Quotes from Henri J.M. Nouwen

Jane’s e-Update

Inspirational words from Henri Nouwen

(These selections were shared with A Nouwen Network members

via the e-Updates, they are presented here in that chronology )

photo by Frank Hamilton

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019

2009

Being with a friend in great pain is not easy. It makes us uncomfortable. We do not know what to do or what to say, and we worry about how to respond to what we hear. Our temptation is to say things that come more out of our own fear than out of our care for the person in pain. Sometimes we say things like 'Well, you’re doing a lot better than yesterday,' or 'You will soon be your old self again,' or 'I’m sure you will get over this.' But often we know that what we’re saying is not true, and our friends know it too.

We do not have to play games with each other. We can simply say: 'I am your friend, I am happy to be with you.' We can say that in words or with touch or with loving silence. Sometimes it is good to say: 'You don’t have to talk. Just close your eyes. I am here with you, thinking of you, praying for you, loving you.”

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’

To become neighbours is to bridge the gap between people. As long as there is distance between us and we cannot look in each other’s eyes, all sorts of false ideas and images arise. We give them names, make jokes about them, cover them with our prejudices, and avoid direct contact. We think of them as enemies. We forget that they love as we love, care for their children as we care for ours, become sick and die as we do. We forget that they are our brothers and sisters and treat them as objects that can be destroyed at will.

Only when we have the courage to cross the street and look in one another’s eyes can we see there that we are children of the same God and members of the same human family.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - July 22

Every human being has a great yet often unknown gift to care, to be compassionate, to become present to the other, to listen, to hear and to receive. If that gift would be set free and made available, miracles could take place.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life ‘

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2010

Our emotional lives move up and down constantly. Sometimes we experience great mood: swings from excitement to depression, from joy to sorrow, from inner harmony to inner chaos. A little event, a word from someone, a disappointment in work, many things can trigger such mood swings. Mostly we have little control over these changes. It seems that they happen to us rather than being created by us.

Thus it is important to know that our emotional life is not the same as our spiritual life. Our spiritual life is the life of the Spirit of God within us. As we feel our emotions shift we must connect our spirits with the Spirit of God and remind ourselves that what we feel is not who we are. We are and remain, whatever our moods, God's beloved children.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - July 23 ‘What We Feel Is Not Who We Are’

The joy that Jesus offers His disciples is His own joy, which flows from His intimate communion with the One who sent Him. It is a joy that does not separate happy days from sad days, successful moments from moments of failure, experiences of honour from experiences of dishonour, passion from resurrection. This joy is a divine gift that does not leave us during times of illness, poverty, oppression or persecution. It is present even when the world laughs or tortures, robs or mains, fights or kills. It is truly ecstatic, always moving us away from the house of fear into the house of love, and always proclaiming that death no longer has the final say, though its noise remain loud and its devastation visible. The joy of Jesus lifts up life to be celebrated.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Lifesigns’ p. 64

More and more, the desire grows in me simply to walk around, greet people, enter their homes, sit on their doorsteps, play ball, throw water, and be known as someone who wants to live with them. It is a privilege to have the time to practice this simple ministry of presence. Still, it is not as simple as it seems.

My own desire to be useful, to do something significant, or to be part of some impressive project is so strong that soon my time is taken up by meetings, conferences, study groups, and workshops that prevent me from walking the streets. It is difficult not to have plans, not to organize people around an urgent cause, and not to feel that you are working directly for social progress. But I wonder more and more if the first thing shouldn’t be to know people by name, to eat and drink with them, to listen to their stories and tell your own, and to let them know with words, handshakes, and hugs that you do not simply like them, but truly love them

Henri J. M. Nouwen in Gracias: A Latin American Journal

"Our vocation as Christians is to follow Jesus on his downward path and to become witnesses to God's compassion in the concrete situation of our time and place"

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life’

Real care is not ambiguous. Real care excludes indifference and is the opposite of apathy. The word “care” finds its roots in the Gothic “Kara” which means lament. The basic meaning of care is: to grieve, to experience sorrow, to cry out with. I am very much struck by this background of the word care because we tend to look at caring as an attitude of the strong toward the weak, of the powerful toward the powerless, of the ‘haves’ toward the ‘have-nots. And, in fact, we feel quite uncomfortable with an invitation to enter into someone’s pain before doing something about it.

Still, when we honestly ask ourselves which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving much advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a gentle and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not-knowing, not-curing, not-healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is the friend who cares.

You might remember moments in which you were called to be with a friend who had lost a wife or husband, child or parent. What can you say, do, or propose at such a moment? There is a strong inclination to say: “Don’t cry; the one you loved is in the hands of God.” “Don’t be sad

because there are so many good things left worth living for.” But are we ready to really experience our powerlessness in the face of death and say: “I do not understand. I do not know what to do but I am here with you.” Are we willing to not run away from the pain, to not get busy

when there is nothing to do and instead stand rather in the face of death together with those who grieve?

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life ‘

A friend is more than a therapist or a confessor, even though a friend can sometimes heal us and offer us God’s forgiveness.

A friend is that other person with whom we can share our solitude, our silence, and our prayer. A friend is that other person with whom we can look at a tree and say, “Isn’t that beautiful,” or sit on the beach and silently watch the sun disappear under the horizon. With a friend we don’t have to say or do something special. With a friend we can be still and know that God is there with both of us.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - March 23 ’Sharing Our Solitude’

Friendship is one of the greatest gifts a human being can receive…. Friendship is being with the other in joy and sorrow, even when we cannot increase the joy or decrease the sorrow.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - January 7

We are good at criticizing others and even better at giving advice. We assume that we know what is best for others, particularly the more unfortunate members of our society. But we are not so good at com- passionate participation. We often fail to draw close. We are afraid of involvement, for we know that we may not be able to control the demands that may be made of us.

Yet compassion asks us precisely to take such a risk. In the words of Nouwen, “compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into places of pain.”

Going there does not mean barging in with easy answers and quick solutions. It means learning to listen even for what, initially, cannot be expressed. It means being honest about our own needs and struggles so that we can listen more carefully. It means journeying with people in their attempts at resolution and healing. It means being there, but not controlling or crowding others. It means reaching out without taking over. It means holding without withholding, giving without looking to receive, and entering a partnership that releases others to pursue their own dreams and aspirations.

Charles Ringma in ‘Dare to Journey with Henri Nouwen’ - Reflection 11 - Drawing Close: True Compassion Enters the Places of Pain

Listening is much more than allowing another to talk while waiting for a chance to respond. Listening is paying full attention to others and welcoming them into our very beings. The beauty of listening is that, those who are listened to start feeling accepted, start taking their words more seriously and discovering their own true selves. Listening is a form of spiritual hospitality by which you invite strangers to become friends, to get to know their inner selves more fully, and even to dare to be silent with you.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life.

