“The true contemplative is a lover of sobriety and obscurity. He prefers all that is quiet, humble, unassuming. He has no taste for spiritual excitements. They easily weary him. His inclination is to that which seems to be nothing, which tells him little or nothing, which promises him nothing. Only one who can remain at peace in emptiness, without projects or vanities, without speeches to justify his own apparent uselessness, can be safe from the fatal appeal of those spiritual impulses that move him to assert himself and ‘be something’ in the eyes of other men. But the contemplative is, of all religious men, the one most likely to realize that he is not a saint and least anxious to appear as one in the eyes of others. He is, in fact, delivered from subjection to appearances and cares very little about them. At the same time, since he has neither the inclination nor the need to be a rebel, he does not have to advertise his contempt for appearances. He simply neglects them. They no longer interest him. He is quite content to be considered an idiot, if necessary, and in this he has a long tradition behind him. Long ago St. Paul said he was glad to be a ‘fool for the sake of Christ.’ The oriental Church has its holy madmen, the yurodivi, imitated on occasion in the West by men like St. Francis of Assisi and many others. The contemplative does not need to be systematic about anything, even about apparent madness. He is content with the wisdom of God, which is folly to men not because it is contrary to the wisdom of man, but because it entirely transcends it.”

Merton, Thomas. The Inner Experience: Notes on Contemplation. Edited and with an Introduction by William H. Shannon. NY: HarperOne, 2003 (pp. 108-109)