Quotes from Henri Nouwen´s book ¡Gracias!:
Fr. Henri Nouwen is a renowned theologian and scholar who spent time at the Maryknoll Institute studying spanish for three months (same as me) and worked in Peru after his time at the institute. ¡Gracias! is a famous book that details his life, feelings, and remarkable insights about his experiences in both the institute and Peru as a volunteer. The book is highly recommended reading for all who are students at the institute.
"Latin America: impressive wealth and degrading poverty, spendid flowers and dusty broken roads, loving people and cruel torturers, smiling children and soldiers who kill. It is here that we have to search for God´s treasure."
"We decide to commit ourselves to the poor, that is, to those who form the oppressed class, those who depend on their work but do not have the means to have a dignified life, since they are exploited by others who deny them their rights. Our work is to search with the poor for the treasure hidden in the ground on which they stand."
"The more we give, the more we support, guide, counsel, and visit, the more we receive, not just similar gifts, but the Lord [itself]. To go to the poor is to go to the Lord. Living this truth in our daily life makes it possible to care for people without conditions, without hesitation, without suspicion, or without the need for immediate rewards. With this sacred knowledge, we can avoid becoming burned out."
"It´s hard for me to accept that the best I can do here is probably not to give but to receive. By receiving in a true and open way, those who give to me can become aware of their own gifts in the eyes of those who receive them gratefully. Gratitude thus becomes the virtue of a missionary. And what else Eucharististic life than a life of gratitude?"
"We are one in [God] and this unity allow us to be free, courageous, and full of hope. Whatever my experience in Latin America will bring to me, it will be a part of my body formed in love and will reverberate in all its members. The Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ are indeed food for eternal life, a life that liberates us to live without fear and to travel without apprehension."
"A true spirituality cannot be constructed, built, or put together; it has to be recognized in the daily life of people who search together to do God´s will in the world."
"Presidents, mayors, and bishops come and go but God continues to enter into our lives."
"True liberation is freeing people from the bonds that prevented them from giving their gifts to others."
"True prayer always includes becoming poor. When we pray we stand naked and vulnerable in front of our Lord and show [God] our true condition. If one were to do this not just for oneself, but in the name of the thousands of surrounding poor, wouldnt that be "mission" in the true sense of being sent into the world as Jesus himself was sent into the world?"
"Latin America offers us the image of the suffering Christ. The poor we see every day, the stories of deportation, torture, and murder we hear every day, and the undernourished children we touch every day, reveal to us the suffering Christ hidden within us. When we allow this image of the suffering Christ within us to grow into its full maturity, then ministry to the poor and oppressed becomes a real possibility because then we can indeed hear, see, and touch [God] within us as well as among us. Thus, prayer becomes ministry and ministry becomes prayer. Once we have seen the suffering Christ among us, we will recognize him in our innermost self. Thus we come to experience that the first commandment to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind, resembles indeed the second: You must love your neighbor as yourself (Matt. 22:39-40)"
***My favorite for this quote entry*** "As the days and weeks pass by and I come to know the students of the language school better, I realize more and more how insecure, fearful, and often lonely many of us are. Not only do we continue to hope for mail from "home," but we also continue to be submerged by thousands around us. At home we at least had our own niche in life, our own place in the world where we could feel useful and admired. Here none of that is present. Here we are in a world that did not invite us, in which we cannot express ourselves and which constantly reminds us of our powerlessness. And still, we know that we are sent here, that God wants us here, and that it is here that we have to work out our salvation."
Fr. Henri Nouwen is a renowned theologian and scholar who spent time at the Maryknoll Institute studying spanish for three months (same as me) and worked in Peru after his time at the institute. ¡Gracias! is a famous book that details his life, feelings, and remarkable insights about his experiences in both the institute and Peru as a volunteer. The book is highly recommended reading for all who are students at the institute.
"Latin America: impressive wealth and degrading poverty, spendid flowers and dusty broken roads, loving people and cruel torturers, smiling children and soldiers who kill. It is here that we have to search for God´s treasure."
"We decide to commit ourselves to the poor, that is, to those who form the oppressed class, those who depend on their work but do not have the means to have a dignified life, since they are exploited by others who deny them their rights. Our work is to search with the poor for the treasure hidden in the ground on which they stand."
"The more we give, the more we support, guide, counsel, and visit, the more we receive, not just similar gifts, but the Lord [itself]. To go to the poor is to go to the Lord. Living this truth in our daily life makes it possible to care for people without conditions, without hesitation, without suspicion, or without the need for immediate rewards. With this sacred knowledge, we can avoid becoming burned out."
"It´s hard for me to accept that the best I can do here is probably not to give but to receive. By receiving in a true and open way, those who give to me can become aware of their own gifts in the eyes of those who receive them gratefully. Gratitude thus becomes the virtue of a missionary. And what else Eucharististic life than a life of gratitude?"
"We are one in [God] and this unity allow us to be free, courageous, and full of hope. Whatever my experience in Latin America will bring to me, it will be a part of my body formed in love and will reverberate in all its members. The Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ are indeed food for eternal life, a life that liberates us to live without fear and to travel without apprehension."
"A true spirituality cannot be constructed, built, or put together; it has to be recognized in the daily life of people who search together to do God´s will in the world."
"Presidents, mayors, and bishops come and go but God continues to enter into our lives."
"True liberation is freeing people from the bonds that prevented them from giving their gifts to others."
"True prayer always includes becoming poor. When we pray we stand naked and vulnerable in front of our Lord and show [God] our true condition. If one were to do this not just for oneself, but in the name of the thousands of surrounding poor, wouldnt that be "mission" in the true sense of being sent into the world as Jesus himself was sent into the world?"
"Latin America offers us the image of the suffering Christ. The poor we see every day, the stories of deportation, torture, and murder we hear every day, and the undernourished children we touch every day, reveal to us the suffering Christ hidden within us. When we allow this image of the suffering Christ within us to grow into its full maturity, then ministry to the poor and oppressed becomes a real possibility because then we can indeed hear, see, and touch [God] within us as well as among us. Thus, prayer becomes ministry and ministry becomes prayer. Once we have seen the suffering Christ among us, we will recognize him in our innermost self. Thus we come to experience that the first commandment to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind, resembles indeed the second: You must love your neighbor as yourself (Matt. 22:39-40)"
***My favorite for this quote entry*** "As the days and weeks pass by and I come to know the students of the language school better, I realize more and more how insecure, fearful, and often lonely many of us are. Not only do we continue to hope for mail from "home," but we also continue to be submerged by thousands around us. At home we at least had our own niche in life, our own place in the world where we could feel useful and admired. Here none of that is present. Here we are in a world that did not invite us, in which we cannot express ourselves and which constantly reminds us of our powerlessness. And still, we know that we are sent here, that God wants us here, and that it is here that we have to work out our salvation."
posted by Michelle Fitzgerald | 11:42 AM
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