Quote

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.

Henri Nouwen

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Henri Nouwen
Age: 64 †
Born: 1932
Born: January 24
Died: 1996
Died: September 21
Catholic Priest
Presbyter
Priest
Psychologist
Theologian
University Teacher
Writer
Henri Jozef Machiel Nouwen
Silence
Weaken
Greatest
Guard
Faith
Ministers
Words
Temptation
Spirit
Sacred
Many
Discipline
Make
Toward
Holy
Lukewarm

More quotes by Henri Nouwen

Image
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.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Aging does not need to be hidden or denied, but can be understood, affirmed and experienced as a process of growth by which the mystery of life is slowly revealed to us.
Henri Nouwen
Image
In our production-oriented society, being busy, having an occupation, has become one of the main ways, if not the main way, of identifying ourselves. Without an occupation, not just our economic security but our very identity is endangered.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Joy is the experience of knowing that you are unconditionally loved and that nothing-sicknes s, failure, emotional distress, oppression, war, or even death--can take that love away.
Henri Nouwen
Image
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.
Henri Nouwen
Image
The Christian leaders of the future have to be theologians, persons who know the heart of God and are trained - through prayer, study, and careful analysis - to manifest the divine event of God's saving work in the midst of the many seemingly random events of their time.
Henri Nouwen
Image
You don't think your way into a new kind of living. You live your way into a new kind of thinking.
Henri Nouwen
Image
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.
Henri Nouwen
Image
In our own woundedness, we can become sources of life for others.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Peacemaking is a full-time vocation that includes each member of God's people.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Although I am a committed Catholic priest, and nowhere hide that fact, my focus is very much a spiritual journey.
Henri Nouwen
Image
To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, welcome, to accept.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Dear God, I am so afraid to open my clenched fists! Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to? Who will I be when I stand before you with empty hands? Please help me to gradually open my hands and to discover that I am not what I own, but what you want to give me.
Henri Nouwen
Image
What makes us human is not our mind but our heart, not our ability to think but our ability to love.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Solitude is the place of purification and transformation, the place of the great struggle and the great encounter.
Henri Nouwen
Image
The journey from teaching about love to allowing myself to be loved proved much longer than I realised.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Friendship has always belonged to the core of my spiritual journey.
Henri Nouwen
Image
Forgiveness is the name of love practiced among people who love poorly. The hard truth is that all people love poorly. We need to forgive and be forgiven every day, every hour increasingly. That is the great work of love among the fellowship of the weak that is the human family.
Henri Nouwen
Image
For Jesus, there are no countries to be conquered, no ideologies to be imposed, no people to be dominated. There are only children, women and men to be loved.
Henri Nouwen
Image
[...]when two people have become present to each other, the waiting of one must be able to cross the narrow line between the living or dying of the other.
Henri Nouwen