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When You Pray, You Open Yourself To The Influence Of The Power Which Has Revealed Itself As Love. The Power Gives You Freedom And Independence. Once Touched By This Power, You Are No Longer Swayed Back And Forth By The Countless Opinions, Ideas, And Feelings Which Flow Through You. You Have Found A Center For Your Life That Gives You A Creative Distance So That Everything You See, Hear, And Feel Can Be Tested Against The Source.

-Henri Nouwen

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When You Pray, You

Henri Nouwen

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When You Pray, You Open Yourself To The Influence Of The Power Which Has Revealed Itself As Love. The Power Gives You Freedom And Independence. Once Touched By This Power, You Are No Longer Swayed Back And Forth By The Countless Opinions, Ideas, And Feelings Which Flow Through You. You Have Found A Center For Your Life That Gives You A Creative Distance So That Everything You See, Hear, And Feel Can Be Tested Against The Source.

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To Live A Spiritual Life We Must First Find The Courage To Enter Into The Desert Of Loneliness And To Change It By Gentle And Persistent Efforts Into A Garden Of Solitude.

In Community, Where You Have All The Affection You Could Ever Dream Of, You Feel That There Is A Place Where Even Community Cannot Reach. That's A Very Important Experience. In That Loneliness, Which Is Like A Dark Night Of The Soul, You Learn That God Is Greater Than Community.

Nuclear Man Is The Man Who Realizes That His Creative Powers Hold The Potential For Self-destruction. He Sees That In This Nuclear Age Vast New Industrial Complexes Enable Man To Produce In One Hour That Which He Labored Over For Years In The Past, But He Also Realizes That These Same Industries Have Disturbed The Ecological Balance And, Through Air And Noise Pollution, Have Contaminated His Own Milieu.

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.

We Enter Into Solitude First Of All To Meet Our Lord And To Be With Him And Him Alone. Only In The Context Of Grace Can We Face Our Sin; Only In The Place Of Healing Do We Dare To Show Our Wounds; Only With A Singleminded Attention To Christ Can We Give Up Our Clinging Fears And Face Our Own True Nature.

Reading With Children Is An Enormous Gift To Them. It's A Great Honor To Invite Children To Read With Adults.

Christian Community Is The Place Where We Keep The Flame Of Hope Alive Among Us And Take It Seriously So That It Can Grow And Become Stronger In Us.

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.

Life Is A Gift, Not To Possess, But To Share.

When We Become Aware That We Do Not Have To Escape Our Pains, But That We Can Mobilize Them Into A Common Search For Life, Those Very Pains Are Transformed From Expressions Of Despair Into Signs Of Hope.

Which Questions Guide Our Lives? Which Questions Do We Make Our Own? Which Questions Deserve Our Undivided And Full Personal Commitment? Finding The Right Questions Is Crucial To Finding The Answers.

I Really Believe That What We Finally Want Is To Know God, As God Has Come To Be Known Through Jesus. Knowledge Is Knowledge Of The Heart - The Spirit - I Would Say. It Is The Spirit In Us Who Reveals God.

Jesus Invites Us To Abide In His Love. That Means To Dwell With All That I Am In Him. It Is An Invitation To A Total Belonging, To Full Intimacy, To An Unlimited Being-with. The Light Of The Spirit Reveals To Us That Love Conquers All Fear.

Prayer Is Not One Of The Many Things The Community Does. Rather, It Is Its Very Beingbut When Prayer Is No Longer Its Primary Concern, And When Its Many Activities Are No Longer Seen And Experienced As Part Of Prayer Itself, The Community Quickly Degenerates Into A Club With A Common Cause But No Common Vocation.

We Seldom Realize Fully That We Are Sent To Fulfill God-given Tasks. We Act As If We Were Simply Dropped Down In Creation And Have To Decide To Entertain Ourselves Until We Die. But We Were Sent Into The World By God, Just As Jesus Was. Once We Start Living Our Lives With That Conviction, We Will Soon Know What We Were Sent To Do.

As Those Who Are Chosen, Blessed, Broken, And Given, We Are Called To Live Our Lives With A Deep Inner Joy And Peace. It Is The Life Of The Beloved, Lived In A World Constantly Trying To Convince Us That The Burden Is On Us To Prove That We Are Worthy Of Being Loved.

I'm Learning That The Blessing Is Located In Our Poor People, In People Who Are Weak; They Are The Ones We Should Stay Close To, Not Because They Need Us But Because We Need To Receive From Them The Blessing.

Through Compassion It Is Possible To Recognize That The Craving For Love That People Feel Resides Also In Our Own Hearts, That The Cruelty The World Knows All Too Well Is Also Rooted In Our Own Impulses. Through Compassion We Also Sense Our Hope For Forgiveness In Our Friends' Eyes And Our Hatred In Their Bitter Mouths. When They Kill, We Know That We Could Have Done It; When They Give Life, We Know That We Can Do The Same. For A Compassionate Person Nothing Human Is Alien: No Joy And No Sorrow, No Way Of Living And No Way Of Dying.

