Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places

I think it's part of the human condition that many of us feel lonely, if not all the time then at least from time to time. And if you're single, it's easy to think the antidote for loneliness is matrimony. But according to Henri Nouwen, those who marry because of loneliness will likely end up as lonely spouses. Our condition is not changed by our circumstance.

We ignore what we already know with a deep-seated, intuitive knowledge - that no love or friendship, no intimate embrace or tender kiss, no community, commune or collective, no man or woman, will ever be able to satisfy our desire to be released from our lonely condition. This truth is so disconcerting and painful that we are more prone to play games with our fantasies than to face the truth of our existence. Thus we keep hoping that one day we will find the man who really understands our experiences, the woman who will bring peace to our restless life, the job where we can fulfill our potentials, the book which will explain everything, and the place where we can feel at home. Such false hope leads us to make exhausting demands and prepares us for bitterness and dangerous hostility when we start discovering that nobody, and nothing, can live up to our absolutistic expectations.

Many marriages are ruined because neither partner was able to fulfill the often hidden hope that the other would take his or her loneliness away. And many celibates live with the naive dream that in the intimacy of marriage their loneliness will be taken away.

- Henri Nouwen, The Wounded Healer, pp. 84-85.

Favorite Books of 2008

David posted his favorite books for 2008, so I guess I may as well do the same.

First, here are all the books I read last year, listed alphabetically by author. This doesn't include newspapers, magazines, or restroom graffiti:

1. Anonymous - The Way of a Pilgrim and the Pilgrim Continues His Way
2. Bauby, Jean-Dominique - The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
3. Brother Lawrence - The Practice of the Presence of God
4. Bruce, A.B. - The Training of the Twelve
5. Coleman, Robert - Des Meisters Plan der Evangelisation
6. Coleman, Robert - The Master Plan of Evangelism (3rd? 4th? reading)
7. Coupland, Douglas - All Families are Psychotic
8. Dorsett, Lyle - A Love Observed: Joy Davidman's Life & Marriage to C.S. Lewis
9. D'Souza, Tony - Whiteman
10. Gaines, James - Evening in the Palace of Reason: Bach Meets Frederick the Great in the Age of Enlightenment
11. Gresham, Douglas - Lenten Lands: My Childhood with Joy Davidman and C.S. Lewis
12. Harris, Robert - Enigma
13. Harris, Robert - Fatherland
14. Henry, Marguerite - White Stallion of Lipizza
15. Hopko, Thomas - Christian Faith And Same Sex Attraction: Eastern Orthodox Reflections
16. Iweala, Uzodinma - Beasts of No Nation
17. Kolakowski, Leszek - Metaphysical Horror
18. Neighbour, Randall - A Pocket Guide to Coaching Small Groups
19. Lewis, C.S. - A Grief Observed (2nd reading)
20. Lewis, C.S. - The Problem of Pain
21. Long, Jimmy - Emerging Hope: A Strategy for Reaching Postmodern Generations
22. Machiavelli, Niccolo - The Prince
23. Nouwen, Henri - Beloved
24. Nouwen, Henri - Can You Drink the Cup?
25. Nouwen, Henri - In the Name of Jesus
26. Pollan, Michael - In Defense of Food
27. Reich, Christopher - Rules of Deception
28. Rice, Anne - Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt
29. Rice, Anne - Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana
30. Richards, Jay (ed.) - Environmental Stewardship in the Judeo-Christian Tradition
31. Robinson, Marilynne - Gilead
32. Salinger, J.D. - Franny and Zooey
33. Sayer, George - Jack: A Life of C.S. Lewis
34. Scazzero, Peter - Emotionally Healthy Spirituality
35. Skinner, Betty Lee - With Integrity of Heart and Skillful Hand
36. Tarnas, Richard - The Passion of the Western Mind (2nd reading)
37. Thigpen, Paul (ed.) - My Daily Catholic Bible: Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition 20-Minute Daily Readings
    
    

9,441 pages. Seems like I ought to be a lot smarter, wiser, and more Godly than I am after all that. What's that verse about always learning but never coming to a knowledge of the truth?

In any case, here are my five favorites. I won't call them "best," because a book might be "best" for a particular purpose, but still not my favorite. And I won't include the Bible, because it's the obvious best and favorite. Of the 36 that remain, my faves as of this particular moment are:

• #6 Coleman - A classic is a classic is a classic. Profound principles in a compact package.
• #21 Long - Super insights into pomo people and times, and how to minister in this culture.
• #28-29 Rice - Miraculously uncheesy imaginings about the days of Jesus before his ministry.
• #31 Robinson - Transcendently beautiful Pulitzer-prize winning novel of forgiveness and transformation.
• #36 Tarnas - A history of philosophy that reads like a novel and makes sense of the mess.

And the favorite among the favorites? That will have to wait for another post.

Nouwen On: Silence and Entertainment

Being silent seems like doing nothing, but it is precisely in silence that we confront our true selves. The sorrows of our lives often overwhelm us to such a degree that we will do everything not to face them. Radio, television, newspapers, books, films, but also hard work and a busy social life all can be ways to run away from ourselves and turn life into a long entertainment.

The word entertainment is important here. It means literally “to keep (tain from the Latin tenere) someone in between (enter).” Entertainment is everything that gets and keeps our mind away from things that are hard to face. Entertainment keeps us distracted, excited, or in suspense. Entertainment is often good for us. It gives us an evening or a day off from our worries and fears. But when we start living life as entertainment, we lose touch with our souls and become little more than spectators in a lifelong show. Even very useful and relevant work can become a way of forgetting who we really are. It is no surprise that for many people retirement is a fearful prospect. Who are we when there is nothing to keep us busy?

