On December 10, 1968, an American Trappist monk died accidentally in Thailand at the age of fifty-three. His name was Thomas Merton, and for the first time in twenty-seven years he was journeying outside his monastery to address the unprecedented gathering of Eastern and Western religious leaders in Bangkok.

A few hours after delivering his lecture, Merton died - alone and tragically, far from the company of his fellow Trappists who knew him as Father Louis, monk, novice master, confessor and hermit-poet; and further still from the solitude of his beloved Gethsemani Abbey, austerely cradled among the cedars and scrub of pine of Western Kentucky.

For millions of people around the world who had come to know and love and follow him through his sixty published books, Merton’s untimely death cast into even starker relief the major themes which had engrossed his mind and fed his imagination for nearly three decades: revitalization of spirituality; integration of solitude and human solidarity; anti-war advocacy; witnessing to peace; social criticism; and dialogue between East and West.

Many years have passed since that fatal afternoon in Bangkok. And yet, those searching honestly for spiritual insights still eventually encounter this pilgrim named Merton, and absorb the message so lucidly conveyed in his essays, journals, letters and poems.

What about this unusual man?

Who is this highly articulate, indeed garrulous, contemplative?

How could this self-admitted hedonist embrace and observe a rigorous monastic life, and yet remain fiercely independent in his thinking, cheerfully unresponsive to his severest critics, and scandalously human in his traditional spirituality?

Why does his quixotic autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, published over three decades ago, continue to fascinate the curious and challenge the complacent?

What can be learned from this Christian whose entire life was a tireless quest to lay bare God’s vision of mankind?

Finally, what can Merton possibly mean to the truly modern men and women of the early Twenty-First Century? How does his vision inform and spiritually transform the youth, adults and elderly of today?

A few months after Paul Wilkes and Audrey Laurine Glynn met to discuss the feasibility of producing a television film on the life and thought of Thomas Merton, they organized a team of nine professionals who combined their talents and resources to create MERTON. Producing the 60-minute PBS documentary required over 50,000 miles of travel - retracing Merton’s footsteps and conducting interviews with 23 men and women who knew him personally. Locations included England, France, Italy, Greece, India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Nicaragua; and domestically, the states of California, Connecticut, Kentucky, Maine, New Jersey, New York and Virginia.

The Rev. Paul Dinter, director of the Merton Center at Columbia University and official sponsor for the Project, offered his Center at 405 West 114th Street as the production office. Columbia University provided extensive support, and Shirley Burden and Edward Rice made their photographic collections available for the film.

Under the direction of Raymond Spellman, the Catholic Communication Campaign provided the initial and major funding for the film. Additional funding sources included: The New York Council for the Humanities, The Oblate (O.M.I.) Sharing Fund, The Raskob Foundation for Catholic Activities, inc., Mrs. Kenneth Dale Owen, The Bob and Dolores Hope Charitable Foundation, The Pallottine Center for Apostolic Causes, Judith L. Chiara, The United Methodist Church and other donors.