Silence Is A Very Concrete, Practical, And Useful Discipline In All Our Ministerial Tasks. It Can Be Seen As A Portable Cell Taken With Us From The Solitary Place Into The Midst Of Our Ministry. Silence Is Solitude Practiced In Action.

Jesus Says, "keep Your Heart On The Kingdom First. Keep Your Heart On God's Love. Keep Focused On The Fact That You Are God's Beloved Daughter Or Son. That's The Truth Of Who You Are.

We Can Be Unhappy About Many Things, But Jy Can Still Be There... It Is Important To Become Aware That At Every Moment Of Our Life We Have An Opportunity To Choose Joy... It Is In The Choice That Our True Freedom Lies, And That Freedom Is, In The Final Analysis, The Freedom To Love.

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.

People Who Have Known The Joy Of God Point Each Other To Flashes Of Light Here And There, And Remind Each Other That They Reveal The Hidden But Real Presence Of God. They Discover That There Are People Who Heal Each Other's Wounds, Forgive Each Other's Offenses, Share Their Possessions, Foster The Spirit Of Community, Celebrate The Gifts They Have Received, And Live In Constant Anticipation Of The Full Manifestation Of God's Glory.

The People Who Most Affected Me Were The Ones Who Got Right In There With Me, Who Cried With Me, But Who Also Had A Certain Authority, Who Dared To Say What Needed Saying.

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.

Trust That The Treasure We Look For Is Hidden In The Ground On Which We Stand.

Where Is Peace To Be Found? The Answer Is Surprising But Clear. In Weakness. Why There? Because In Our Weakness, Our Familiar Ways Of Controlling And Manipulating Our World Are Being Stripped Away, And We Are Forced To Let Go From Doing Much, Thinking Much, And Relying On Our Self-sufficiency. Right There Where We Are Most Vulnerable, The Peace That Is Not Of This World Is Mysteriously Hidden.

When You Pray, You Open Yourself To The Influence Of The Power Which Has Revealed Itself As Love. The Power Gives You Freedom And Independence. Once Touched By This Power, You Are No Longer Swayed Back And Forth By The Countless Opinions, Ideas, And Feelings Which Flow Through You. You Have Found A Center For Your Life That Gives You A Creative Distance So That Everything You See, Hear, And Feel Can Be Tested Against The Source.

Friends Share Our Pain And Touch Our Wounds With A Gentle And Tender Hand.

Lifting Our Cup Means Sharing Our Life So We Can Celebrate It. When We Truly Believe We Are Called To Lay Down Our Lives For Our Friends, We Must Dare To Take The Risk To Let Others Know What We Are Living.

Prayer Is Not What Is Done By Us, But Rather What Is Done By The Holy Spirit In Us.

The More You Are Called To Speak For God's Love, The More You Will Need To Deepen The Knowledge Of That Love In Your Own Heart. The Farther The Outward Journey Takes You, The Deeper The Inward Journey Must Be. Only When Your Roots Are Deep Can Your Fruits Be Abundant.

I Feel The Problems I Have Are Meant To Purify Me.

For As Long As You Can Remember, You Have Been A Pleaser, Depending On Others To Give You An Identity. You Need Not Look At That Only In A Negative Way. You Wanted To Give Your Heart To Others, And You Did So Quickly And Easily. But Now You Are Being Asked To Let Go Of All These Self-made Props And Trust That God Is Enough For You. You Must Stop Being A Pleaser And Reclaim Your Identity As A Free Self.

When We Are Securely Rooted In Personal Intimacy With The Source Of Life, It Will Be Possible To Remain Flexible Without Being Relativistic, Convinced Without Being Rigid, Willing To Confront Without Being Offensive, Gentle And Forgiving Without Being Soft, And True Witnesses Without Being Manipulative.

Today's Reading Was "if They Ask You To Walk A Mile, Walk Two. Don't Take An Eye For An Eye Or A Tooth For A Tooth." You Have Chances Every Second To Live This Word, But It Has To Be In You. It Can't Just Be An Idea; It Has To Sink From The Mind Into The Heart.

God Is Your Safety And Your Home. You Are Well Embraced." Start Living The Multi-formity Of Life From This Place. If You Can Hold On To That, It All Becomes One.

Where True Inner Freedom Is, There Is God. And Where God Is, There We Want To Be.

Much Violence Is Based On The Illusion That Life Is A Property To Be Defended And Not To Be Shared.

Today I Personally Believe That While Jesus Came To Open The Door To God's House, All Human Beings Can Walk Through That Door, Whether They Know About Jesus Or Not. Today I See It As My Call To Help Every Person Claim His Or Her Own Way To God.