A mosaic consists of thousands of little stones. Some are blue, some are green, some are yellow, some are gold. When we bring our faces close to the mosaic, we can admire the beauty of each stone. But as we step back from it, we can see that all these little stones reveal to us a beautiful picture, telling a story none of these stones can tell by itself.

That is what our life in community is about. Each of us is like a little stone, but together we reveal the face of God to the world. Nobody can say: “I make God visible.” But others who see us together can say: “They make God visible.” Community is where humility and glory touch.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ -

"In our world full of strangers, estranged from their own past, culture and country, from their neighbors, friends and family, from their deepest self and their God, we witness a painful search for a hospitable place where life can be lived without fear and where community can be found. …it is possible for men and women and obligatory for Christians to offer an open and hospitable space where strangers can cast off their strangeness and become our fellow human beings.

…Hospitality, therefore, means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend.

…The paradox of hospitality is that it wants to create emptiness, but a friendly emptiness where strangers can enter and discover themselves as created free; free to sing their own songs, speak their own languages, dance their own dances; free also to leave and follow their own vocations. Hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adopt a life style of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find their own.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Reaching Out: The Three Movements in the Spiritual Life’ p.68

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2011

Once in a while we meet a gentle person. …Gentle is the one who does “not break the crushed reed, or snuff the faltering wick” (Matthew 12:20). Gentle is the one who is attentive to the strengths and weaknesses of the other and enjoys being together more than accomplishing something. A gentle person treads lightly, listens carefully, looks tenderly, and touches with reverence. A gentle person knows that true growth requires nurture, not force. Let’s dress ourselves with gentleness. In our tough and often unbending world our gentleness can be a vivid reminder of the presence of God among us.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ -

I would like to speak to you about the spiritual life as the life of the beloved. …Let me start by telling you that many of the people that I live with hear voices that tell them that they are no good, that they are a problem, that they are a burden, that they are a failure. They hear a voice that keeps saying, “If you want to be loved, you had better prove that you are worth loving. You must show it.”

But what I would like to say is that the spiritual life is a life in which you gradually learn to listen to a voice that says something else, that says, “You are the beloved and on you my favor rests.”

You are the beloved and on you my favor rests. Jesus heard that voice. He heard that voice when He came out of the Jordan River. I want you to hear that voice, too. It is a very important voice that says, "You are my beloved son; you are my beloved daughter. I love you with an everlasting love. I have molded you together in the depths of the earth. I have knitted you in your mother's womb. I've written your name in the palm of my hand and I hold you safe in the shade of my embrace. I hold you. You belong to Me and I belong to you. You are safe where I am. Don't be afraid. Trust that you are the beloved. That is who you truly are."

I want you to hear that voice. It is not a very loud voice because it is an intimate voice. It comes from a very deep place. It is soft and gentle. I want you to gradually hear that voice. We both have to hear that voice and to claim for ourselves that that voice speaks the truth, our truth. It tells us who we are. That is where the spiritual life starts — by claiming the voice that calls us the beloved.

Henri J. M. Nouwen from the sermon “Life of the Beloved,” May 17, 1991

Prayer is the way to both the heart of God and the heart of the world – precisely because they have been joined through the suffering of Jesus Christ…Praying is letting one’s own heart become the place where the tears of God’s children merge and become tears of hope.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Love in a Fearful Land’

Who are we? Are we what we do? Are we what others say about us? Are we the power we have? It often seems that way in our society. But the Spirit of Jesus given to us reveals our true spiritual identities. The Spirit reveals that we belong not to a world of success, fame, or power but to God. The world enslaves us with fear; the Spirit frees us from that slavery and restores us to the true relationship.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - June 10 ‘Empowered to Be ‘.

There is a great difference between successfulness and fruitfulness. Success comes from strength, control, and respectability. A successful person has the energy to create something, to keep control over its development, and to make it available in large quantities. Success brings many rewards and often fame. Fruits, however, come from weakness and vulnerability. And fruits are unique. A child is the fruit conceived in vulnerability, community is the fruit born through shared brokenness, and intimacy is the fruit that grows through touching one another’s wounds. Let’s remind one another that what brings us true joy is not successfulness but fruitfulness.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’

In the biblical understanding, our heart is at the center of our being. It’s not a muscle, but a symbol for the very center of our being. Now the beautiful thing about the heart is that the heart is the place where we are most ourselves. It is the very core of our being, the spiritual center of our being. Solitude and silence, for instance, are ways to get to the heart, because the heart is the place where God speaks to us, where we hear the voice that calls us beloved. This is precisely the most intimate place. …Prayer and solitude are ways to listen to the voice that speaks to our heart, in the center of our being. One of the most amazing things is that if you enter deeper and deeper into that place, you not only meet God, but you meet the whole world there.

…When God speaks in my heart, my heart becomes as wide as the world. It becomes like the marketplace of the world. A lot of people think about prayer or solitude as withdrawing from the world into a private space, but that’s not at all the case. …Solitude and prayer bring you into a spiritual communion with the whole people.

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen one of these big wagon-wheels. They have a hub with all these spokes, but quite often we remain on the rim of the wheel. Prayer is to go to the hub. That’s solitude, that’s the heart. Prayer is going to your heart, but it’s also going to the heart of the world and all the spokes get together right there. It is not that you lose contact, in fact you are more connected with people when you’re in the heart than when you run around on the edges.

Spiritually speaking, that is what intercessory prayer is all about. It is to enter into the heart of God and be there in communion not only with God, but also with humanity. My deepest conviction is that communion with God and solidarity with all of humanity always go together.

Henri J. M. Nouwen, Extracted from “Beloved”: Henri Nouwen in Conversation

Consolation is a beautiful word. It means “to be” (con-) “with the lonely one” (solus). To offer consolation is one of the most important ways to care. Life is so full of pain, sadness, and loneliness that we often wonder what we can do to alleviate the immense suffering we see. We can and must offer consolation. We can and must console the mother who lost her child, the young person with AIDS, the family whose house burned down, the soldier who was wounded, the teenager who contemplates suicide, the old man who wonders why he should stay alive.

To console does not mean to take away the pain but rather to be there and say, “You are not alone, I am with you. Together we can carry the burden. Don’t be afraid. I am here.” That is consolation. We all need to give it as well as to receive it.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - February 9 ‘Giving and Receiving Consolation’

Gratitude, ... goes beyond the “mine” and “thine” and claims the truth that all of life is a pure gift. In the past I always thought of gratitude as a spontaneous response to the awareness of gifts received, but now I realize that gratitude can also be lived as a discipline. The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy.

