Get Your Free Audiobook
-
Thomas Merton
- A Life Inspired
- Narrated by: Robert Grothe
- Length: 1 hr and 56 mins
- Categories: Religion & Spirituality, Christianity
Non-member price: $10.08
People who bought this also bought...
-
New Seeds of Contemplation
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Jonathan Montaldo, Sharon Cross
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
New Seeds of Comtemplation is one of Thomas Merton's most widely read and best loved books. Christians and non-Christians alike have joined in praising it as a notable successor in the meditative tradition of St. John of the Cross, the Cloud of Unknowing, and the medieval mystics, while others have compared Merton's reflections to those of Thoreau.
-
-
Beautiful, poetic masterpiece.
- By Anonymous User on 14-12-2020
-
The Wisdom of the Desert
- Sayings from the Desert Fathers of the Fourth Century
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Greg Chun
- Length: 1 hr and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Wisdom of the Desert was one of Thomas Merton's favorites among his own books, surely because he had hoped to spend his last years as a hermit. The personal tones of the translations and the blend of reverence and humor so characteristic of him show how deeply Merton identified with the legendary authors of these sayings and parables, the fourth-century Christian fathers who sought solitude and contemplation in the deserts of the Near East.
-
The Way of Chuang Tzu (Second Edition)
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Greg Chun
- Length: 2 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Working from existing translations, Thomas Merton composed a series of his own versions of the classic sayings of Chuang Tzu, the most spiritual of Chinese philosophers. Chuang Tzu, who wrote in the fourth and third centuries BC, is the chief authentic historical spokesperson for Taoism and its founder, Lao Tzu (a legendary character known largely through Chuang Tzu’s writings).
-
Contemplative Prayer
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Jonathan Montaldo
- Length: 4 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is Merton at his best, applying ancient wisdom to the longings of our age through thoughtful commentary on Scripture and writers of the Western spiritual tradition. This book distills Merton's own reading and long experience with contemplation.
-
Eye of the Heart
- A Spiritual Journey into the Imaginal Realm
- By: Cynthia Bourgeault
- Narrated by: Patricia Rodriguez
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Author Cynthia Bourgeault investigates the imaginal realm - an energetic realm well known to the mystical traditions but often forgotten in our own times. It is invisible to the physical eye, but clearly perceptible through the eye of the heart. The imaginal realm has long been associated with the personal world of dreams, prophecy, and oracles, and it also points toward a higher vision of our human purpose that is both evolutionary and collective. Bourgeault explores both aspects of imaginal reality and tells listeners how we can cooperate more fully with its guidance in our lives.
-
-
Stepping in to the unknown - a courageous work
- By Marita on 17-01-2021
-
Love, Henri
- Letters on the Spiritual Life
- By: Henri J.M. Nouwen
- Narrated by: Douglas James
- Length: 10 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Love, Henri consists of over 100 letters that stretch from the earliest years of Henri's career up through his last 10 years at L'Arche Daybreak. Rich in spiritual insights, the letters highlight a number themes that emerged in both Henri's work over the years, including vocation, solitude, prayer, suffering, and perseverance in difficult times. These deeply spiritual letters, sometimes poignant, sometimes funny, ulimately demonstrate the rich value of communicating with God through others.
-
-
Blessed beyond words
- By Jacqui on 29-05-2018
-
New Seeds of Contemplation
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Jonathan Montaldo, Sharon Cross
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
New Seeds of Comtemplation is one of Thomas Merton's most widely read and best loved books. Christians and non-Christians alike have joined in praising it as a notable successor in the meditative tradition of St. John of the Cross, the Cloud of Unknowing, and the medieval mystics, while others have compared Merton's reflections to those of Thoreau.
-
-
Beautiful, poetic masterpiece.
- By Anonymous User on 14-12-2020
-
The Wisdom of the Desert
- Sayings from the Desert Fathers of the Fourth Century
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Greg Chun
- Length: 1 hr and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Wisdom of the Desert was one of Thomas Merton's favorites among his own books, surely because he had hoped to spend his last years as a hermit. The personal tones of the translations and the blend of reverence and humor so characteristic of him show how deeply Merton identified with the legendary authors of these sayings and parables, the fourth-century Christian fathers who sought solitude and contemplation in the deserts of the Near East.