I Speak Of God's Love And Grace And Redemption And Freedom, But When I Say "in The Context Of This Community," It Is Heard Differently. To Be With People So Obviously Broken, So Obviously Handicapped, And Here To Discover Real Joy And Peace - That Makes The Word Of God Come Alive.

Why Is It Important That You Are With God And God Alone On The Mountain Top? It's Important Because It's The Place In Which You Can Listen To The Voice Of The One Who Calls You The Beloved. To Pray Is To Listen To The One Who Calls You 'my Beloved Daughter,' 'my Beloved Son,' 'my Beloved Child.' To Pray Is To Let That Voice Speak To The Center Of Your Being, To Your Guts, And Let That Voice Resound In Your Whole Being.

I Am Deeply Convince That The Necessity Of Prayer, And To Pray Unceasingly, Is Not As Much Based On Our Desire For God As On God's Desire For Us. It Is God's Passionate Pursuit Of Us That Calls Us To Prayer.

When The Imitation Of Christ Does Not Mean To Live A Life Like Christ, But To Live Your Life As Authentically As Christ Lived His, Then There Are Many Ways And Forms In Which A Man Can Be A Christian.

Precisely Where I Feel My Poverty Is Where I Discover God's Blessing.

Without Pentecost The Christ-event - The Life, Death, And Resurrection Of Jesus - Remains Imprisoned In History As Something To Remember, Think About And Reflect On. The Spirit Of Jesus Comes To Dwell Within Us, So That We Can Become Living Christs Here And Now.

The Best Of Community Does Give One A Deep Sense Of Belonging And Well-being; And In That Sense Community Takes Away Loneliness.

I Want My Work To Create Space Where People Can Meet God, Rather Than Give Them Something They Can "apply" To Their Daily Life.

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.

The Evangelical Movement Has Become Just A Bit Victimized By A Success-oriented Culture, Wanting The Church - Like The Corporation - To Be Successful.

I Am Learning That The Best Cure For Hypocrisy Is Community. Hypocrisy Is Not So Much The Result Of Not Living What I Preach But Much More Of Not Confessing My Inability To Fully Live Up To My Own Words.

As We Read Spiritually About Spiritual Things, We Open Our Hearts To God's Voice. Sometimes We Must Be Willing To Put Down The Book We Are Reading And Just Listen To What God Is Saying To Us Through Our Words.

The Great Challenge Is To Discover That We Are Truly Invited To Participate In The Divine Life Of The Father, The Son, And The Holy Spirit.

We Have To Trust That Our Stories Deserve To Be Told. We May Discover That The Better We Tell Our Stories The Better We Will Want To Live Them.

Compassion Requires Us To Be Weak With The Weak, Vulnerable With The Vulnerable, And Powerless With The Powerless. Compassion Means Full Immersion In The Condition Of Being Human.

Ministry Is A Very Confronting Service. It Does Not Allow People To Live With Illusions Of Immortality And Wholeness. It Keeps Reminding Others That They Are Mortal And Broken, But Also That With The Recognition Of This Condition, Liberation Starts.

Community Means That People Come Together Around The Table, Not Just To Feed Their Bodies, But To Feed Their Minds And Their Relationships.

Solitude Is The Furnace Of Transformation. Without Solitude We Remain Victims Of Our Society And Continue To Be Entangled In The Illusions Of The False Self.

The Journey From Teaching About Love To Allowing Myself To Be Loved Proved Much Longer Than I Realised.

The World Is Waiting For New Saints, Ecstatic Men And Women Who Are So Deeply Rooted In The Love Of God That They Are Free To Imagine A New International Order.

The Real 'work' Of Prayer Is To Become Silent And Listen To The Voice That Says Good Things About Me.

There Is A Wonderful Story In The Gospel Of Luke (6:12-26). Jesus Went Up To The Mountain To Pray At Night; In The Morning He Came Down From The Mountain And Called His Twelve Apostles Around Him. In The Afternoon He Went Out On The Plain With Them To Preach The Good News And Heal The Sick. He Had Communion With God First, Then He Had Community, And Then He Went Out To Do The Work Of God. That's The Order Of Things.

Ministry In No Way Is A Privilege...it Is The Core Of The Christian Life. No Christian Is A Christian Without Being A Minister.

What Once Seemed Such A Curse Has Become A Blessing. All The Agony That Threatened To Destroy My Life Now Seems Like The Fertile Ground For Greater Trust, Stronger Hope, And Deeper Love.

Compassion Asks Us To Go Where It Hurts, To Enter Into The Places Of Pain, To Share In Brokenness, Fear, Confusion, And Anguish. Compassion Challenges Us To Cry Out With Those In Misery, To Mourn With Those Who Are Lonely, To Weep With Those In Tears. Compassion Requires Us To Be Weak With The Weak, Vulnerable With The Vulnerable, And Powerless With The Powerless. Compassion Means Full Immersion In The Condition Of Being Human.

