In June 1974, Henri Nouwen, already a noted author and lecturer, took a leave from his professorship at Yale to spend seven months at a Trappist monastery, The Abbey of The Genesee. His diary reveals both the daily life of a monk—sorting raisins for the monk’s bread, lifting rocks from the riverside intended for a new chapel—and the journey of a priest and theologian seeking to get closer to God.
My friend and fellow congregant, Dick Johnson, steered me toward The Genesee Diary, and in opening the cover I was immediately struck by Nouwen's anxiety and struggle. Even in the Introduction, he asks,
"What was turning my vocation to be a witness to God's love into a tiring job? These questions kept intruding themselves into my few unfilled moments and challenging me to face my restless self. Maybe I spoke more about God than with him. Maybe writing about prayer kept me from a prayerful life."
Stepping away from a busy life was not easy. As an established and popular academic, he had succeeded in surrounding himself with classes, lectures, articles to write, people to meet.
"While complaining about too many demands, I felt uneasy when none were made. While speaking about the burden of letter writing, an empty mailbox made me sad. While fretting about tiring lecture tours, I felt disappointed when there were no invitations.... While desiring to be alone, I was frightened of being left alone."
Joining the abbey, not as a visitor but more as a temporary monk, gave Nouwen the break in schedule he feared but needed. His days were structured by monastic life and rules; breakfast was served between 3 and 5 am. He discovered that it was no longer necessary to think about "what shall I do today." He would read the note from Brother Anthony that indicated his daily assignments: bread baking, 5:30-8:15; lumber crew, 1-3.
It is not that Nouwen did not work—he notes that his back hurt frequently and his hands were chapped—but that he learned that he did not have to worry about it. Indeed, the abbot related that the sole idea of monastic life was to create a life-long vacation. "You can't do that on your own, so we form communities," he was told.
After several weeks, Nouwen wrote that monastic life was giving him a new, sacred rhythm. "I am being slowly lifted up from the gray, dull, somewhat monotonous, secular time cycle into a very colorful, rich sequence of events in which solemnity and playfulness, joy and grief, seriousness and lightness take each other's place off and on."
The release of of anxiety about work, and the status and ego involvement in it, created spiritual space.
"Contemplative life is a human response to the fundamental fact that the central things in life, although spiritually perceptible, remain invisible in large measure and can very easily be overlooked by the inattentive, busy, distracted person that each of us can so readily become. The contemplative looks not so much around things but through them into their center. Through the center he discovers the world of spiritual beauty that is more real, has more density, more mass, more energy, and greater intensity than physical matter."
The lesson for me is that finding our soulful center allows anxiety to flow away.
We really didn't need it at all.
The Henri Nouwen Society
The Society exists to extend Nouwen's work and ministry. Visit its site and you can sign up for daily meditations, podcasts, and more. Below is a speech he gave in 1994 on finding your center.
Join us on Friday morning at 8 Pacific time for silent Centering Prayer. If you need the internet URL, email me at charlestaylorkerchner@gmail.com We are also associated with the Meditation Chapel, a worldwide network of that offers over 100 online meditation opportunities a week. I can help you register, if you wish.
Banner Photo: Külli Kittus via Unsplash