- Henri Nouwen, Can You Drink the Cup?, p. 94

A New Community

My friend Garrett and I are starting a new discipleship group tomorrow evening. It will be smaller than the one pictured above, and I'm praying for a few other differences, as well . . . community and missionality for a start. Everybody staying awake would be good, too, though we'll let the dog sleep if she wants to.

I recently read Henri Nouwen's book, Can You Drink the Cup?, and found his description of community to represent one of the things I greatly desire for this new group:

Nothing is sweet or easy about community. Community is a fellowship of people who do not hide their joys and sorrows but make them visible to each other in a gesture of hope. In community we say: “Life is full of gains and losses, joys and sorrows, ups and downs – but we do not have to live it alone. We want to drink our cup together and thus celebrate the truth that the wounds of our individual lives, which seem intolerable when lived alone, become sources of healing when we live them as part of a fellowship of mutual care.”
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[Community is] a fellowship of little people who together make God visible in the world.
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So often we are inclined to keep our lives hidden. Shame and guilt prevent us from letting others know what we are living. We think: “If my family and friends knew the dark cravings of my heart and my strange mental wanderings, they would push me away and exclude me from their company.” But the opposite is true. When we dare to lift our cup and let our friends know what is in it, they will be encouraged to lift their cups and share with us their own anxiously hidden secrets. The greatest healing often takes place when we no longer feel isolated by our shame and guilt and discover that others often feel what we feel and think what we think and have the fears, apprehensions, and preoccupations we have.
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The important question is, “Do we have a circle of trustworthy friends where we feel safe enough to be intimately known and called to an always greater maturity?

Vulnerability, growth, and mission. May they all be true of our new group as we seek to follow Jesus and be transformed into His image.

Nouwen On: Solitude

There is absolutely no reason for most people to be as busy as they are. You want to earn more money than you need. You want to see more television than you need. You want to read more books than you need to read. You want to see more people. You want to keep in touch with too many friends. You want to travel too much. You can even be busy with looking for the meaning of solitude! . . . . I shall have no time to pray whatsoever unless I radically say that prayer and solitude - being alone with God - is a priority. But my senses aren't saying that to me.

...

Solitude is a hard discipline, because we have the luxury of so many stimulations.

...

Solitude is listening to the voice who calls you the beloved. It is being alone with the one who says, "You are my beloved, I want to be with you. Don't go running around, don't start to prove to everybody that you're beloved. You are already beloved." That is what God says to us. Solitude is the place where we go in order to hear the truth about ourselves.

- Henry Nouwen, Beloved, pp. 11-13

Where to Go? What to Do? And I Don't Have a Thing to Wear!

"I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go."

- Jesus, speaking to Peter, John 21.19



The world says, "When you were young you were dependent and could not go where you wanted, but when you grow old you will be able to make your own decisions, go your own way, and control your own desitny." But Jesus has a different vision of maturity: It is the ability and willngness to be led where you would rather not go.

- Henri Nouwen, "In the Name of Jesus," p.81

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In a recent post, I quoted Thomas Hopko, who said, "The freer a person is, the less they choose. Thus a person who would be perfectly free by God's grace would never 'choose' anything at all. They would see, know, and will what is good, true, and beautiful, and do it." But in the Nouwen quote above, the suggestion is that we need to be willing to be led where we do not prefer to go. Do these paradoxical thoughts go together? I think they do.

It seems to me that a fully Christlike person will automatically do what pleases God, and will want to do it. But we are not yet fully Christlike. Therefore, there will still be times - many times, I fear - when we must force ourselves to do what is right simply because we know it is right. As we continue to develop Godly character through the disciplines of grace, we will increasingly desire to do what pleases Him.

I believe the Orthodox Hopko's statement, but I still often inhabit the Catholic Nouwen's reality. As a Protestant prayer book suggests, if I only do what I feel like doing, I will regularly "leave undone those things which I ought to have done, and do those things which I ought not to have done." I will "follow too much the devices and desires of my own heart." (After the Episcopal/Anglican Book of Common Prayer)

Nouwen on Spiritual Leadership

I surprise myself to see that after 16 months of blogging, I still haven't featured anything from Henri Nouwen. He's among my favorite authors (a pretty long list, admittedly), and every book of his that I've read has left me with something good to think about.

Here are some excerpts from his 1989 book, In the Name of Jesus: Reflections on Christian Leadership. He describes the kind of leader I desire to be:

It is not enough for the priests and ministers of the future to be moral people, well trained, eager to help their fellow humans, and able to respond creatively to the burning issues of their time. All of that is very valuable and important, but it is not the heart of Christian leadership. The central question is, Are the leaders of the future truly men and women of God, people with an ardent desire to dwell in God's presence, to listen to God's voice, to look at God's beauty, to touch God's incarnate Word, and to taste fully God's infinite goodness?
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For the future of Christian leadership it is of vital importance to reclaim the mystical aspect of theology so that every word spoken, every word of advice given, and every strategy developed can come from a heart that knows God intimately.
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Christian leaders cannot simply be persons who have well-informed opinions about the burning issues of our time. Their leadership must be rooted in the permanent, intimate relationship with the incarnate Word Jesus, and they need to find there the source for their words, advice, and guidance. . . . Dealing with burning issues without being rooted in a deep personal relationship with God easily leads to divisiveness because, before we know it, our sense of self is caught up in our opinion about a given subject. But 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.

pp. 43-47