Hope Is Willing To Leave Unanswered Questions Unanswered And Unknown Futures Unknown. Hope Makes You See God's Guiding Hand Not Only In The Gentle And Pleasant Moments But Also In The Shadows Of Disappointment And Darkness.

I Am Very Grateful That I Am In Touch With So Many Different Church Groups. I Am Always Very Moved By The Fact That So Many People - Practically Over The Spectrum Of The Christian World - Are Responding To My Writing.

Peace Is First Of All The Art Of Being.

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... We Must Dare To Opt Consciously For Our Chosenness And Not Allow Our Emotions, Feelings, Or Passions To Seduce Us Into Self-rejection.

The Real Enemies Of Our Life Are The 'oughts' And The 'ifs.' They Pull Us Backward Into The Unalterable Past And Forward Into The Unpredictable Future. But Real Life Takes Place In The Here And Now.

Ministers Are Tempted To Join The Ranks Of Those Who Consider It Their Primary Task To Keep Other People Busy … But Our Task Is The Opposite Of Distraction … How To Keep Them From Being So Busy That They Can No Longer Hear The Voice Of God Who Speaks In Silence.

Indeed, When God's Glory Dwells In Me, There Is Nothing Too Far Away, Nothing Too Painful, Nothing Too Strange Or Too Familiar That It Cannot Contain And Renew By Its Touch. Every Time I Recognize The Glory Of God In Me And Give It Space To Manifest Itself To Me, All That Is Human Can Be Brought There And Nothing Will Be The Same Again.

In Solitude We Become Aware That Our Worth Is Not The Same As Our Usefulness.

Joy Is The Experience Of Knowing That You Are Unconditionally Loved.

In Their Poverty, The Mentally Handicapped Reveal God To Us And Hold Us Close To The Gospel.

Mentally Handicapped

To Learn Patience Is Not To Rebel Against Every Hardship.

A Little Criticism Makes Me Angry, And A Little Rejection Makes Me Depressed. A Little Praise Raises My Spirits, And A Little Success Excites Me. It Takes Very Little To Raise Me Up Or Thrust Me Down. Often I Am Like A Small Boat On The Ocean, Completely At The Mercy Of Its Waves. All The Time And Energy I Spend In Keeping Some Kind Of Balance And Preventing Myself From Being Tipped Over And Drowning Shows My Life Is Mostly A Struggle For Survival: Not A Holy Struggle, But An Anxious Struggle Resulting From The Mistaken Idea That It Is The World That Defines Me.

The Joy That Compassion Brings Is One Of The Best-kept Secrets Of Humanity. It Is A Secret Known Only To A Very Few People, A Secret That Has To Be Rediscovered Over And Over Again.

Best Kept Secrets

The Question Is Not How Much Are You Going To Accomplish? Or Can You Show Some Results? But Are You In Love With Jesus? In Our World Of Brokeness And Despair, There Is An Enormous Need For Men And Women Who Know The Heart Of God; A Heart That Forgives, Cares, Reaches Out And Wants To Heal.

The Crisis Of Our Prayer Life Is That Our Minds May Be Filled With Ideas Of God While Our Hearts Remain Far From Him.

Who Am I? Where Have I Come From? Where Am I Going?-are Not Questions With An Answer But Questions That Open Us Up To New Questions Which Lead Us Deeper Into The Unshakeable Mystery Of Existence.

The Fruits Of Your Labors May Be Reaped Two Generations From Now. Trust, Even When You Don't See The Results.

Jesus Was A Revolutionary, Who Did Not Become An Extremist, Since He Did Not Offer An Ideology, But Himself. He Was Also A Mystic, Who Did Not Use His Intimate Relationship With God To Avoid The Social Evils Of His Time, But Shocked His Milieu To The Point Of Being Executed As A Rebel. In This Sense He Also Remains For Nuclear Man The Way To Liberation And Freedom.

Intimate Relationships

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.

The Church Will Always Be Renewed When Our Attention Shifts From Ourselves To Those Who Need Our Care. The Blessing Of Jesus Always Comes To Us Through The Poor. The Most Remarkable Experience Of Those Who Work With The Poor Is That, In The End, The Poor Give More Than They Receive. They Give Food To Us.

As We Are Involved In Unceasing Thinking, So We Are Called To Unceasing Prayer.

The Deepest Satisfaction Of Writing Is Precisely That It Opens Up New Spaces Within Us Of Which We Were Not Aware Before We Started To Write. To Write Is To Embark On A Journey Whose Final Destination We Do Not Know.

[praying] Demands That You Take To The Road Again And Again, Leaving Your House And Looking Forward To A New Land For Yourself And Your [fellow Human]. This Is Why Praying Demands Poverty, That Is, The Readiness To Live A Life In Which You Have Nothing To Lose So That You Always Begin Afresh.