Gratitude as a discipline involves a conscious choice. I can choose to be grateful even when my emotions and feelings are still steeped in hurt and resentment. It is amazing how many occasions present themselves in which I can choose gratitude instead of a complaint. I can choose to be grateful when I am criticized, even when my heart still responds in bitterness. I can choose to speak about goodness and beauty, even when my inner eye still looks for someone to accuse or something to call ugly. I can choose to listen to the voices that forgive and to look at the faces that smile, even while I still hear words of revenge and see grimaces of hatred.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in The Return of the Prodigal Son, p. 85

The secret of waiting is the faith that the seed has been planted, that something has begun. Active waiting means to be present fully to the moment, in the conviction that something is happening where you are and that you want to be present to it. A waiting person is someone who is present to the moment, who believes that this moment is the moment.

A waiting person is a patient person. The word patience means the willingness to stay where we are and live the situation out to the full in the belief that something hidden there will manifest itself to us. …Patient living means to live actively in the present and wait there. Waiting, then, is not passive. It involves nurturing the moment, as a mother nurtures the child that is growing in her.

…To wait open-endedly is an enormously radical attitude toward life. So is to trust that something will happen to us that is far beyond our own imaginings. So, too, is giving up control over our future and letting God define our life, trusting that God molds us according to God's love and not according to our fear. The spiritual life is a life in which we wait, actively present to the moment, trusting that new things will happen to us, new things that are far beyond our own imagination, fantasy, or prediction. That, indeed, is a very radical stance toward life in a world preoccupied with control.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in A Homily on Waiting

God has given you a beautiful self. There God dwells and loves you with the first love, which precedes all human love. You carry your own beautiful, deeply loved self in your heart. You can and must hold on to the truth of the love you were given and recognize that same love in others who see your goodness and love you.

Henri J. M. Nouwen inThe Inner Voice of Love: A Journey Through Anguish to Freedom

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2012

Fellowship with Jesus Christ is not a commitment to suffer as much as possible, but a commitment to listen with him to God’s love without fear. It is to obedience – understood as an intimate, fearless listening to God’s continuing love – that we are called.

We are often tempted to “explain” suffering in terms of “the will of God.” Not only can this evoke anger and frustration, but also it is false. “God’s will” is not a label that can be put on unhappy situations. God wants to bring joy not pain, peace not war, healing not suffering. Therefore, instead of declaring anything and everything to be the will of God, we must be willing to ask ourselves where in the midst of our pains and sufferings we can discern the loving presence of God. When, however, we discover that our obedient listening leads us to our suffering neighbors, we can go to them in the joyful knowledge that love brings us there. We are poor listeners because we are afraid that there is something other than love in God.

Henri Nouwen - Compassion

Compassion means to suffer with, to live with those who suffer.… We are sent to wherever there is poverty, loneliness, and suffering to have the courage to be with people. Trust that by throwing yourself into that place of pain you will find the joy of Jesus. All ministries in history are built on that vision. A new world grows out of compassion.

Be compassionate as your heavenly Father is compassionate. It's a great call. But don't be fearful; don't be afraid. Don't say, "I can't do that. When you are aware that you are the beloved, and when you have friends around you with whom you live in community, you can do anything. You're not afraid anymore. You're not afraid to knock on the door while somebody's dying. You're not afraid to open a discussion with a person who underneath all the glitter is much in need of ministry. You're free.

I've experienced that constantly. When I was depressed or when I felt anxious, I knew my friends couldn't solve it. Those who ministered to me were those who were not afraid to be with me. Precisely where I felt my poverty I discovered God's blessing.

Henri Nouwen from: “Moving from Solitude to Community to Ministry.” (This article originally appeared in Leadership Journal, Spring 1995.

Dear God,

Speak gently in my silence.

When the loud outer noises of my surroundings

and the loud inner noises of my fears

keep pulling me away from you,

help me to trust that you are still there

even when I am unable to hear you.

Give me ears to listen to your small, soft voice saying:

"Come to me, you who are overburdened,

and I will give you rest...

for I am gentle and humble of heart."

Let that loving voice be my guide.

Amen.

Henri J. M. Nouwen - With Open Hands

Often mission is thought of exclusively in terms of giving, but true mission is also receiving. If it is true that the Spirit of Jesus blows where it wants, there is no person who cannot give that Spirit. In the long run, mission is possible only when it is as much receiving as giving, as much being cared for as caring. We are sent to the sick, the dying, the handicapped, the prisoners, and the refugees to bring them the good news of the Lord’s resurrection. But we will soon be burned out if we cannot receive the Spirit of the Lord from those to whom we are sent.

That Spirit, the Spirit of love, is hidden in their poverty, brokenness, and grief. That is why Jesus said: “Blessed are the poor, the persecuted, and those that mourn.” Each time we reach out to them they in turn---whether they are aware of it or not---will bless us with the Spirit of Jesus and so become our ministers. Without this mutuality of giving and receiving, mission and ministry easily become manipulative or violent. When only one gives and the other receives, the giver will soon become an oppressor and the receivers, victims. But when the giver receives and the receiver gives, the circle of love, begun in the community of the disciples, can grow as wide as the world.

Henri J.M. Nouwen - “With Burning Heart”.

Joys are hidden in sorrows! I know this from my own times of depression. I know it from living with people with mental handicaps. I know it from looking into the eyes of patients, and from being with the poorest of the poor. We keep forgetting this truth and become overwhelmed by our own darkness. We easily lose sight of our joys and speak of our sorrows as the only reality there is.

We need to remind each other that the cup of sorrow is also the cup of joy, that precisely what causes us sadness can become the fertile ground for gladness. Indeed, we need to be angels for each other, to give each other strength and consolation. Because only when we fully realize that the cup of life is not only a cup of sorrow but also a cup of joy will we be able to drink it.

Henri J.M. Nouwen - Can You Drink The Cup

When we say to people, "I will pray for you," we make a very important commitment. The sad thing is that this remark often remains nothing but a well-meant expression of concern. But when we learn to descend with our mind into our heart, then all those who have become part of our lives are led into the healing presence of God and are touched by him in the center of our being. We are speaking here about a mystery for which words are inadequate.

Here we can see the intimate relationship between prayer and ministry. The discipline of leading all our people with their struggles into the gentle and humble heart of God is the discipline of prayer as well as the discipline of ministry. As long as ministry only means that we worry a lot about people and their problems; as long as it means an endless number of activities which we can hardly coordinate, we are still very much dependent on our own narrow and anxious heart. But when our worries are led to the heart of God and there become prayer, then ministry and prayer become two manifestations of the same all-embracing love of God.

Henri J.M. Nouwen - The Way of the Heart: Desert Spirituality and Contemporary Ministry

Keep your eyes on the prince of peace, the one who doesn't cling to his divine power; the one who refuses to turn stones into bread, jump from great heights and rule with great power; the one who says, "Blessed are the poor, the gentle, those who mourn, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness; blessed are the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers and those who are persecuted in the cause of uprightness" (see Matt. 5:3-11); the one who touches the lame, the crippled, and the blind; the one who speaks words of forgiveness and encouragement; the one who dies alone, rejected and despised. Keep your eyes on him who becomes poor with the poor, weak with the weak, and who is rejected with the rejected. He is the source of all peace.

