The Seven Story Mountain By: Thomas Merton

A very humble story without being preachy , it is solely about his search for self-completion. Merton credits becoming a monk on having " the mentality of a medieval serf when I was barely out of the cradle". He is very opinionated though, which seems funny, he says "Thousands of Catholics everywhere, have the consummate audacity to weep and complain because God does not hear their prayers for peace, when they have neglected not only His will, but the ordinary dictates of natural reason and prudence, and let their children grow up according to the standards of a civilization of hyenas. He had a very interesting and painful life. His mother dies when he is six, his father when he was still a child, and both grandparents while he was in college. Then his brother is killed in World War II when Thomas is in his twenties, leaving him with no family. After his father's death his grandparents give him his inheritance (while they are still alive) in allotments so he can live and he pretty much raises himself, travelling the world as a teenager. He didn't tell his story with any hints of bitterness, simply stated what happened. It was humbling to know Merton did a lot of soul searching before he knew what he needed in his life, which he found as a monk.