The More We Touch The Intimate Love Of God Which Creates, Sustains, And Guides Us, The More We Recognize The Multitude Of Fruits That Come Forth From That Love.

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.

Somewhere We Know That Without Silence, Words Lose Their Meaning.

Distance Friendship

Inspirational Long Distance Relationship

I Wrote To My Bishop, The Archbishop Of Utrecht, Holland, And Explained That I Wanted Not Just Permission To Stay Longer, But A Mission. He Met Me At The Trosly L'arche Community And We Spent A Few Days Together . . . I Wanted Him To Get To Know L'arche, To Understand What I Was Doing There. Afterward He Said, "i Understand Now, Henri. You Have Found A Home For Your Self."

Too Many Of Us Are Lonely Ministers Practicing A Lonely Ministry.

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.

In This Crazy World, There's An Enormous Distinction Between Good Times And Bad, Between Sorrow And Joy. But In The Eyes Of God, They're Never Separated. Where There Is Pain, There Is Healing. Where There Is Mourning, There Is Dancing. Where There Is Poverty, There Is The Kingdom.

When We Break Bread And Give It To Each Other, Fear Vanishes And God Becomes Very Close.

The Church Is Not An Institution Forcing Us To Follow Rules But A Community Inviting Us To Still Our Hunger And Thirst At Its Table.

Hunger And Thirst

Is My Growing Old Making Me Any Closer To Christ? Am I Only Getting Older Or Am I Getting More Godly?

Living In A Community With Very Wounded People, I Came To See That I Had Lived Most Of My Life As A Tightrope Artist Trying To Walk On A High, Thin Cable From One Tower To The Other, Always Waiting For The Applause When I Had Not Fallen Off And Broken My Leg.

It's An Incredible Mystery Of God's Love That The More You Know How Deeply You Are Loved, The More You Will See How Deeply Your Sisters And Your Brothers In The Human Family Are Loved.

Active Waiting Means Present Fully To The Moment, In The Conviction That Something Is Happening Where You Are And That You Want To Be Present To It.

The Mystery Of One Man Is Too Immense And Too Profound To Be Explained By Another Man.

Live, Work, And Travel With Handicapped People, So I Can Stay Close To Them. But Since I Am Often Busy With Many Things, It's A Constant Struggle To Keep The Handicapped Members Of Our Community In The Center Of My Life.

I Have Always Felt That If I Am Very Personal And Connected With What I Myself Am Living, My Writing Will Transcend Ecclesial Boundaries.

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 Our Words More Seriously And Discovering Their True Selves.

Friendship And Love Are Impossible Without A Mutual Vulnerability.

Love And Friendship

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.

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.

If You Are Not Able To Be Silent, You Will Not Be Able To Speak Well.

It Is Freeing To Become Aware That We Do Not Have To Be Victims Of Our Past And Can Learn New Ways Of Responding. Forgiveness Is Love Practiced Among People Who Love Poorly. It Sets Us Free Without Wanting Anything In Return.

We Have To Keep Asking Ourselves: 'what Does It All Mean? What Is God Trying To Tell Us? How Are We Called To Live In The Midst Of All This?' Without Such Questions Our Lives Become Numb And Flat.

Good Families Always Ritualize The Table. You Can Say, "this Is A Christmas Meal; This Is A Birthday Meal."

When You Are Still Young And Not Yet Adult, You Want To Hold Everything In Your Own Hands, But If You Have Your Hands Open Toward Prayer, You Are Able To Stretch Out Your Arms And Let Yourself Be Led Without Knowing Where. You Know Only The Freedom Which God's Breath Has Brought You Will Lead To New Life, Even If The Cross Is The Only Sign Of It You Can See.

Your Heart Is Greater Than Your Wounds.

Somehow, Somewhere, I Know That God Loves Me, Even Though I Do Not Feel That Love As I Can Feel A Human Embrace, Even Though I Do Not Hear A Voice As I Hear Human Words...god Is Greater Than My Senses, Greater Than My Thoughts, Greater Than My Heart. I Do Believe That He Touches Me In Places That Are Unknown Even To Myself.

It Is God’s Passionate Pursuit Of Us That Calls Us To Prayer.

When We Give Generously, With An Abundance Mentality, What We Give Away Will Multiply.

Abundance Mentality

Teaching, Therefore, Asks First Of All The Creation Of A Space Where Students And Teachers Can Enter Into A Fearless Communication With Each Other And Allow Their Respective Life Experiences To Be Their Primary And Most Valuable Source Of Growth And Maturation. It Asks For A Mutual Trust In Which Those Who Teach And Those Who Want To Learn Can Become Present To Each Other, Not As Opponents, But As Those Who Share In The Same Struggle And Search For The Same Truth.

As Ministers Our Greatest Temptation Is Toward Too Many Words. They Weaken Our Faith And Make Us Lukewarm. But Silence Is A Sacred Discipline, A Guard Of The Holy Spirit.

