Clifford Shaw was a composer living in Louisville, Kentucky. He discussed setting some of Thomas Merton's poems to music.
Robert D. Sharp served in a number of missions in the military in the Second World War. He sends his mission card to Merton, detailing 35 missions from 1944-1945. He read Merton's letter in the April 2, 1965 issue of «Commonweal» and said that he "wept over the part I played in that war."
H. J. Shandrewsmith writes from Pittsburgh. He sends poems to Merton by Oscar Gibson, his brother-in-law.
Fr. Dismas Sexton was a Franciscan writing first from the novitiate and later from Saint Joseph Seminary in Teutopolis, Illinois.
Fr. Brocard Sewell (baptized Michael Sewell - Brocard being his religious name) was a Carmelite friar and editor of «The Aylesford Review» at his home at Aylesford Priory in Kent, England. Though born into an Anglican family, his father was involved in the Oxford Movement and Sewell became a Catholic while still a youth. Throughout his life, he maintained an interest in Anglican-Catholic dialogue. While a young man, he became involved with G. K. Chesterton's distributist movement and «G. K.'s Weekly». Similar to Merton and the Franciscans, Sewell was rejected from the Dominicans. Also like Merton, he attempted joining a contemplative order. His first attempt to enter the Carmelites failed in 1937. Though he was a pacifist, or essentially so, he served as a map specialist during the Second World War for the British. In 1952, he applied for entry with the Carmelites at Aylesford and was, this time, allowed to join. It is from Aylesford that Sewell writes Merton. Merton contributed to «The Aylesford Review». Sewell would later live in various other Carmelite monasteries. (Source: McGreal, Wilfred. "Obituary of Fr. Brocard Sewell, 0.Carm." Website of the British Province of Carmelites. Accessed 2006 April 24. ‹http://www.carmelite.org/obit/bs_obituary.html›.)
Fr. Seraphim was a Trappist monk from Tilburg Abbey in the Netherlands.
Sr. Seraphim of the Holy Spirit was a Carmelite nun and prioress of the Carmel of Mary Immaculate and St. Joseph in Louisville, Kentucky.
David R. Semon was a 27-year-old college sophomore at Borromeo Seminary in Wickliffe, Ohio.
Ron Seitz was a poet, author and essayist and a former professor of creative writing at University of Louisville and Bellarmine University. He was born in Louisville, Kentucky, but traveled extensively as a young man and took a variety of different jobs before returning to Louisville.
Fr. Léon Seiller writes from France.
Sr. Helen Jean Seidel was the Mistress of Novices for the Sisters of Loretto at their motherhouse in Nerinx, Kentucky, at the time of writing.
Ernesto Seguny writes on behalf of the Conferencia Episcopal Argentina in Buenos Aires.
Fr. Sebastian was the editor of «Elias» magazine. He writes from Stella Maris Monastery in Haifa, Israel.
The Rev. John Whitman Sears was a psychologist and Universalist minister. He was born in Lawrence, Kansas, but moved with his family to California. He returned to the University of Kansas for college and was afterward ordained a minister. His ministry led him to North Carolina and back to Kansas where he left the ministry for social work. During the Great Depression, he moved with his family to San Carlos, California, studying psychology. He later moved to San Mateo where he joined his brother in a business of counseling and psychology, and from there he writes to Merton. (Source: "In Memoriam: Unitarian Universalist Ministers 2000-2001." Website of the Unitarian Universalist Association. Accessed 21 April 2006. ‹http://www.uua.org/programs/ministry/news/obituaries2001.html›.)
David H. Scott was Religious Book Editor of the Trade Book Department of McGraw-Hill Book Company. He writes from New York.
Donna Scolastica seems to have been a Camaldolese abbess.
Rabbi Stephen Schwarzschild was a pacifist rabbi writing from Temple Beth El in Lynn, Massachusetts.
In 1958, Br. Emmanuel Schuurmans became Abbot of Maria Toevlucht (Mary's Refuge) in Zundert in the Netherlands. He brought about many reforms to his community and Merton discusses with him permission to live the eremitical life and other changes to the Trappist Order.
Clarence W. Schultz worked at the News Publishing Company of Tell City, Indiana.
James Schulte was a senior at Saint Louis University at the time of correspondence with Merton. He writes from St. Louis, Missouri.
Mother M. L. Schroen was a Religious of the Sacred Heart of Manhattanville and writes from the General Headquarters in Rome, Italy.
Fr. Luke Schreffer was an Augustinian priest from St. Augustine Monastery in Nova Scotia, Canada.
August Schou was President of the Nobel Prize Committee at the time of this correspondence.
Webster Schott was Editorial Director of Hallmark Cards in Kansas City, Missouri.
It is unclear from the correspondence, but it seems Emily Schossberger may have worked for the publishing firm of New Directions.
The Rev. Dr. Howard Schomer was a Congregationalist minister and President of Chicago Theological Seminary. He was a Delegated Observer of the Second Vatican Council, representing the International Congregational Council. He was an anti-war activist and took part in some of the Civil Rights Movement's demonstrations with Martin Luther King, Jr.
Fr. Hilarion Schmock was a Trappist priest from Gethsemani Abbey.
Mary Ann Schmidt was a typist for Merton living in Washington, D.C.
Br. Richard Schmidlen was a Trappist monk of Gethsemani Abbey.
