The Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University

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Author QuotedHenri Perrin
Title QuotedPriest and Worker: The Autobiography of Henri Perrin
Date (Year/Month/Day)1964/04/13
Imprint 
QuotationThis would be the fiftieth birthday of the Worker Priest Henri Perrin if he were alive. The publishers have sent me proofs of his autobiography (actually a collection of fragments of letters) [Priest and Worker: Autobiography of Fr. Henri Perrin, 1964]. The fact is that he was driven to despair by the stolid conservatism of the Church-her refusal to become detached from sterile commitment to a society that is finished. As a matter of fact the whole question is perhaps less complicated than it may seem. So much of the class consciousness-(left wing or right wing)-in France is just bourgeois anyway. The guilt at not being a worker is a bourgeois guilt.
Quotation SourceDancing in the Water of Life: Seeking Peace in the Hermitage. The Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume 5, 1963-1965.; Edited by Robert E. Daggy. / San Francisco : Harper Collins. 1997, p. 95
Letter to 
Notes 
Link to Merton's Copy  

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