Let’s Not Be Afraid To Look At Everything That Has Brought Us To Where We Are Now And Trust That We Will Soon See In It The Guiding Hand Of A Loving God.

Every Time You Reject Yourself, You Idealize Others

In A Strange Way The Spiritual Life Isn't "useful" Or "successful." But It Is Meant To Be Fruitful. And Fruitfulness Comes Out Of Brokenness.

If You Believe You Are The Beloved Of God, You Need To Spend Time Listening To His Voice - Period! You Can't Say, "yes God Calls Me The Beloved, But I Have To Go Out To Do Something Now."

Keep A Space Where God Can Let Something Totally New Take Place.

A Life Without A Lonely Place, That Is, Without A Quiet Center, Becomes Destructive.

It's Not Easy To Sit And Trust That In Solitude God Will Speak To You - Not As A Magical Voice But That God Will Let You Know Something Gradually Over The Years. And In That Word From God You Will Find The Inner Place From Which To Live Your Life. Solitude Is Where Spiritual Ministry Begins. That's Where Jesus Listened To God. That's Where We Listen To God.

...the Word That Seems Best To Summarize The Desire Of The Human Heart Is 'communion.' ...wherever We Look It Is Communion That We Seek.

Do Not Hesitate To Love And To Love Deeply.

In A World So Torn Apart By Rivalry, Anger, And Hatred, We Have The Privileged Vocation To Be Living Signs Of A Love That Can Bridge All Divisions And Heal All Wounds.

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.

Hospitality Means Primarily The Creation Of Free Space Where The Stranger Can Enter And Become A Friend Instead Of An Enemy. Hospitality Is Not To Change People, But To Offer Them Space Where Change Can Take Place. It Is Not To Bring Men And Women Over To Our Side, But To Offer Freedom Not Disturbed By Dividing Lines.

My Writing Has Developed Drastically . The Return Of The Prodigal Son Is The Most Important Thing I've Done, And My Most Mature Book.

Jesus Didn't Live Alone. He Had Peter, John, And James Around Him. There Were The Twelve And The Other Disciples. They Formed Circles Of Intimacy Around Jesus. We Too Need These Circles Of Intimacy, But It's A Discipline.

You Are The Heir To The Kingdom. Prosperity Is Your Birth Right And You Hold The Key To More Abundance In Every Area Of Your Life Then You Can Possibly Imagine.

Think Of Each Wound As You Would Of A Child Who Has Been Hurt By A Friend. As Long As That Child Is Ranting And Raving, Trying To Get Back At The Friend, One Wound Leads To Another. But When The Child Can Experience The Consoling Embrace Of A Parent, She Or He Can Live Through The Pain, Return To The Friend, Forgive, And Build Up A New Relationship. Be Gentle With Yourself, And Let Your Heart Be Your Loving Parent As You Live Your Wounds Through.

In 1984, Jean Vanier Invited Me Me To Visit L'arche Community In Trosly, France. He Didn't Say "we Need A Priest" Or "we Could Use You." He Said, "maybe Our Community Can Offer You A Home." I Visited Several Times, Then Resigned From Harvard And Went To Live With The Community For A Year. I Loved It! I Didn't Have Much To Do. I Wasn't Pastor Or Anything. I Was Just A Friend Of The Community.

As Long As We Have Our Stories There Is Hope.

In Our Own Woundedness, We Can Become Sources Of Life For Others.

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.

To Be Baptized Means To Make The Passage With The People Of Israel And With Jesus From Slavery To Freedom And From Death To New Life. It Is A Commitment To A Life In And Through Jesus.

So I Am Praying While Not Knowing How To Pray. I Am Resting While Feeling Restless, At Peace While Tempted, Safe While Still Anxious, Surrounded By A Cloud Of Light While Still In Darkness, In Love While Still Doubting.

Intimacy Is Not A Happy Medium. It Is A Way Of Being In Which The Tension Between Distance And Closeness Is Dissolved And A New Horizon Appears. Intimacy Is Beyond Fear.

Jesus Does Not Respond To Our Worry-filled Way Of Living By Saying That We Should Not Be So Busy With Worldly Affairs. He Does Not Try To Pull Us Away From The Many Events, Activities, And People That Make Up Our Lives. . . . He Asks Us To Shift The Point Of Gravity, To Relocate The Center Of Our Attention, To Change Our Priorities. Jesus Does Not Speak About A Change Of Activities, A Change In Contacts, Or Even A Change Of Pace. He Speaks About A Change Of Heart.

To Live In The Present, We Must Deeply Believe That What Is Most Important Is In The Here And Now.

Live In The Present

Pay Attention To The People God Puts In Your Path If You Want To Discern What God Is Up To In Your Life.

The Difference Between Rich And Poor Is Not That The Rich Sin Is More Than The Poor, That The Rich Find It Easier To Call Sin A Virtue.

