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| Link | Quote | Stars | Tags | Author |
| 8eb5b18 | When you experience a great need for human affection, you have to ask yourself whether the circumstances surrounding you and the people you are with are truly where God wants you to be. Whatever you are doing--watching a movie, writing a book, giving a presentation, eating, or sleeping--you have to stay in God's presence. If you feel a great loneliness and a deep longing for human contact, you have to be extremely discerning. Ask yourself w.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 118044c | When you let your wounded self express itself in the form of apologies, arguments, or complaints--through which it cannot be truly heard--you will only grow frustrated and increasingly feel rejected. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 6b67b42 | all the good things our world has to offer are yours to enjoy. But you can enjoy them truly only when you can acknowledge them as affirmations of the truth that you are the Beloved of God. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| fa93a59 | It is important to think about the Church not as "over there" but as a community of struggling, weak people of whom we are part and in whom we meet our Lord and Redeemer." | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 41f35e6 | Drinking our cup is not simply adapting ourselves to a bad situation and trying to use it as well as we can. Drinking our cup is a hopeful, courageous, and self-confident way of living. It is standing in the world with head erect, solidly rooted in the knowledge of who we are, facing the reality that surrounds us and responding to it from our hearts. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 9eb8840 | A true disciple of Jesus will always go to where people are feeling weak, broken, sick, in pain, poor, lonely, forgotten, anxious, and lost. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 5dbb4a8 | I don't know how I'll be as a shaman. I'll find out when I try it. You both know me. You've known me since before we even had names. I can't travel in my dreams, or above the sky. There aren't any spirits that talk to me or through me. I can't sing the songs. I can't help people who are sick. But I'll tell you this, and he raised his right forefinger before them and seized them with his eyes: --I can paint that fucking cave. | Kim Stanley Robinson | ||
| 0e107a5 | Just when all those around me were assuring me they loved me, cared for me, appreciated me, yes, even admired me, I experienced myself as a useless, unloved, and despicable person. Just when people were putting their arms around me, I saw the endless depth of my human misery and felt that there was nothing worth living for. Just when I had found a home, I felt absolutely homeless. Just when I was being praised for my spiritual insights, I f.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| a6e687a | Your life, my life, is given graciously by God. Our lives are not problems to be solved but journeys to be taken | Henri J. M. Nouwen | ||
| 91abbb4 | Here the mystery of drinking the cup becomes clear. The coming and leaving of friends, the experiences of love and betrayal, of care and indifference, of generosity and stinginess can become the way to true human freedom. Yes, people who love us also disappoint us, moments of great satisfaction also reveal unfulfilled needs, being home also shows us our homelessness. But all of these tensions can create in us that deep, deep yearning for fu.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| b6e407a | A spiritual life doesn't necessarily lead to tranquillity, to peace, or to a beautiful feeling about ourselves or about how nice it is to be together with others. The chipping-away process can hurt. It might mean being lonely in a place where you never wanted to go. It might lead you to a vocation you never sought. It might ask you to do uncomfortable things. Or it might ask you to obediently and routinely do comfortable things that are not.. | Henri J. M. Nouwen | ||
| 00ae709 | Deep spiritual formation is required, involving the whole person--body, mind, and heart. Formation in the mind of Christ, "who did not cling to power but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, who did not cling" (Phil. 2:6-8) is not what most seminaries are about. But to the degree that such formation is being sought after and realized, there is hope for the church of the twenty-first century." | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| c575cb9 | To live a spiritual life does not mean that we must leave our families, give up our jobs, or change our ways of working; it does not mean that we have to withdraw from social or political activities, or lose interest in literature and art; it does not require severe forms of asceticism or long hours of prayer. Changes such as these may in fact grow out of our spiritual life, and for some people radical decisions may be necessary. But the sp.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 8aac6a8 | Deep and mature friendship does not mean that we keep looking each other in the eyes, constantly impressed or enraptured by each other's beauty, talents, and gifts, but it does mean that together we look at the one who calls us to a life of service. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 7d28aa2 | Indeed, living a spiritual life requires a change of heart, a conversion. Such a conversion may be marked by a sudden inner change, or it can take place through a long, quiet process of transformation. But it always involves an inner experience of oneness. We realize that we are in the center, and that from there all that is and all that takes place can be seen and understood as part of the mystery of God's life with us. Our conflicts and p.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 96e3352 | But this leaves us with a very difficult question. Is there a way to move from our worry-filled life to the life of the Spirit? Must we simply wait passively until the Spirit comes along and blows away our worries? Are there any ways by which we can prepare ourselves for the life of the Spirit and deepen that life once it has touched us? | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| e728a89 | A lot of giving and receiving has a violent quality, because the givers and receivers act more out of need than out of trust. What looks like generosity is actually manipulation, and what looks like love is really a cry for affection or support. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 365c67b | Those you have deeply loved become part of you. The longer you live, there will always be more people to be loved by you and to become part of your inner community. The wider your inner community becomes, the more easily you will recognize your own brothers and sisters in the strangers around you. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 090d55a | Real loneliness comes when we have lost all sense of having things in common. When | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| ae40089 | Genius is not a matter of intelligence, but of spirit; and we cannot speak accurately of the spirit in any language but music. | Kim Stanley Robinson | ||
| 3928bd6 | There is no office in this needful worldBut dignifies the doer if done well. | Alfred Austin | ||