-
The Way of Chuang Tzu (Second Edition)
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Greg Chun
- Length: 2 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Working from existing translations, Thomas Merton composed a series of his own versions of the classic sayings of Chuang Tzu, the most spiritual of Chinese philosophers. Chuang Tzu, who wrote in the fourth and third centuries BC, is the chief authentic historical spokesperson for Taoism and its founder, Lao Tzu (a legendary character known largely through Chuang Tzu’s writings).
-
Contemplative Prayer
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Jonathan Montaldo
- Length: 4 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is Merton at his best, applying ancient wisdom to the longings of our age through thoughtful commentary on Scripture and writers of the Western spiritual tradition. This book distills Merton's own reading and long experience with contemplation.
-
Eye of the Heart
- A Spiritual Journey into the Imaginal Realm
- By: Cynthia Bourgeault
- Narrated by: Patricia Rodriguez
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Author Cynthia Bourgeault investigates the imaginal realm - an energetic realm well known to the mystical traditions but often forgotten in our own times. It is invisible to the physical eye, but clearly perceptible through the eye of the heart. The imaginal realm has long been associated with the personal world of dreams, prophecy, and oracles, and it also points toward a higher vision of our human purpose that is both evolutionary and collective. Bourgeault explores both aspects of imaginal reality and tells listeners how we can cooperate more fully with its guidance in our lives.
-
-
Stepping in to the unknown - a courageous work
- By Marita on 17-01-2021
-
Love, Henri
- Letters on the Spiritual Life
- By: Henri J.M. Nouwen
- Narrated by: Douglas James
- Length: 10 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Love, Henri consists of over 100 letters that stretch from the earliest years of Henri's career up through his last 10 years at L'Arche Daybreak. Rich in spiritual insights, the letters highlight a number themes that emerged in both Henri's work over the years, including vocation, solitude, prayer, suffering, and perseverance in difficult times. These deeply spiritual letters, sometimes poignant, sometimes funny, ulimately demonstrate the rich value of communicating with God through others.
-
-
Blessed beyond words
- By Jacqui on 29-05-2018
-
In Praise of the Useless Life
- A Monk’s Memoir
- By: Paul Quenon OCSO, Pico Lyer - foreword
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 5 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Monastic life and its counter-cultural wisdom come alive in the stories and lessons of Br. Paul Quenon, OCSO, during his more than five decades as a Trappist at the Abbey of Gethsemani. He served as a novice under Thomas Merton, and he also welcomed some of the monastery's more well-known visitors to Merton's hermitage. In Praise of the Useless Life includes Quenon's quiet reflections on what it means to live each day with careful attentiveness. The humble peace and simplicity of the monastery and of Quenon's daily life are beautifully portrayed in this memoir.
-
Dorothy Day
- Dissenting Voice of the American Century
- By: John Loughery, Blythe Randolph
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 17 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After growing up in a conservative middle-class Republican household and working several years as a left-wing journalist, Dorothy Day converted to Catholicism and became an anomaly in American life for the next 50 years. As an orthodox Catholic, political radical, and a rebel who courted controversy, she attracted three generations of admirers. A believer in civil disobedience, Day went to jail several times protesting the nuclear arms race. She was critical of capitalism and US foreign policy, and as skeptical of modern liberalism as political conservatism.
-
Can You Drink the Cup?
- By: Henri J. M. Nouwen
- Narrated by: Dan Anderson O.F.M.
- Length: 2 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Nouwen uses the cup as a metaphor to articulate the basic postures of the spiritual life: holding, lifting and drinking. The cup is a powerful image in our human experience. We use cups in our celebrations of a variety of events. Nouwen reminds us that we also use the cup as a symbolic vessel—for sorrow, joy, blessings, salvation.
-
Antebellum Era
- A History from Beginning to End
- By: Hourly History
- Narrated by: Jason Zenobia
- Length: 1 hr and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In his Gettysburg Address in 1863, President Lincoln wrote of the birth of the United States that had taken place “fourscore and seven years ago”. Although a broad overview of American history leaps from the surrender of the British at Yorktown in 1781 to the firing upon Fort Sumter in 1861, historians realize that those 80 years in between represent a dynamic but unsung era in the chronicle of the nation’s ancestry. The Antebellum Era encompasses the period from the first Fugitive Slave Law of 1793 to its more drastic sequel in 1850.