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.

We Must Ask Ourselves How Many Times Others Would Benefit More From Our Silence Than From Our Words.

God's Kingdom Is A Place Of Abundance Where Every Generous Act Overflows Its Original Bounds And Becomes Part Of The Unbounded Grace Of God At Work In The World.

Learning To Weep, Learning To Keep Vigil, Learning To Wait For The Dawn. Perhaps This Is What It Means To Be Human.

I Kept Running Around It In Large Or Small Circles, Always Looking For Someone Or Something Able To Convince Me Of My Belovedness. Self-rejection Is The Greatest Enemy Of The Spiritual Life Because It Contradicts The Sacred Voice That Calls Us The "beloved". Being The Beloved Expresses The Core Truth Of Our Existence.

When You Recognize The Festive And The Still Moments As Moments Of Prayer, Then You Gradually Realize That To Pray Is To Live.

I Was Forced To Enter The Basement Of My Soul And Look Directly At What Was Hidden There, And To Choose, In The Face Of It All, Not Death But Life.

It Is Not That The University As Such Is Against Spiritual Formation. It Is Just That Often The University Does Not Know How To Integrate Spiritual Formation Within Its Academic Disciplines.

The Gospel Word Of The Day Can Become Like A Painting On The Walls. Of Your Inner Room, The Inner Room That Is Your Heart.

Prayer Is First Of All Listening To God. It's Openness. God Is Always Speaking; He's Always Doing Something.

The Life-converting Experience Is Not The Discovery That I Have Choices To Make That Determine The Way I Live Out My Existence, But The Awareness That My That My Existence Itself Is Not In The Center. Once I 'know' God, That Is, Once I Experience God's Love As The Love In Which All My Human Experiences Are Anchored, I Can Desire Only One Thing: To Be In That Love.

Our Life Is Full Of Brokenness - Broken Relationships, Broken Promises, Broken Expectations. How Can We Live With That Brokenness Without Becoming Bitter And Resentful Except By Returning Again And Again To God's Faithful Presence In Our Lives.

It Is Good To Have A Prayer On Your Lips Wherever You Go. There Are So Many Moments In Life When You Are Free To Pray. When You Are Waiting For The Cashier In The Supermarket, Getting Mad Because He Or She Doesn't Hurry, Say A Little Prayer: 'lord, Jesus Christ, Have Mercy On Me.' Take That Prayer With You Wherever You Go.

From The Moment We Claim The Truth Of Being The Beloved, We Are Faced With The Call To Become Who We Are.

To Live A Spiritual Life We Must First Find The Courage To Enter Into The Desert Of Our Loneliness And To Change It By Gentle And Persistent Efforts Into A Garden Of Solitude. The Movement From Loneliness To Solitude, However, Is The Beginning Of Any Spiritual Life Because It It Is The Movement From The Restless Senses To The Restful Spirit,l From The Outward-reaching Cravings To The Inward-reaching Search, From The Fearful Clinging To The Fearless Play.

Resentment And Gratitude Cannot Coexist, Since Resentment Blocks The Perception And Experience Of Life As A Gift. My Resentment Tells Me That I Don't Receive What I Deserve. It Always Manifests Itself In Envy.

The University Has Become A Place That Prepares You For The Fights In The World.

People Forget Ideas; They Don't Forget The Real Presence.

Although We Tend To Think About Saints As Holy And Pious, And Picture Them With Halos Above Their Heads And Ecstatic Gazes, True Saints Are Much More Accessible. They Are Men And Women Like Us, Who Live Ordinary Lives And Struggle With Ordinary Problems. What Makes Them Saints Is Their Clear And Unwavering Focus On God And God's People.

The Mystery Of Ministry Is That We Have Been Chosen To Make Our Own Limited And Very Conditional Love The Gateway For The Unlimited And Unconditional Love Of God.

Unconditional Love

A Happy Life Is A Life For Others.

People Who Read Your Ideas Tend To Think That Your Writings Reflect Your Life.

Distance Never Seperates Two Hearts That Really Care, For Our Memories Span The Miles And In Seconds We Are There. But Whenever I Start Feeling Sad Cuz I Miss You I Remind Myself How Lucky I Am To Have Someone So Special To Miss.

Although Many, We Might Even Say Most, Strangers In This World Become Easily The Victim Of A Fearful Hostility, 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.

Writing Is Not Just A Job. It Helps Me To Pray. It's A Way Of Being.

Emit Gratitude As Though It Was Done

You Have To Dare To Live Through The Pain And Struggle. Acknowledge Your Anguish But Do Not Let It Pull You Out Of Yourself. Hold On To Your Chosen Direction, Your Discipline, Your Prayer, Your Work, Your Guides, And Trust That One Day Love Will Have Conquered Enough Of You That Even The Most Fearful Part Will Allow Love To Cast Out All Fear.