| b37a3fb | Judas betrayed Jesus. Peter denied him. Both were lost children. Judas, no longer able to hold on to the truth that he remained God's child, hung himself. In terms of the prodigal son, he sold the sword of his sonship. Peter, in the midst of his despair, claimed it and returned with many tears. Judas chose death. Peter chose life. I realize that this choice is always before me. Constantly | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| b940122 | The immense joy in welcoming back the lost son hides the immense sorrow that has gone before. The | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 7bef3d5 | The "distant country" is the world in which everything considered holy at home is disregarded." | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| db9fc4b | There is great pain and suffering in the world. But the pain hardest to bear is your own. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| d006e2a | In our production-oriented society, being busy, having an occupation, has become one of the main ways, if not the main way, of identifying ourselves. Without an occupation, not just our economic security but our very identity is endangered. This explains the great fear with which many people face their retirement. After all, who are we when we no longer have an occupation? | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| bc1562a | When you speak to others about your pain without fully owning it, you expect something from them that they cannot give. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 7f0f803 | All these "ifs" fill our minds with anxious thoughts and make us wonder constantly what to do and what to say in case something should happen in the future. Much, if not most, of our suffering is connected with these preoccupations. Possible career changes, possible family conflicts, possible illnesses, possible disasters, and a possible nuclear holocaust make us anxious, fearful, suspicious, greedy, nervous, and morose. They prevent us fro.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 28fe269 | Not only being occupied but also being preoccupied is highly encouraged by our society. The way in which newspapers, radio, and TV communicate their news to us creates an atmosphere of constant emergency. The excited voices of reporters, the predilection for gruesome accidents, cruel crimes, and perverted behavior, and the hour-to-hour coverage of human misery at home and abroad slowly engulf us with an all-pervasive sense of impending doom.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 2f98621 | Each little step toward the center seemed like an impossible demand, a demand requiring me to let go one more time from wanting to be in control, to give up one more time the desire to predict life, to die one more time to the fear of not knowing where it all will lead, and to surrender one more time to a love that knows no limits. And still, I knew that I would never be able to live the great commandment to love without allowing myself to .. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| d08520c | Unfulfilled BENEATH OUR WORRYING lives, however, something else is going on. While our minds and hearts are filled with many things, and we wonder how we can live up to the expectations imposed upon us by ourselves and others, we have a deep sense of unfulfillment. While busy with and worried about many things, we seldom feel truly satisfied, at peace, or at home. A gnawing sense of being unfulfilled underlies our filled lives. Reflecting a.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 3f65bda | Boredom is often closely linked to resentment. When we are busy, yet wondering if our busyness means anything to anyone, we easily feel used, manipulated, and exploited. We begin to see ourselves as victims pushed around and made to do all sorts of things by people who do not really take us seriously as human beings. Then an inner anger starts to develop, an anger which in time settles into our hearts as an always fretting companion. Our ho.. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| e86aad6 | For Paul, praying is like breathing. It cannot be interrupted without mortal danger. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| b17c821 | When I fail, I feel jealous or resentful of these others. When I succeed, I worry that others will be jealous or resentful of me. I become suspicious or defensive and increasingly afraid that I won't get what I so much desire or will lose what I already have. Caught | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 02925f7 | He had become so disconnected from what gives life--family, friends, community, acquaintances, and even food--that he realized that death would be the natural next step. All at once he saw clearly the path he had chosen and where it would lead him; he understood his own death choice; and he knew that one more step in the direction he was going would take him to self-destruction. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 44aad3b | To be lifted up into the divine life of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit does not mean, however, to be taken out of the world. On the contrary, those who have entered into the spiritual life are precisely the ones who are sent into the world to continue and fulfill the work that Jesus began. The spiritual life does not remove us from the world but leads us deeper into it. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 8f905d9 | The gospel proclaims human freedom and dignity more than human enslavement and depravity. What is needed is a balance of biblical values and emphasis on the empowering quality of the gospel. The spiritual values of humility, long suffering, endurance, and obedience are to be affirmed alongside self-reliance, freedom, proclamation, mission, and authority. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| d5c47d0 | But there are many other voices, voices that are loud, full of promises and very seductive. These voices say, "Go out and prove that you are worth something." Soon after Jesus had heard the voice calling him the Beloved, he was led to the desert to hear those other voices. They told him to prove that he was worth love in being successful, popular, and powerful. Those same voices are not unfamiliar to me. They" | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 68bdcd3 | But when I forget that voice of the first unconditional love, then these innocent suggestions can easily start dominating my life and pull me into the "distant country." It" | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 471009c | All of these mental games reveal to me the fragility of my faith that I am the Beloved One on whom God's favor rests. I am so afraid of being disliked, blamed, put aside, passed over, ignored, persecuted, and killed, that I am constantly developing strategies to defend myself and thereby assure myself of the love I think I need and deserve. And in so doing I move far away from my father's home and choose to dwell in a "distant country." | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 278f5a4 | There is a deep hole in your being, like an abyss. You will never succeed in filling that hole, because your needs are inexhaustible. You have to work around it so that gradually the abyss closes. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 906b7ee | Long before you, mother, or I was born, the death of Christ was celebrated in the Eucharist. And it will be celebrated long after we have died. During our few years of conscious participation in the Eucharist, our lives and deaths become part of this ongoing proclamation of the life and death of Christ. Therefore I dare to say that every time I celebrate the Eucharist and every time you receive the body and blood of Christ, we remember not .. | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 619589d | coming home" meant, for me, walking step by step toward the One who awaits me with open arms and wants to hold me in an eternal embrace. I" | Henri J.M. Nouwen | ||
| 827aad9 | Coming home and staying there where God dwells, listening to the voice of truth and love, that was, indeed, the journey I most feared because I knew that God was a jealous lover who wanted every part of me all the time. When would I be ready to accept that kind of love? | Henri J.M. Nouwen |