Bruno P. Schlesinger was a professor at St. Mary's College in Indiana. Born in Austria, Schlesinger was a Jewish convert to Catholicism who came to Indiana in the late 1930's and earned a doctorate from Notre Dame. He began at Saint Mary's in 1945. Schlesinger helped found the Christian Culture Program, based on concepts by historian Christopher Dawson, to study unifying principles in the liberal arts through the lens of Christian humanism and the development of Western culture through Christianity's historical roots. Saint Mary's is a women's college, and Merton writes that "women are perhaps capable of salvaging something of humanity in our world today. Certainly they have a better chance of grasping and understanding and preserving a sense of Christian culture" (Merton, Thomas. Letter to Bruno Schlesinger. December, 13, 1961.) An informational booklet for the program quoted Merton's comments. (Source: «The Hidden Ground of Love», p. 541.)
William G. Schlecht writes from the Washington Friends of Buddhism in Washington, D.C.
Fr. Mario Schierano writes to Merton from the Sacra Paenitentiaria Apostolica, Officium de Indulgentiis, in Italy. It seems to be granting Merton some sort of indulgence. Schierano was a priest of Turin, Italy, who in 1971 became the archbishop of Italy's military.
The Rt. Rev. Msgr. Joseph E. Schieder was Director of the Youth Department of the National Catholic Welfare Conference. He writes from Washington, D.C.
William J. Schickel was the architect and liturgical consultant for the renovation of Gethsemani Abbey's church and cloister. Schickel was living in Loveland, Ohio, at the time of this correspondence.
Phillip Scharper seems to have worked with Frank Sheed at the publisher Sheed and Ward.
Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi was a scholar on mystical aspects of Judaism. He was born in Poland in 1924 and grew up in Vienna. Later, in France, he was sent to a prison camp by the Vichy government. He was able to escape to the United States in 1941. He studies at the Lubavitch Yeshiva in Brooklyn and was ordained a rabbi in 1947. He received a Master of Arts in psychology from Boston University in 1953. He taught religion at University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, from 1956-1957, and was later Chair of the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies. He completed a doctorate at the University of Cincinnati in 1968. While in Cincinnati, he made a number of visits to see Merton.
Br. Aloysius Scanlan was a Cistercian monk writing from Caldey Abbey in the south of Wales.
John Nevin Sayre was a pacifist and leader in the Peace Movement of the 20th century. He served in leadership positions in the International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR) and the United States national office of FOR. He writes from Nyack, New York.
Sr. Anne Saword was a Trappistine nun from Chimay, Belgium.
George L. Saunders, Jr. was co-director of the Law Enforcement Task Force of the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence in Washington, D.C.
Ruth Fuller Sasaki was a Zen practitioner and author on Zen from Kyoto, Japan. She began Zen practice in 1941 at the Nanzen-ji Monastery in Kyoto under Nanshinken Roshi and later Goto Zuigan Roshi (with some interim interruptions causing her to move to New York to study under Sokei-an Roshi). She writes to express interest in Merton's «Mystics and Zen Masters» and to introduce Merton to her books «The Zen Koan» and «Zen Dust». She questions Merton on some statements he makes about "do-it-yourself" Zen and the question of practicing Zen without the guidance of a Zen master.
Miguel de Sanmiguel was chief editor of Ediciones Guadarrama publishers in Madrid, Spain.
Ira Sandperl was a friend and mentor of Joan Baez and came with her to visit Merton in December of 1966. Sandperl was an authority on Gandhi and co-founded a peace institute with Joan Baez.
Mery-Lú Sananes was a student in the Facultad de Humanidades y Educación at the Universidad Central in Caracas, Venezuela, as were the others that signed his initial letter to Merton: Jaime López-Sanz, Irene Flores, and Ramón Montiel. They write to inform Merton that LAM, a student literary group, translated his poem "Original Child Bomb" into Spanish (as "Niña Bomba Original"). Sananes and López-Sanz did the translation.
Edward R. Sammis writes on behalf of Harper and Row, Publishers, New York.
Archbishop Tulio Botero Salazar was a Vincentian priest who became Archbishop of Medellín, Colombia.
Serge St. Jean writes from Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to an unknown religious sister (Merton is mentioned in the letter).
Fr. Carleton Michael Sage writes at first from the Theological College of the Catholic University of America and later from St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore, Maryland.
Mouni Sadhu, born in Poland as Mieczyslaw Demetriusz Sudowski. Although he published a number of books, the details of his life are sketchy. He was known variously as an occultist and a practicing Catholic to his death and a bridge-builder between Christian and Hindu traditions. As a young man, he fought for Germany during World War I. He married in 1936, but his wife was said to have died in a German bombing of Poland in 1939. He fought against the Germans in World War II, was captured and imprisoned until liberated by the Allies in 1945. He then went first to France and after another year to Brazil. There, he wrote his first book (in Portuguese), «Quem Sou Eu?». Thence, he spent a year studying under Sri Ramana Maharshi before permanently residing in Australia. He writes to Merton from Box Hill, Victoria, Australia, asking Merton to write a Foreword for a planned book, «Contemplation: an Outline for Practical Study» (published under the title «Meditation: an Outline for Practical Study«). (Source: Pugsley, Tim. "Mouni Sadhu - Information." Website. Accessed 2006/03/15. ‹http://www.mounisadhu.com›.)
Eric Sackheim writes on behalf of the Japanese publisher Mushinsha Limited. Sackheim had completed graduate studies in Japanese at Harvard University and went to Japan on a Fulbright Scholarship in 1960. He published anthologies of Chinese and Japanese poetry, including the poems of Kusano Shimpei. He was also interested in American folk and roots music, publishing a seminal book on blues music.
Servando Sacaluga was a professor writing from New York who introduced Merton to the poems of Mercedes Cortázar.
Archbishop Joseph T. Ryan began his tenure in the Archdiocese of Anchorage, Alaska, in 1966. He writes to Merton from Alaska. He later served as archbishop of the United States Military.