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" In solitude we become aware that we were together before we came together and that life is not a creation of our will but rather an obedient response to the reality of our being united. "

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" Our efforts to disconnect ourselves from our own suffering end up disconnecting our suffering from God's suffering for us. The way out of our loss and hurt is in and through. "

Henri Nouwen

Own

Loss

Hurt

" Somewhere we know that without silence words lose their meaning, that without listening speaking no longer heals, that without distance closeness cannot cure. "

" One of the most beautiful ways for spiritual formation to take place is to let your insecurity lead you closer to the Lord. Natural hypersensitivity can become an asset; it makes you aware of your need to be with people and it allows you to be more willing to look at their needs. "

" Much violence is based on the illusion that life is a property to be defended and not to be shared. "

" Waiting is a period of learning. The longer we wait, the more we hear about him for whom we are waiting. "

Henri Nouwen

Him

Learning

" When you recognize the festive and the still moments as moments of prayer, then you gradually realize that to pray is to live. "

" 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 as 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. "

" Ministry is the least important thing. You cannot not minister if you are in communion with God and live in community. "

" God is a God of the present. God is always in the moment, be that moment hard or easy, joyful and painful. "

" The greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity or power, but self-rejection. "

" To give someone a blessing is the most significant affirmation we can offer. "

" Our glory is hidden in our pain, if we allow God to bring the gift of himself in our experience of it. "

" To be a Christian who is willing to travel with Christ on his downward road requires being willing to detach oneself constantly from any need to be relevant, and to trust ever more deeply the Word of God. "

" One of the main tasks of theology is to find words that do not divide but unite, that do not create conflict but unity, that do not hurt but heal. "

" Solitude is very different from a 'time-out' from our busy lives. Solitude is the very ground from which community grows. Whenever we pray alone, study, read, write, or simply spend quiet time away from the places where we interact with each other directly, we are potentially opened for a deeper intimacy with each other. "

" Most Christian leadership is exercised by people who do not know how to develop healthy, intimate relationships and have opted for power and control instead. Many Christian empire-builders have been people unable to give and receive love. "

" 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 healing, not curing... that is a friend who cares. "

" Spiritual identity means we are not what we do or what people say about us. And we are not what we have. We are the beloved daughters and sons of God. "

" The spiritual life is not a life before, after, or beyond our everyday existence. No, the spiritual life can only be real when it is lived in the midst of the pains and joys of the here and now. "

" Our inclination is to show our Lord only what we feel comfortable with. But the more we dare to reveal our whole trembling self to him, the more we will be able to sense that his love, which is perfect love, casts out all our fears. "

" Solitude is the place where we can connect with profound bonds that are deeper than the emergency bonds of fear and anger. "

" The Christian leader of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self. God loves us, not because of what we do or accomplish, but because God has created and redeemed us in love. "

" Our first responsibility in the midst of violence is to prevent it from destroying us. "

Henri Nouwen

Violence

Our

" When we have nothing to cling to as our own and cease thinking of ourselves as people who must defend privileges, we can open ourselves freely to others with the faithful expectation that our strength will manifest itself in our shared weakness. "

" Friendship has always belonged to the core of my spiritual journey. "

" To be a minister means above all to become powerless, or in more precise terms, to speak with our powerlessness to the condition of powerlessness which is so keenly felt but so seldom expressed by the people of our age. "

" Prayer is the most concrete way to make our home in God. "

" I've had a tremendous problem with depression in my life. I'd rather not talk about it, because it's over. But depression is real. "

" I have an increasing sense that the most important crisis of our time is spiritual and that we need places where people can grow stronger in the spirit and be able to integrate the emotional struggles in their spiritual journeys. "

" Fear is the great enemy of intimacy. Fear makes us run away from each other or cling to each other but does not create true intimacy. "