Henri Nouwen Quotes

Prayer is the most concrete way to make our home in God.

By my definition, prayer is consciously hanging out with God. Being with God in a deliberate way.

The thing that brings people to wail at a wall, or face Mecca, or to go to church, is a search for that feeling of purity.

I'm happiest in an empty church. I love the smell of a church.

By turning your eyes on God in meditation, your whole soul will be filled with God. Begin all your prayers in the presence of God.

Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.

Let us be silent, that we may hear the whispers of the gods.

I find there are a few places where I like to meditate more than in other places. There's a little Catholic church that I go to, and there's another temple I go to - there are certain places where I just feel more comfortable.

Home is the center of my being where I can hear the voice that says: 'You are my Beloved, on you my favor rests' - the same voice that gave life to the first Adam and spoke to Jesus, the second Adam; the same voice that speaks to all the children of God and sets them free to live in the midst of a dark world while remaining in the light.

Dearest Jesus, holy child, make thee a bed, soft, undefiled, within my heart, that it may be a quiet chamber kept for thee.

Seeing God face to face is to feel that He is enthroned in our hearts even as a child feels a mother's affection without needing any demonstration.

Let us pray, and as we pray, let us make room for Jesus in our hearts.

For many people, God is a frightening idea. Asking God for help doesn't seem very comforting if we think of Him as something outside ourselves, or capricious, or judgmental. But God is love and He dwells within us. We are created in His image, or mind, which means that we are extensions of His love, or Sons and Daughters of God.

We need prayer to understand God's love for us. If we really mean to pray and want to pray we must be ready to do it now. These are only the first steps towards prayer but if we never make the first step with determination, we will not reach the last one: the presence of God

No friend have I. I must live by myself alone; but I know well that God is nearer to me than others in my art, so I will walk fearlessly with Him.

In that Holy Place where you tell Him everything and he understands; there are angels who stand in wait to hear his every command. How may they serve you and increase your joy?

Private place and plenty of time are the life of prayer.

The one thing you absolutely need is the one thing you can never lose: God's presence and love for you. Just have to talk to him.

You have to listen to the one who calls you beloved. That has to be affirmed over and over again. That is prayer - listening to the voice of the one who calls you "the beloved."

We need not just one flash of light and comfort, but we need the continuing blessing of communication with God.

There has come to you as your birthright something beautiful and sacred and divine. Never forget that. Your Eternal Father is the Great master of the Universe. He rules over all, but He also will listen to your prayers as His daughter and hear you as you speak with Him. He will answer your prayers. He will not leave you alone.

God never ceases to speak to us, but the noise of the world without and the tumult of our passions within bewilder us and prevent us from listening to him

I am alone, I am all alone, I am completely alone. Grasping this reality, I let go of my bag, drop to my knees and press my forehead against the floor. There, I offer up to the universe a fervent prayer of thanks. First in English. Then in Italian. And then - just to get the point across - in Sanskrit.

I will not leave you, I cannot leave you, for you are My creation and My product, My daughter and My son, My purpose and My... Self. Call on Me, therefore, wherever and whenever you are separate from the peace that I am. I will be there. With Truth. And Light. And Love.

Communing with God is communing with our own hearts, our own best selves, not with something foreign and accidental. Saints and devotees have gone into the wilderness to find God; of course they took God with them, and the silence and detachment enabled them to hear the still, small voice of their own souls, as one hears the ticking of his own watch in the stillness of the night.