Where is this peace to be found? The answer is clear. In weakness. First of all, in our own weakness, in those places of our hearts where we feel most broken, most insecure, most in agony, most afraid. Why there? Because there our familiar ways of controlling our world are being stripped away; there we are called to let go from doing much, thinking much, and relying on our self-sufficiency. Right there where we are weakest the peace which is not of this world is hidden.

Henri J.M. Nouwen - Adam's Story: The Peace That Is Not Of This World

“The mystery of our ministry is that we are called to serve not with our power but with our powerlessness. It is through powerlessness that we can enter into solidarity with our fellow human beings, form a community with the weak, and thus reveal the healing, guiding, and sustaining mercy of God. We are called to speak to people not where they have it together but where they are aware of their pain, not where they are in control but where they are trembling and insecure, not where they are self-assured and assertive but where they dare to doubt and raise hard questions; in short, not where they live in the illusion of immortality but where they are ready to face their broken, mortal, and fragile humanity. As followers of Christ, we are sent into the world naked, vulnerable, and weak, and thus we can reach our fellow human beings in their pain and agony and reveal to them the power of God’s love and empower them with the power of God’s Spirit.”

Henri J.M. Nouwen -The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life

For us to work for justice and peace and really be activists in the good sense of the word is to do it not because we need to prove to ourselves or anybody that we are worth loving. Rather, it is because we are so in touch with our belovedness that we are free to act according to the truth and say no to injustice and say yes when we see justice and peace.

…The great obstacle which prevents the Spirit working in us is self-rejection. The greatest obstacle to the Spirit working in us is that we say to ourselves that we are useless, we are nothing.

Once I know I am the Beloved, once I start discovering that in me, then the Spirit can work in me and in others; then we can do wonderful things.

Henri J. M. Nouwen from Discipleship and Reconciliation quoted in The Only Necessary Thing

Before concluding these thoughts about our being blessed, I must tell you that claiming your own blessedness always leads to a deep desire to bless others. The characteristics of the blessed ones is that, wherever they go, they always speak words of blessing.

It is remarkable how easy it is to bless others, to speak good things to and about them, to call forth their beauty and truth, when you yourself are in touch with your own blessedness. The blessed one always blesses. And people want to be blessed! This is so apparent wherever you go.

No one is brought to life through curses, gossip, accusations, or blaming. There is so much of that taking place around is all the time. And it calls forth only darkness, destruction, and death. As the "blessed ones," we can walk through this world and offer blessings. It doesn't require much effort. It flows naturally from our hearts. When we hear within ourselves the voice calling us by name and blessing us, the darkness no longer distracts us. The voice that calls us the Beloved will give us words to bless others and reveal to them that they are no less blessed than we.”

Henri J. M. Nouwen from Life of the Beloved

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2013

"There is much emphasis on notoriety and fame in our society. Our newspapers and television keep giving us the message: What counts is to be known, praised, and admired, whether you are a writer, an actor, a musician, or a politician.

Still, real greatness is often hidden, humble, simple, and unobtrusive. It is not easy to trust ourselves and our actions without public affirmation. We must have strong self-confidence combined with deep humility. Some of the greatest works of art and the most important works of peace were created by people who had no need for the limelight. They knew that what they were doing was their call, and they did it with great patience, perseverance, and love."

Henri J. M. Nouwen from Bread For The Journey Hidden Greatness

Even though we are often downcast, Jesus always speaks about hope. And this hope is different from optimism. Jesus is not an optimist. He is not a pessimist.

Optimism arranges reality in a way that enables us to say things will get better. Pessimism arranges the same reality so that we can say things will probably get worse. When it rains the optimist says, How wonderful! Things will grow! Seeing the same rain, the pessimist says, everything will drown!

Being neither an optimist nor a pessimist, Jesus speaks about hope that is not based on chances that things will get better or worse. His hope is built on the promise that whatever happens, God will stay with us at all times.

God is the God of life…

Henri J. M. Nouwen from The Road to Peace

Ministry always means to empower others to give their gifts to each other. Ministry is about multiplication. You give away what you have---that little piece of bread in your hand---and it multiplies. You give away the little ministry that you have and everyone becomes a minister to others. Then there is more ministry being done than you have ever seen.

This is what Jesus meant when He said (in effect), “It is good for you that I die; if I go then you can do your job.” Jesus’ task was to create a community that was empowered. Jesus said, “I will go and I will send you My Spirit, and My Spirit will empower you. All the things the Father told Me, I’m telling you. All the things I am doing, you will do, and even greater things.”

Jesus never said that He could do something that we couldn’t do. He never said that He was something we are not. He said, I am the Son of God, and you are children of God. I am called from death to life and you are as well. I know everything about the love of God and I hold back nothing from you. That’s the whole concept of the Church; we are the body of Christ—-we are the living Christ. The sacramental vision of Christ means that Christ is where we are.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in “Beauty of the Beloved”

The great spiritual battle begins---and never ends---with the reclaiming of our chosenness. Long before any human being saw us, we are seen by God’s loving eyes. Long before anyone heard us cry or laugh, we are heard by God who is all ears for us. Long before any person spoke to us in this world, we are spoken to by the voice of eternal love.Our preciousness, uniqueness and individuality are not given to us by those who meet us in clock-time---our brief chronological existence---but by the One who has chosen us with an everlasting love, a love that existed from all eternity and will last through all eternity.

How do we get in touch with our chosenness when we are surrounded by rejection? I have already said that this involves a real spiritual struggle. Are there any guidelines in this struggle? Let me try to formulate a few.

First of all, you have to keep unmasking the world about you for what it is: manipulative, controlling, power-hungry and, in the long run, destructive. The world tells you many lies about who you are, and you simply have to be realistic enough to remind yourself of this.Every time you feel hurt, offended or rejected, you have to dare to say to yourself: “These feelings, strong as they may be, are not telling me the truth about myself. The truth, even though I cannot feel it right now, is that I am the chosen child of God, precious in God’s eyes, called the Beloved from all eternity and held safe in an everlasting embrace.”

Secondly, you have to keep looking for people and places where your truth is spoken and where you are reminded of your deepest identity as the chosen one. Yes, we must dare to opt consciously for our chosenness and not allow our emotions, feelings or passions to seduce us into self-rejection. The synagogues, the churches, the many communities of faith, the different support groups helping us with our addictions, family, friends, teachers and students: all of these can become reminders of our truth. The limited, sometimes broken, love of those who share our humanity can often point us to the truth of who we are: precious in God’s eyes.

