Henri Nouwen (1932-1996) was a Dutch born Roman Catholic priest, academic, author and theologian. Nouwen reached the top of the academic ladder with posts at Notre Dame, Yale and Harvard, but made the surprising decision to leave academia and to work with physically and mentally handicapped people at the L’Arche Daybreak community in Richmond Hill, Ontario.
Here are some of his thoughts…
- Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us the ‘beloved’ – Henri Nouwen
- The main question is not ‘How can we hide our wounds?’ so we don’t have to be embarrassed but ‘How can we put our woundedness in the service of others?’ When our wounds cease to be a source of shame and become a source of healing, we have become wounded healers – Henri Nouwen
- Love between people, when given by God, is stronger than death. When you have loved deeply, that love can grow even stronger after the death of the person you love. You have to trust that every true friendship has no end, that a communion of saints exists among all those, living and dead, who have truly loved God and one another – Henri Nouwen
As always, nice chatting…
