, is pseudo news, manufactured events. Some days
ten-tenths. The ritual morning trance, in which one scans
columns of newsprint, creates a peculiar form of generalized
pseudo-attention to a pseudo-reality. This experience is taken
seriously, it is one’s daily immersion in “reality.” . . . My own
experience has been that renunciation of this self-hypnosis, of
this participation in the unquiet universal trance, is no sacrifice
of reality at all. To “fall behind” in this sense is to get out of
the big cloud of dust that everybody is kicking up, to breathe
and to see a little more clearly.

 

[christofirst]

Merton, of course, lived in another era. Once at Gethsemani, his contact with the “outside world” was very limited, consisting mostly of letters written to and from friends and associates, and these were often scrutinized by his abbot (which was common practice then). It sometimes amazes me that he was able to stay as timely and topical as he did.

I got rid of my TV years ago, as the hours spent viewing had become a great waste of time, but now I find my computer has effectively replaced it. I have to admit I often find that the lure of the computer even pulls me away from prayer. Whatever I’m working on, or a possible new email, or some bit of news, too often seems more compelling and interesting to me than time devoted to prayer. But I am aware of this tendency, and I, at the very least, always try to start my day with quiet prayer before turning on or checking my electronic devices (I have come to notice the word “vice” lurking in “device” ).