…Thirdly, you have to celebrate your chosenness constantly. This means saying “thank you” to God for having chosen you, and “thank you” to all who remind you of your chosenness. Gratitude is the most fruitful way of deepening your consciousness that you are not an “accident,” but a divine choice.It is important to realise how often we have had chances to be grateful and have not used them. When someone is kind to us, when an event turns out well, when a problem is solved, a relationship restored, a wound healed, there are very concrete reasons to offer thanks: be it with words, with flowers, with a letter, a card, a phone call or just a gesture of affection.

…What fascinates me so much is that every time we decide to be grateful it will be easier to see new things to be grateful for. Gratitude begets gratitude, just as love begets love.

I hope that these three guidelines for getting in touch with your chosenness can help you in your daily life. For me, they are the spiritual disciplines for my life as the chosen one.It is not easy to practice them, especially during times of crisis. Before I know it, I find myself complaining again, brooding again about some rejection and plotting ways to take revenge, but, when I keep my disciplines close to my heart, I am able to step over my shadow into the light of my truth.

Before concluding these thoughts about “being chosen,” I want to impress upon you the importance of this truth for our relationships with others. When we claim and constantly reclaim the truth of being the chosen ones, we soon discover within ourselves a deep desire to reveal to others their own chosenness.Instead of making us feel that we are better, more precious or valuable than others, our awareness of being chosen opens our eyes to the chosenness of others. That is the great joy of being chosen: the discovery that others are chosen as well. In the house of God there are many mansions. There is a place for everyone---a unique, special place.Once we deeply trust that we ourselves are precious in God’s eyes, we are able to recognise the preciousness of others and their unique places in God’s heart.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in “Life of the Beloved”

“How does the Church witness to Christ in the world? First and foremost by giving visibility to Jesus' love for the poor and the weak. In a world so hungry for healing, forgiveness, reconciliation, and most of all unconditional love, the Church must alleviate that hunger through its ministry.”

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’

“A theology of weakness challenges us to look at weakness not as a worldly weakness that allows us to be manipulated by the powerful in society and church, but as a total and unconditional dependence on God that opens us to be true channels of the divine power that heals the wounds of humanity and renews the face of the earth.”.

Henri J.M. Nouwen from My Way Home: Pathways to Life and Spirit.

When Jesus tells the story of the good Samaritan (see Luke 10:29-37) to answer the question “Who is my neighbour?” he ends the by asking: “Which, … do you think, proved himself a neighbour to the man who fell into the bandits’ hands?” The neighbour, Jesus makes clear, is not the poor man laying on the side of the street, stripped, beaten, and half dead, but the Samaritan who crossed the road, “bandaged his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them, … lifted him onto his own mount and took him to an inn and looked after him.”

My neighbour is the one who crosses the road for me!

We become neighbours when we are willing to cross the road for one another. There is so much separation and segregation: between black people and white people, between gay people and straight people, between young people and old people, between sick people and healthy people, between prisoners and free people, between Jews and Gentiles, Muslims and Christians, Protestants and Catholics.

There is a lot of road crossing to do. We are all very busy in our own circles. We have our own people to go to and our own affairs to take care of. But if we could cross the street once in a while and pay attention to what is happening on the other side, we might become neighbours.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’

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2014

There is a great difference between successfulness and fruitfulness. Success comes from strength, control, and respectability. A successful person has the energy to create something, to keep control over its development, and to make it in large quantities. Success brings many rewards and often fame. Fruits, however, come from weakness and vulnerability. And fruits are unique. A child is the fruit conceived in vulnerability, community is the fruit born through shared brokenness, and intimacy is the fruit that grows through touching another¹s wounds. Let¹s remind one another that what brings us true joy is not successfulness but fruitfulness.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’

Prayer and action can never be seen as contradictory or mutually exclusive. Prayer without action grows into powerless pietism, and action without prayer degenerates into questionable manipulation. If prayer leads us into a deeper unity with the compassionate Christ, it will always give rise to concrete acts of service. And if concrete acts of service do indeed lead us to a deeper solidarity with the poor, the hungry, the sick, the dying, and the oppressed, they will always give rise to prayer. In prayer we meet Christ, and in him all human suffering. In service we meet people, and in them the suffering Christ.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ’Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life' (pp. 116-7)

Honest, direct confrontation is a true expression of compassion. As Christians, we are in the world without being of it. It is precisely this position that renders confrontation both possible and necessary. The illusion of power must be unmasked, idolatry must be undone, oppression and exploitation must be fought, and all who participate in these evils must be confronted. This is compassion. We cannot suffer with the poor when we are unwilling to confront those persons and systems that cause poverty. We cannot set the captives free when we do not want to confront those who carry the keys. We cannot profess our solidarity with those who are oppressed when we are unwilling to confront the oppressor. Compassion without confrontation fades quickly into fruitless sentimental commiseration.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ’Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life' p. 124

Above all, prayer is a way of life which allows you to find a stillness in the midst of the world where you open your hands to God's promises and find hope for yourself, your neighbor, and your world. In prayer, you encounter God not only in the small voice and the soft breeze, but also in the midst of the turmoil of the world, in the distress and joy of your neighbor, and in the loneliness of your own heart.

Prayer leads you to see new paths and to hear new melodies in the air. Prayer is the breath of your life which gives you the freedom to go and to stay where you wish and to find the many signs which point out the way to a new land. Praying is not simply some necessary compartment in the daily schedule of a Christian or a source of support in a time of need, nor is it restricted to Sunday mornings or mealtimes. Praying is living. It is eating and drinking, action and rest, teaching and learning, playing and working. Praying pervades every aspect of our lives. It is the unceasing recognition that God is wherever we are, always inviting us to come closer and to celebrate the divine gift of being alive.

Henri Nouwen – With Open Hands (p. 156-157)

-“In our world full of strangers, estranged from their own past, culture and country, from their neighbors, friends and family, from their deepest self and their God, we witness a painful search for a hospitable place where life can be lived without fear and where community can be found.”

…“Our society seems to be increasingly full of fearful, defensive, aggressive people anxiously clinging to their property and inclined to look at their surrounding world with suspicion, always expecting an enemy to suddenly appear, intrude and do harm. But still – that is our vocation: to convert the hostis into a hospes, the enemy into a guest and to create the free and fearless space where brotherhood and sisterhood can be formed and fully experienced.”

… “if there is any concept worth restoring to its original depth and evocative potential it is the concept of hospitality. It is one of the richest biblical terms that can deepen and broaden our insight in our relationships to our fellow human beings. Old and New Testament stories not only show how serious our obligation is to welcome the stranger in our home, but they also tell us that guests are carrying precious gifts with them, which they are eager to reveal to a receptive host.”

… When hostility is converted into hospitality then fearful strangers can become guests revealing to their hosts the promise they are carrying with them. Then, in fact, the distinction between host and guest proves to be artificial and evaporates in the recognition of the newfound unity.”

