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We just have to recognize life for what it is: a gift to be grateful for, not a property to cling to, hoard, or defend.

Henri Nouwen

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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
Hoard
Cling
Defend
Recognize
Grateful
Property
Gift
Life

More quotes by Henri Nouwen

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Good families always ritualize the table. You can say, This is a Christmas meal this is a birthday meal.
Henri Nouwen
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Peacemaking is a full-time vocation that includes each member of God's people.
Henri Nouwen
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The most important thing I've come to believe in is that people with mental handicaps have a unique mission to bring God's blessing to the World.
Henri Nouwen
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In God's eyes the most significant is often the most hidden.
Henri Nouwen
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Our glory is hidden in our pain, if we allow God to bring the gift of himself in our experience of it.
Henri Nouwen
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We are all healers who can reach out and offer health, and we are all patients in constant need of help.
Henri Nouwen
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To give someone a blessing is the most significant affirmation we can offer.
Henri Nouwen
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You don't think your way into a new kind of living. You live your way into a new kind of thinking.
Henri Nouwen
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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.
Henri Nouwen
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Friendship has always belonged to the core of my spiritual journey.
Henri Nouwen
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Ministry in no way is a privilege...it is the core of the Christian life. No Christian is a Christian without being a minister.
Henri Nouwen
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Ministry is the least important thing. You cannot not minister if you are in communion with God and live in community.
Henri Nouwen
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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.
Henri Nouwen
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Waiting time is not wasting time. Waiting patiently in expectation is the foundation of the spiritual life.
Henri Nouwen
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The resistance to praying is like the resistance of tightly clenched fists. This image shows a tension, a desire to cling tightly to yourself, a greediness which betrays fear.
Henri Nouwen
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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.
Henri Nouwen
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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.
Henri Nouwen
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It is precisely in times of spiritual dryness that we must hold on to our spiritual discipline so that we can grow into new intimacy with God.
Henri Nouwen
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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.
Henri Nouwen
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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