" That mankind has in this sense been cowardly has done life endless harm; the experiences that are called 'visions', the whole so-called 'spirit-world',death,all those things so closely akin to us,have by daily parrying been so crowded out of life that the senses with which we could have grasped them are atrophied. To say nothing of God."                                                                                          Rainer Maria Rilke                                           'Letters To A Young Poet'
					walter
	The great sin,the source of all other sins,is idolatry. Never has it been greater,more prevalent than now. It is almost completely unrecognized-precisely because it is so overwhelmingly total. It takes in everything. There is nothing else left       Fetishism of money and power,machines,possessions,medicine,sports,clothes,etc.,all kept going by greed for money and power. The Bomb is only one accidental aspect of the cult. Indeed,the Bomb is not the worst. We should be thankful for it as a sign,a revelation of what the rest of our civilization points to: the self-immolation of man to his own greed and his own despair. Behind it all are the principalities and powers whom man serves in his idolatry. Christians are as deeply involved in this as anyone else.                                Thomas Merton    Journals   April 17,1965. Holy Saturday