Henri Nouwen in Reaching Out: The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life. (p.65-67).

This leaves us with the urgent question: How can we be or become a caring community, a community of people not trying to cover the pain or to avoid it by sophisticated bypasses, but rather share it as the source of healing and new life? It is important to realize that you cannot get a Ph.D. in caring, that caring cannot be delegated by specialists, and that therefore nobody can be excused from caring. Still, in a society like ours, we have a strong tendency to refer to specialists. When someone does not feel well, we quickly think, 'Where can we find a doctor?' When someone is confused, we easily advise him to go to a counselor. And when someone is dying, we quickly call a priest. Even when someone wants to pray we wonder if there is a minister around.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life

A friend is more than a therapist or a confessor, even though a friend can sometimes heal us and offer us God’s forgiveness.

Henri J. M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’ - March 23

The Spirit of Christ sends us into the world. To the degree that we are guided not by our fears but by the power of the Spirit, we become aware of the needs of the world and we experience a deep desire to be of service. The prisoners, the sick, the hungry, the homeless, as well as the many who are entangled in war or in the preparation for war, are shown to us as brothers and sisters with whom we are united in solidarity.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in A Cry for Mercy: Prayers from the Genesee, p.103

Dear Lord, today I thought of the words of Vincent Van Gogh “It is true there is an ebb and flow, but the sea remains the sea.” You are the sea. Although I experience many ups and downs in my emotions and often feel great shifts and changes in my inner life, you remain the same. Your sameness is not the sameness of a rock, but the sameness of a faithful lover. Out of your love I came to life; by your love I am sustained, and to your love I am always called back. There are days of sadness and days of joy; there are feelings of guilt and feelings of gratitude; there are moments of failure and moments of success; but all of them are embraced by your unwavering love.

My only real temptation is to doubt in your love, to think of myself as beyond the reach of your love, to remove myself from the healing radiance of your love. To do these things is to move into the darkness of despair.

O Lord, sea of love and goodness, let me not fear too much the storms and winds of my daily life, and let me know that there is ebb and flow but that the sea remains the sea. Amen.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in A Cry for Mercy: Prayers from the Genesee, p.117

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2015

I feel within me a strong desire to live my life on my own. In fact, my society praises the self-made people who are in control of their destinies, set their own goals, fulfil their own aspirations, and build their own kingdoms. It is very hard for me to truly believe that spiritual maturity is a willingness to let others guide me and “lead me even where I would rather not go,”(John 21:18). And still, every time I am willing to break out of my false need for self-sufficiency and dare to ask for help, a new community emerges– a fellowship of the weak– strong in the trust that together we can be a people of hope for a broken world. Simon of Cyrene discovered a new communion. Everyone whom I allow to touch me in my weakness and help me to be faithful to my journey to God’s home will come to realize that he or she has a gift to offer that may have remained hidden for a very long time. To receive help, support, guidance, affection, and care may well be a greater call than that of giving all these things because in receiving I reveal the gift to the givers and a new life together can begin.

Henri J.M. Nouwen in ‘Walk With Jesus: Stations of the Cross’

The Holy Spirit whom Jesus promised to his followers is the great gift of God.Without the Spirit of Jesus we can do nothing, but in and through His Spirit we can live free, joyful, and courageous lives.We cannot pray, but the Spirit of Christ can pray in us.We cannot create peace and joy, but the Spirit of Christ can fill us with a peace and joy which is not of this world.We cannot break through the many barriers which divide races, sexes, and nations, but the Spirit of Christ unites all people in the all-embracing love of God.

The Spirit of Christ burns away our many fears and anxieties and sets us free to move wherever we are sent. That is the great liberation of Pentecost.

Henri Nouwen in ‘A Cry for Mercy: Prayers from the Genesee’.

Every real revolutionary is challenged to be a mystic at heart, and one who walks the mystical way is called to unmask the illusory quality of human society. Mysticism and revolution are two aspects of the same attempt to bring about radical change. No mystics can prevent themselves from becoming social critics, since in self-reflection they will discover the roots of a sick society. Similarly, no revolutionaries can avoid facing their own human condition, since in the midst of their struggle for a new world they will find that they are also fighting their own reactionary fears and false ambitions. Mystics and revolutionaries must cut loose from their selfish needs for a safe and protected existence and face without fear their own miserable condition and that of the world around them. The appearance of Jesus in our midst has made it undeniably clear that changing the human heart and changing human society are not separate tasks, but are as interconnected as the two beams of the cross.

Henri Nouwen, in The Wounded Heart

You have an idea of what the new country looks like. Still, you are very much at home, although not truly at peace, in the old country. You know the ways of the old country, its joys and pains, its happy and sad moments. You have spent most of your days there. Even though you know you have not found what your heart most desires, you remain quite attached to it. It is part of your very bones.

Now you have come to realize that you must leave it and enter the new country, where your Beloved dwells. You know that what helped and guided you in the old country no longer works, but what else do you have to go by? You are being asked to trust that you will find what you need in the new country. That requires the death of what has become so precious to you: influence, success, yes, even affection and praise.

Trust is so hard, since you have nothing to fall back on. Still, trust is what is essential. The new country is where you are called to go, and the only way to go there is naked and vulnerable.

It seems that you keep crossing and recrossing the border. For a while you experience a real joy in the new country. But then you feel afraid and start longing again for all you left behind, so you go back to the old country. To your dismay, you discover that the old country has lost its charm. Risk a few more steps into the new country, trusting that each time you enter it, you will feel more comfortable and be able to stay longer.

Henri Nouwen in The Inner Voice of Love

When we talk to one another, we often talk about what happened, what we are doing, or what we plan to do. Often we say, “What’s up?” and we encourage one another to share the details of our daily lives. But often we want to hear something else. We want to hear, “I’ve been thinking of you today,” or “I missed you,” or “I wish you were here,” or “I really love you.” It is not always easy to say these words, but such words can deepen our bonds with one another.

Telling someone “I love you” in whatever way is always delivering good news.Nobody will respond by saying, “Well, I knew that already, you don’t have to say it again”!Words of love and affirmation are like bread. We need them each day, over and over. They keep us alive inside.

Henri Nouwen in Bread For The Journey - Feb. 12

In solitude, we come to know the Spirit who has already been given to us. The pains and struggles we encounter in our solitude thus becomes the way to hope, because our hope is not based on something that will happen after our sufferings are over, but on the real presence of God’s healing Spirit in the midst of these sufferings.

The discipline of solitude allows us gradually to come in touch with this hopeful presence of God in our lives, and allows us also to taste even now the beginnings of the joy and peace which belong to the new heaven and the new earth.

The discipline of solitude, as I have described it here, is one of the most powerful disciplines in developing a prayerful life. It is a simple, though not easy, way to hear the voice that makes all things new.

