...all prayer, reading, meditation and all the activities of the monastic life are aimed at purity of heart, an unconditional and totally humble surrender to God, a total acceptance of ourselves and of our situation as willed by him. ...Purity of heart is then correlative to a new spiritual identity - the "self" as recognized in the context of realities willed by God...

Thomas Merton, Contemplative Prayer (New York: Image Books, 1971) 68
 

Thought for the Day

Purity of heart is the enlightened awareness of the new man, as opposed to the complex and perhaps rather disreputable fantasies of the "old man."

Contemplative Prayer: 68