-
Zen and the Birds of Appetite
- By: Thomas Merton
- Narrated by: Greg Chun
- Length: 4 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Exploring the relationship between Christianity and Zen, especially through his dialogue with the great Zen teacher D.T. Suzuki, the book makes an excellent introduction to a comparative study of these two traditions, as well as giving the listener a strong taste of the mature Merton. Never does one feel him losing his own faith; rather, one feels that faith getting deeply clarified and affirmed. Just as the body of "Zen" cannot be found by the scavengers, so too, Merton suggests, with the eternal truth of Christ.
-
The Long Loneliness
- The Autobiography of the Legendary Catholic Social Activist
- By: Dorothy Day
- Narrated by: Nancy Linari
- Length: 12 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Dorothy Day died in 1980, the New York Times eulogized her as “a nonviolent social radical of luminous personality...founder of the Catholic Worker Movement and leader for more than 50 years in numerous battles of social justice.” Here, in her own words, this remarkable woman tells of her early life as a young journalist in the crucible of Greenwich Village political and literary thought in the 1920s, and of her momentous conversion to Catholicism that meant the end of a Bohemian lifestyle and common-law marriage.
-
Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls
- Revealing the Jewish Roots of Christianity
- By: John Bergsma
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 7 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From award-winning scholar John Bergsma comes an intriguing audiobook that reveals new insights on the Essenes, a radical Jewish community predating Christianity, whose existence, beliefs, and practices are often overlooked in the annuls of history. Bergsma reveals how this Jewish sect directly influenced the beliefs, sacraments, and practices of early Christianity and offers new information on how Christians lived their lives, worshiped, and eventually went on to influence the Roman Empire and Western civilization.
-
-
early church practices with 1st cen justifications
- By Anonymous User on 09-10-2020
-
He Sat Down (So You Can Too)
- How to Receive the Peace of Jesus in a World that Stands
- By: Wes Raley
- Narrated by: Wes Raley
- Length: 6 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We know that Jesus came to give us an abundant life (John 10:10). Yet many of us would describe our lives with words such as busy, stressed, anxious, or even overwhelmed. Despite how much we dislike the weight of such a frantic existence, we often carry on living with a gap between our experience and the fullness of life we know that Jesus offers. But it doesn't have to be this way. The Bible makes it clear that the position of victory is seated. Seated in Christ.
-
Following Jesus
- Finding Our Way Home in an Age of Anxiety
- By: Henri J. M. Nouwen, Richard Rohr, Gabrielle Earnshaw
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 3 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At one of the lowest points in Henri Nouwen’s life, he gave a series of lectures on the importance of following Jesus in an age of anxiety. Drawn from those talks, this new work reveals what sustained Nouwen to remain faithful to the teachings of Jesus and led him to become an icon of compassion and vulnerability. Here, he writes eloquently about calling and purpose, fear and hope. And he explains why - with so many choices available to the 21st-century seeker - the greatest reward for those looking for spiritual direction is rediscovering Jesus’ teaching on love.
-
Wondrous Encounters
- Scripture for Lent
- By: Richard Rohr
- Narrated by: John Quigley O.F.M.
- Length: 4 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of today's most prophetic voices, Richard Rohr invites us to self-disclosure and to enter the wondrous divine dialogue with clarity, insight and holy desire! These daily meditations for Lent are his gift to us for our transformation into our original "image and likeness," which is the very image of God.
-
Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light
- The Private Writings of the 'Saint of Calcutta'
- By: Brian Kolodiejchuk M.C.
- Narrated by: Sherry Kennedy Brownrigg, Paul Smith, Greg Friedman O.F.M., and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This book includes correspondence (and context for understanding it) from Mother Teresa's early years in religious life and throughout her years as founder of a new religious community. This correspondence reveals Mother Teresa's struggles, doubts and her sense of abandonment by God. These revelations can encourage and strengthen us as she reveals her abiding faith despite darkness and trials.