Henri Nouwen in “Making All Things New ”

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2016

One of the most powerful experiences in a life of compassion is the expansion of our hearts into a world-embracing space of healing from which no one is excluded. When, through discipline, we have overcome the power of our impatient impulses to flee or to fight, to become fearful or angry, we discover a limitless space into which we can welcome all the people of the world. Prayer for others, therefore, cannot be seen as an extraordinary exercise that must be practiced from time to time. Rather, it is the very beat of a compassionate heart. To pray for a friend who is ill, for a student who is depressed, for a teacher who is in conflict; for people in prisons, in hospitals, on battlefields; for those who are victims of injustice, who are hungry, poor, and without shelter; for those who risk their career, their health, and even their life in the struggle for social justice for leaders of church and state – to pray for all these people is not a futile effort to influence God’s will, but a hospitable gesture by which we invite our neighbors into the center of our hearts.

To pray for others means to make them part of ourselves. To pray for others means to allow their pains and sufferings, their anxieties and loneliness, their confusion and fears to resound in our innermost selves. To pray, therefore, is to become those for whom we pray, to become the sick child, the fearful mother, the distressed father, the nervous teenager, the angry student, and the frustrated striker. To pray is to enter into a deep inner solidarity with our fellow human beings so that in and through us they can be touched by the healing power of God’s Spirit. When, as disciples of Christ, we are able to bear the burdens of our brothers and sisters, to be marked with their wounds, and even be broken by their sins, our prayer becomes their prayer, our cry for mercy becomes their cry. In compassionate prayer, we bring before God those who suffer not merely “over there,” not simply “long ago,” but here and now in our innermost selves. And so it is in and through us that others are restored; it is in and through us that they receive new light, new hope, and new courage; it is in and through us that the Spirit touches them with God’s healing presence.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, ‘The Only Necessary Thing: Living A Prayerful Life’, Compiled & Edited by Wendy Wilson Greer. 1999.p.144,145.(Originally quoted in Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life, Nouwen, McNeill & Morrsion, pp. 109)

"I have written these meditations with my eyes on Jesus who wants to break down the walls between the Third World and ourselves, the poor and the rich, the healthy and the sick, those far away and those close by, those who suffer in their bodies and those who suffer in their innermost being.

In the heart of Jesus there is no place for anxious comparisons between the degrees and depths of human suffering. Little is accomplished by wondering who suffers more than who, and whose pain is the worst. Jesus died and rose for all people, with all their differences, so that all could be lifted up with him into the splendor of God."

Henri Nouwen in“Walk With Jesus: Stations Of The Cross”1990, 2015

The marvelous vision of the peaceable Kingdom, in which all violence has been overcome and all men, women, and children live in loving unity with nature, calls for its realization in our day-to-day lives. Instead of being an escapist dream, it challenges us to anticipate what it promises.

Every time we forgive our neighbor, every time we make a child smile, every time we show compassion to a suffering person, every time we arrange a bouquet of flowers, offer care to tame or wild animals, prevent pollution, create beauty in our homes and gardens, and work for peace and justice among peoples and nations we are making the vision come true.

We must remind one another constantly of the vision. Whenever it comes alive in us we will find new energy to live it out, right where we are. Instead of making us escape real life, this beautiful vision gets us involved.

Henri Nouwen in Bread For The Journey (December 13)

So many terrible things happen every day that we start wondering whether the few things we do ourselves make any sense. When people are starving only a few thousand miles away, when wars are raging close to our borders, when countless people in our own cities have no homes to live in, our own activities look futile. Such considerations, however, can paralyse us and depress us.

Here the word call becomes important. We are not called to save the world, solve all problems, and help all people. But we each have our own unique call, in our families, in our work, in our world. We have to keep asking God to help us see clearly what our call is and to give us the strength to live out that call with trust. Then we will discover that our faithfulness to a small task is the most healing response to the illnesses of our time.

Henri Nouwen in Bread For The Journey

Joy is the experience of knowing that you are unconditionally loved and that nothing — sickness, failure, emotional distress, oppression, war, or even death — can take that love away.

Joy is not the same as happiness. We can be unhappy about many things, but joy can still be there because it comes from the knowledge of God’s love for us. We are inclined to think that when we are sad we cannot be glad, but in the life of a God-centered person, sorrow and joy can exist together.

That isn’t easy to understand, but when we think about some of our deepest life experiences, such as being present at the birth of a child or the death of a friend, great sorrow and great joy are often seen to be parts of the same experience. Often we discover the joy in the midst of the sorrow.

I remember the most painful times of my life as times in which I became aware of a spiritual reality much larger than myself, a reality that allowed me to live the pain with hope. I dare even to say: ‘My grief was a place where I found joy.’ Still, nothing happens automatically in the spiritual life.

Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day. It is a choice based on the knowledge that we belong to God and have found in God our refuge and our safety and that nothing, not even death, can take God away from us.

Henri Nouwen in Here and Now: Living in the Spirit (1994)

When we claim and constantly reclaim the truth of being the chosen ones, we soon discover within ourselves a deep desire to reveal to others their own chosenness. Instead of making us feel that we are better, more precious or valuable than others, our awareness of being chosen opens our eyes to the chosenness of others. That is the great joy of being chosen: the discovery that others are chosen as well. In the house of God there are many mansions. There is a place for everyone - a unique, special place. Once we deeply trust that we ourselves are precious in God’s eyes, we are able to recognize the preciousness of others and their unique places in God's heart.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World

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2017

Friendship is one of the greatest gifts a human being can receive. It is a bond beyond common goals, common interests, or common histories. It is a bond stronger than sexual union can create, deeper than a shared fate can solidify, and even more intimate than the bonds of marriage or community. Friendship is being with the other in joy and sorrow, even when we cannot increase the joy or decrease the sorrow. It is a unity of souls that gives nobility and sincerity to love. Friendship makes all of life shine brightly.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, in Bread for the Journey

Good memories offer good guidance.We all have had the experience that in times of distress, failure, and depression it is the good memories which give us new confidence and hope.When the night is dark and everything seems black and fearful, we can hope for a bright new day because we have seen a bright day before.

Our hope is built on our memories. Without memories there is no expectations.

We do not always realize that among the best things we can give each other are good memories: kind words, signs of affection, gestures of sympathy, peaceful silences and joyful celebrations.

At the time they all may have seemed obvious, simple, and without many consequences, but as memories they can save us in the midst of confusion, fear, and darkness.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, in The Living Reminder p.59.