The Greatest Trap In Our Life Is Not Success, Popularity Or Power, But Self-rejection.

Meaningful Life

The Art Of Living Is To Enjoy What We Can See And Not Complain About What Remains In The Dark. When We Are Able To Take The Next Step With Trust That We Will Have Enough Light For The Step That Follows, We Can Walk Through Life With Joy And Be Surprised At How Far We Go.

I Have Found It Very Important In My Own Life To Try To Let Go Of My Wishes And Instead To Live In Hope. I Am Finding That When I Choose To Let Go Of My Sometimes Petty And Superficial Wishes And Trust That My Life Is Precious And Meaningful In The Eyes Of God Something Really New, Something Beyond My Own Expectations Begins To Happen For Me. (finding My Way Home)

As A General Remark, I Would Say We Must Move From The Moral To The Mystical Life.

What Makes Us Human Is Not Our Mind But Our Heart, Not Our Ability To Think But Our Ability To Love.

Yes, It's A Competitive World, But Where Is Your Heart?

One Of The Tragedies Of Our Life Is That We Keep Forgetting Who We Are

Prayer Is The Beginning And The End, The Source And The Fruit, The Core And The Content, The Basis And The Goal Of All Peacemaking.

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.

Solitude Is An Essential Element For The Spiritual Health Of A Child. If We Only Stimulate Our Children - Keep Them Busy With Endless Stories With No Space To Be Alone - That's Not Good.

God Doesn't Give Us Just Enough. God Gives Us More Than Enough: More Bread And Fish Than We Can Eat, More Love Than We Dared To Ask For.

Solitude Is The Place Where We Can Connect With Profound Bonds That Are Deeper Than The Emergency Bonds Of Fear And Anger.

The Friend Who Cares Makes It Clear That Whatever Happens In The External World, Being Present To Each Other Is What Really Matters. In Fact, It Matters More Than Pain, Illness, Or Even Death.

Each Individual Human Being Can Claim The Spirit Of Jesus As The Guiding Spirit Of His Or Her Life. In That Spirit We Can Speak And Act Freely And Confidently With The Knowledge That The Same Spirit That Inspired Jesus Is Inspiring Us.

It Is In Solitude That We Discover That Being Is More Important Than Having And That We Are Worth More Than The Results Of Our Efforts. In Solitude We Discover That Our Life Is Not A Possession To Be Defended But A Gift To Be Shared.

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.

...marriage Is Foremost A Vocation. Two People Are Called Together To Fulfill A Mission That God Has Given Them. Marriage Is A Spiritual Reality. That Is To Say, A Man And A Woman Come Together For Life, Not Just Because They Experience Deep Love For Each Other, But Because They Believe That God Loves Each Of Them With An Infinite Love And Has Called Them To Each Other To Be Living Witnesses Of That Love. To Love Is To Embody God's Infinite Love In A Faithful Communion With Another Human Being.

Our Lives Are Unique Stones In The Mosaic Of Human Existence -- Priceless And Irreplaceable.

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.

When I Trust Deeply That Today God Is Truly With Me And Holds Me Safe In A Divine Embrace, Guiding Every One Of My Steps I Can Let Go Of My Anxious Need To Know How Tomorrow Will Look, Or What Will Happen Next Month Or Next Year. I Can Be Fully Where I Am And Pay Attention To The Many Signs Of God's Love Within Me And Around Me.

I Often Wonder If My Knowledge About God Has Not Become My Greatest Stumbling Block To My Knowledge Of God.

Knowledge Of God

It Is Precisely When You Are Loved A Lot That You Might Realize A Second Loneliness Which Is Not To Be Solved But Lived. This Second Loneliness Is An Existential Loneliness That Belongs To The Basis Of Our Being. It's Where We Are Unfulfilled Because Only God Can Fill Us.

In Other Words, First We Must Call People To Communion With God, To Intimacy With God, To A Sense Of Belonging. Most People Are Lost, Confused, Alienated. They Suffer And Struggle Immensely In Relationships. We Have To Proclaim Loudly And Clearly In Our Actions And In Our Words That God Loves Us That We Belong To Him. That's A Call To The Mystical Life.

Community Is First Of All A Quality Of The Heart. It Grows From The Spiritual Knowledge That We Are Alive Not For Ourselves But For One Another.

Now I Wonder Whether I Have Sufficiently Realized That During All This Time God Has Been Trying To Find Me, To Know Me, And To Love Me. The Question Is Not 'how Am I To Find God?' But 'how Am I To Let Myself Be Found By Him?' The Question Is Not 'how Am I To Love God?' But 'how Am I To Let Myself Be Loved By God?'

Television Is Obviously An Enormous Intruder. Quite Often People Say They Have No Time, But In Fact They Waste A Lot Of Time On Things That Are Not Healthy.

If You Feel Loved, You Can Do A Thousand Things. If You Feel Rejected, Everything Becomes A Problem.

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