I am re-reading Merton's "No Man is an Island" again and am taken with his erudite ideas on vocation. I am not sure why I have not seen this before in his texts. Merton, in usually poetic manner opens several good avenues to think about vocation. What struck me today is his insights in how we measure vocation.Merton writes:
"Gratitude and confidence and freedom from ourselves: these are signs that we have found our vocation and are living up to it even though everything else may seem to have gone wrong. They give us peace in any suffering. They teach us to laugh at despair. And we may have to."
Merton is closer to the ideals of the Gospel in this paragraph, in my opinion, than the pragmatic, motivational catnip of most of the contemporary authors on Christian Leadership.
Further Reading:
Merton, T 1955. No Man is an Island. New York: Harcourt.