… What, then, is the compassionate way? The compassionate way is the patient way. Patience is the discipline of compassion.” … "if we cannot be patient we cannot be com-patient. If we ourselves are unable to suffer, we cannot suffer with others. If we lack the strength to carry the burden of our own lives, we cannot accept the burden of our neighbours. Patience is the hard but fruitful discipline of the disciple of the compassionate Lord.” …”Patience involves staying with it, living it through, listening carefully to what presents itself to us here and now.” … "Patience as active entering into the thick of life opens us to a new experience of time. Patience makes us realise that the Christian who has entered into discipleship with Jesus Christ lives not only with a new mind but also in a new time. The discipline of patience is the concentrated effort to let the new time into which we are led by Christ determine our perceptions and decisions.”

“… Patient moments are moments in which we have a very different experience of time. It is the experience of the moment as full, rich, and pregnant. Such an experience makes us want to stay where we are and take it all in. …These moments are not necessarily happy, joyful, or ecstatic. they may be full of sorrow and pain, or marked by agony and struggle. What counts is the experience of fullness, inner importance, and maturation. What counts is the knowledge that in that moment real life touched us.”

“… Patience dispels clock time and reveals a new time, the time of salvation. It is not the time measured by the abstract, objective units of the clock, the watch, or the calendar, but rather the time lived from within and experienced as full time. It is this full time about which scripture speaks. All the great events of the Gospel occur in the fullness of time.” …”Patience opens us to many different people, all of whom can be invited to taste the fullness of God’s presence. Patience opens our hearts to small children and makes us aware that their early years are as important in God’s compassionate eyes as the later years of adults. It makes us realise that is not the length of one’s life that counts, but its fullness. Patience opens our hearts to the elderly and prevents us from the clock-time judgement that their most important years have already passed. Patience opens us to the sick and dying and allows us to sense that one minute of really being together can remove the bitterness of a lifetime. Patience helps us to give a moment of rest and joy to the driven young executive and to create some silence for busy young married couples. Patience allows us to take ourselves less seriously and makes us suspicious every time our many altruistic and service-oriented plans put us back on the time line of our clocks, watches, and calendars. Patience makes us loving, caring, gentle, tender, and always grateful for the abundance of God’s gifts.

It is not difficult to recognise people who are patient. In their presence, something very deep happens to us. They lift us out of our anxious restlessness and bring us with them into the fullness of God’s time. In their presence, we feel how much we are loved, accepted, and cared for. The many things, both large and small, that filled us with anxiety suddenly seem to lose their power over us, and we recognise that all we really longed for is being realized in this one moment of compassion.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Donald P. McNeill, Douglas A. Morrison in Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life p. 92-93, 95-96, 98,101-102

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2018

We work on the premise that God acts in this world, in the lives of individuals and communities. God is doing something right now. Our task is to become aware of where and how God is presently acting and to recognize that indeed it is God who is acting. Our task is to help people see that in fact they are involved in the spiritual life already.

Henri J.M. Nouwen: ‘Spiritual Direction: Wisdom for the Long Walk of Faith’

If prayer leads us into a deeper unity with the compassionate Christ, it will always give rise to concrete acts of service. And if concrete acts of service do indeed lead us to a deeper solidarity with the poor, the hungry, the sick, the dying and the oppressed, they will always give rise to prayer. In prayer we meet Christ, and in him all human suffering. In service we meet people, and in them the suffering Christ.

…Action with and for those who suffer is the concrete expression of the compassionate life and the final criterion of being a Christian. Such acts do not stand beside the moments of prayer and worship but are themselves such moments. Why? Because Jesus Christ, who did not cling to his divinity, but became as we are, can be found where there are hungry, thirsty, alienated, naked, sick, and imprisoned people. Precisely when we live in an ongoing conversation with Christ and allow his Spirit to guide our lives, we will recognize him in the poor, the oppressed, and the downtrodden, and will hear his cry and respond to it whenever he reveals himself.

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Donald P. McNeill, Douglas A. Morrison in ‘Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life’

"The marvelous vision of the peaceable Kingdom, in which all violence has been overcome and all men, women, and children live in loving unity with nature, calls for its realization in our day-to-day lives. Instead of being an escapist dream, it challenges us to anticipate what it promises.

Henri Nouwen in Bread For The Journey (December 13)

Each day holds a surprise. But only if we expect it can we see, hear, or feel it when it comes to us. Let’s not be afraid to receive each day’s surprise, whether it comes to us as sorrow or joy. It will open a new place in our hearts, a place where we can welcome new friends and celebrate more fully our shared humanity.”

Henri Nouwen in Bread For The Journey - Jan. 1

…Compassion is not a bending toward the underprivileged from a privileged position; it is not a reaching out from on high to those who are less fortunate below; it is not a gesture of sympathy or pity for those who fail to make it in the upward pull. On the contrary, compassion means going directly to those people and places where suffering is most acute and building a home there. God’s compassion is total, absolute, unconditional, without reservation. It is the compassion of one who keeps going to the most forgotten corners of the world, and who cannot rest as long as he knows that there are still human beings with tears in their eyes. It is the compassion of a God who does not merely act as a servant, but whose servanthood is a direct expression of his divinity. (p. 27)

…Radical servanthood is not an enterprise in which we try and surround ourselves with as much misery as possible, but a joyful way of life in which our eyes our opened to the vision of the true God who chose the way of servanthood to make himself known. The poor are called blessed not because poverty is good, but because theirs in the kingdom of heaven; the mourners are called blessed not because mourning is good, but because they shall be comforted.

…Radical servanthood challenges us, while attempting persistently to overcome poverty, hunger, illness, and any other form of human misery, to reveal the gentle presence of our compassionate God in the midst of our broken world.

…Joy and gratitude are the qualities of the heart by which we recognise those who are committed to a life of service in the path of Jesus Christ. …Wherever we see real service we also see joy, because in the midst of service a divine presence becomes visible and a gift is offered. Therefore, those who serve as followers of Jesus discover that they are receiving more than they are giving. Just as a mother does not need to be rewarded for the attention she pays to her child, because her child is her joy, so those who serve their neighbour will find their reward in the people whom they serve. The joy of those who follow their Lord on His self-emptying and humbling way shows that what they seek is not misery and pain but the God whose compassion they have felt in their own lives. Their eyes do not focus on poverty and misery, but on the face of the loving God. (p. 31-32)

Henri J.M. Nouwen, Donald P. McNeill, Douglas A. Morrison, in Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life

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2019

Many voices ask for our attention. There is a voice that says, 'Prove that you are a good person.' Another voice says, 'You’d better be ashamed of yourself.' There also is a voice that says, 'Nobody really cares about you,' and one that says, 'Be sure to become successful, popular, and powerful.' But underneath all these often very noisy voices is a still, small voice that says, 'You are my Beloved, my favor rests on you.' That’s the voice we need most of all to hear. To hear that voice, however, requires special effort; it requires solitude, silence, and a strong determination to listen.

That’s what prayer is. It is listening to the voice that calls us 'my Beloved'.”

Henri J.M. Nouwen in ‘Bread for the Journey:A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith’