When I agree to speak to some group, I try to offer a topic
that will be acceptable to them. But I
also think about my own preparation time and decide that I want to work on
something special to me. I recently
agreed to a commitment to offer some thoughts about Henri Nouwen. When I made this commitment, I knew I would
enjoy it. And I also knew I had some
work to do before I was ready. But it would
be a labor of love.
I knew Henri Nouwen.
I did not know him well---except through his writings---but was an
acquaintance. I am sure many folks
claimed to be friends with him, but I did not have nearly enough time with him
to qualify as a friendship. I heard him
speak a few times. I have two or three
pictures of the two of us---pictures which I cherish, but which will mean
nothing to anyone else. I share this
much so that when I write a few times about Nouwen, it will make sense.
Nouwen was born in 1932 in Holland. He was the oldest of four children and
certainly the most religious of them. He
was Catholic, who felt called to the priesthood. He studied psychology and theology and,
eventually, was ordained in 1957. After
further studies, he received his doctorate.
Nouwen spent some time at the Menniger Clinic in Topeka, KS, where he
worked with psychiatric patients in what we now call pastoral counseling. Clearly, Nouwen was equipping himself in both
spirituality and psychology, twin themes that are almost always present in his
writings.
Nouwen was a restless spirit. In this we are reminded of another spiritual
sage of mine, namely, the Cistercian monk, Thomas Merton. In fact, Nouwen spent a little time at
Merton’s monastery in Kentucky, the Abbey of Gethsemani. In effect like Merton, Nouwen was on a double
search: for himself and for God. And
like Merton, he would suggest you don’t find one without finding the
other. And like Merton, Nouwen’s
writings are the spiritual trail we can follow as both men pursued this
search. I am sure that was part of the
appeal of both writers for me.
Nouwen spent time teaching in the finest schools in our
country, namely, Yale and Harvard. He
spent time traveling abroad and lived with the poor in Peru and Bolivia. He stayed in monasteries on occasion. And he finally and ironically, wound up
committing his life to the L’Arche Daybreak community in Toronto, one of a
number of care centers begun by Jean Vanier to care for severely handicapped
people. In fact, Nouwen was given charge
of a young man, Adam, about whom Nouwen wrote much.
One of the most important books from Nouwen for me
personally was a journal account of his seven-month stay in a Trappist
monastery in NY. The book is called The Genesee Diary, Genesee being the
name of the monastery. This book was
published in 1976 and was literally his diary of seven months spent there in
1974. I did not yet know Nouwen, but it
is interesting to think he was experiencing things and reflecting and writing
on them in a way that would affect me less than a decade later.
I am enjoying the chance to go back and re-read The Genesee Diary. Given where I am in life, it is impossible to
read it the same way I did the first time.
I know so much more---about myself, about life, etc. But I likely know so much less---about myself
and things forgotten. This leads to me to say re-reading is perhaps not even
that, but rather a fresh reading. I
share a few thoughts that strike me now.
The first journal entry is June 2, 1974. I had to laugh when I read Nouwen’s initial
words: “Thanks be to God that I am here.”
I decided not even to read further.
Partly because of reading Nouwen, Merton and others, I learned about
monks, monasteries and monasticism.
Whenever I go to a monastery, the most sure experience I have is I slow
down. Simply walking onto monastic
grounds feels holy. Spiritually, I shift
down a few gears. I start noticing,
appreciating and centering.
I now know why Nouwen would begin the journal that way:
“Thanks be to God that I am here.” I am
sure the first time I read this book, I never paused at those words. I did not know enough; I was too
superficial. I do not claim I am a deep
person now, but I have known some deep times.
The monastery almost always takes me there again. But I know I am not going to live in a monastery. And neither did Nouwen, which is what makes
him different than Merton. Nouwen
visited; Merton moved in.
So my question is the same one that drove Nouwen. How can I learn to live and be present to the
Spirit so that wherever I am, I can say, “Thanks be to God that I am
here.” The best of my own Quaker
tradition knows this perspective.
Quakers talk about living in the Presence. In that sense it is not a place; it is an
experience. And finally, I think that
also is true of the monastery. Finally,
it is not the place; it is the experience.
Clearly, Nouwen knew at Genesee he was in the place where
there was the Presence of the Spirit. At
Genesee he would learn what it meant to live in the Presence. And if he learned that well, he could still
live in the Presence when he left Genesee.
He did learn that. And that is
what I am still questing to learn and to live---the Presence of the Spirit.
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