-
-
The Story of Mother Teresa
- By Judy Amadio on 17-07-2019
-
Hope to Die
- The Christian Meaning of Death and the Resurrection of the Body
- By: Scott Hahn, Emily Stimpson Chapman
- Narrated by: Scott Hahn
- Length: 4 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Catholics, we believe in the resurrection of the body. We profess it in our creed. We're taught that to bury and pray for the dead are corporal and spiritual works of mercy. We honor the dead in our Liturgy through the rite of Christian burial. We do all of this, and more, because when Jesus Christ took on flesh for the salvation of our souls he also bestowed great dignity on our bodies. In Hope to Die: The Christian Meaning of Death and the Resurrection of the Body, Scott Hahn explores the significance of death and burial from a Catholic perspective.
Publisher's Summary
Thomas Merton is one of the most famous American Catholic authors of the twentieth century. A prolific writer, Merton published 36 books and collections of poems over the span of 27 years, and has 38 posthumous publications that bear his name. Even more impressive than his voluminous output, however, is his deep spirituality that enraptured generations of people seeking intimate union with God. This is the story of a man who sought God throughout his life and dedicated himself to a life of holiness.
More from the same
What listeners say about Thomas Merton
Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Aschendorff
- 13-04-2017
Robert Grothe--narrator, is a real live robot!
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
This narration was so clumsy and awful that it almost totally made me want to stop listening. So bad I honest to gosh don't believe it was done by a human but a clumsily computerized robot. Not one, not one name or word that a fairly educated Catholic would know was pronounced correctly...just impossible! However, it is SO terrible that it would almost make it worth the price to listen to it, laugh at the stupid mis-pronunciations, and have a contest with a friend determining what the "narrator" attempted to say.
Who was your favorite character and why?
Obviously, Thomas Merton.
Would you be willing to try another one of Robert Grothe’s performances?
On April Fool's Day, yes. If it was free
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
over maybe six months...
Any additional comments?
This is my very first review. I want my money back!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Kindle Customer
- 08-08-2017
This is a dreadful reading
Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?
I would not recommend it. It is written at a level appropriate for a child and the narration is dreadful.
What other book might you compare Thomas Merton to and why?
You would be much better off reading Seven Storey Mountain.
How did the narrator detract from the book?
The narrator has difficulty pronouncing simple words and names. For example, he cannot pronounce Bermuda or Cicero. This is just painful to listen to.
Was Thomas Merton worth the listening time?
It is very short so I suppose so.
Any additional comments?
Didn't anyone listen to this before they put it up for sale? Good grief!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Nicholas Grahl
- 20-09-2020
Read by a early version of Siri
I was disappointed with this book and do not recommend it at all. The narration was terrible. Really bad sounding punch-in’s and mispronouncing of words and names, which completely distracted from the middle school like outline structure of the biography. All around a bad purchase on my part.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Vernon W.
- 14-10-2019
Wasted Space
Not worth the money or time to download. Don't waste your time. Of all the bios I have read this is the weakest bio of Merton. Not a good presentation or version.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- carol m amadio
- 22-05-2018
Interesting Life Summary, very Poor Presentation
A clear, interesting summary of Merton’s life. The presenter ‘s mispronunciations were frequent and distracting. This book should be recorded again.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Ellis Barnsley
- 11-04-2017
overview of Merton's life
This is a very brief overview of Merton's life so if you just want some headlines this may be perfect for you, but if you want something deeper I suggest you go elsewhere. A good starting point nonetheless.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Renee J.
- 23-02-2017
Disappointing
Would you try another book from Wyatt North and/or Robert Grothe?
The information is fine if limited, but the narrator makes listening a frustrating experience. He mispronounces some common words.
What was your reaction to the ending? (No spoilers please!)
Disappointing. This was the information I was interested in, but the writer glossed over it. He shared much information about Merton's youth and rakish behaviour. I wanted to know more about his spiritual life and his time studying other religions.
If this book were a movie would you go see it?
No.
Any additional comments?
This is a snapshot rather than a satisfying biographical piece.
20 Best Fantasy Audiobooks
This genre is so full of talent, it can be difficult to know what to listen to next — so look no further than this list to get you started.



20 Best Nonfiction Audiobooks
From the entire history of humanity to astrophysics, to our gut and mental health, dig into this list and learn something new.



Best Australian Podcasts on Audible
Audible Original Podcasts are free for Audible members. Check out this list of home-grown content, from binge-worthy true crime to self-help.


