Henri Nouwen Society
"My first twenty-four years of life were basically to prepare myself for the Catholic priesthood. I was born and raised in a Roman Catholic family, went to Roman Catholic schools, and lived a life in which I related exclusively to Roman Catholics. It was a time in which all boundaries were clear. I was a Roman Catholic and not a Protestant; I was a Christian and not Muslim, Buddhist, or Hindu; I was a believer and not a pagan; I was a man and not a woman; I was Dutch and not German, French, or English; I was white and not black, etc... I was a very happy person, felt close to God, and had a very disciplined prayer life and a very clear-cut vocation. I was ordained in July 1957.
After my ordination, I studied psychology at the Catholic University of Nijmegen in Holland, visited the Vatican Council, worked as a chaplain of the Holland America Line, and was trained as a reserve army chaplain. I then studied for a few years at the Menninger Clinic to explore the relationship between religion and psychiatry, taught for two years at Notre Dame, ten years at Yale, and three years at Harvard, and made visits to Latin America. During all these years I learned that Protestants belong as much to the Church as Catholics, that Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims believe as much in God as Christians, that pagans can love one another as much as believers, that the human psyche is multidimensional, that theology, psychology, and sociology are intersecting at many places, that women have a real call to ministry, that homosexual people have a unique vocation in the Christian community, that the poor belong to the heart of the Church, and that the Spirit of God blows where it wants. All of these discoveries gradually broke down many fences that had given me a safe haven and made me deeply aware that God's covenant with God's people includes everyone."
#HenriNouwen SPIRITUAL DIRECTION
www.henrinouwen.org
-------
www.henrinouwen.org
-------
No comments:
Post a Comment