life of silence and contemplation, this is an impassioned book, showing that the cloister may be a retreat from but not necessarily an escape from the world, if one is genuinely committed to the Christian faith. Merton’s chief concern is not with the haphazard violence of oppressed individuals that is expressed in riots but with what he calls ‘white-collar violence, the systematically organized bureaucratic and technological destruction of man.' . . . His thinking is radical, but unless one is committed to the belief that the status quo is the will of God, what he proposes deserves serious consideration.” —Pulpit Digest

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