Reading & Discussing Henri Nouwen

Reading: Part IV, Trust the Catcher, Chapter 20 to Chapter 29; p. 127-180

A flyer must fly, and a catcher must catch, and the flyer must
trust, with outstretched arms, that his catcher
will be there for him. – Henri Nouwen, p. 161
Note: An excerpt from Nouwen’s Our Greatest Gift

We have had another week of heartfelt, touching, and insightful comments and we continued to have new participants join our community and introduce themselves here. Thanks to everyone that is participating in our Advent book discussion—those posting comments and those following along in the quiet of their hearts.

This week we turn to the imperative to trust the catcher. In his journal Henri wrote, “I am convinced that I have been sent to the Rodleighs to discover something new about life and death, love and fear, peace and conflict, Heaven and hell, something I can’t get to know and write about in any other way.” (p.130) What did Henri discover? Here is my take. In his letter to Bart Gavigan we read, “The words that really struck me were words by Rodleigh, ‘When I have done my flying, I have to stretch out my hands, and trust that the catcher will be there for me. The greatest mistake I can make is try to catcher.’ I have thought about these words that express the human challenge to trust your neighbor, to trust your God, to trust love, to trust that we will finally be safe.” (p.171). Henri also refers to God as the ultimate Catcher when he writes, “Dying is trusting in the catcher. To care for the dying is to say, ‘Don’t be afraid. Remember you are the beloved child of God. He will be there when you make your long jump….Just stretch out your arms and hands and trust, trust, trust.'” For me, living spiritually, not just dying, is trusting in the catcher. Henri summarizes this spiritual insight in the quote in bold at the top of the post.
Does Henri’s spiritual insight resonate with your personal experience? Who are the catchers in your life? For whom are you the catcher? Do you find the image of God as the ultimate Catcher helpful? To the extent you are comfortable, share and example of flying and catching in your life.

In addition to trusting the catcher, there are other scenes and ideas worthy of your reflection.

• “I saw many connections between my L’Arche community in Toronto and this circus community… They are both communities for special people.” (Nouwen, p. 136)
• Chapter 23 presents Henri’s encounter with Rembrandt’s The Return of the Prodigal Son and his emotional, psychological, and spiritual breakdown.
• Chapter 25 describes Henri’s trapeze flight followed by the discussion about the Flying Rodleighs between Henri and his friends Ron and Fran.
• “They are just people like we are. (note: with conflict, struggles). (W)hen you go on the trapeze, forget everything else. Be only there and totally there….to be totally present in the present…” (Nouwen, p. 173)
• “You know it was like the university was the mind, L’Arche was the heart, but the trapeze was about the body. And the body tells a spiritual story.” (Nouwen, p. 180)

As always, you are invited to share whatever touched you in the reading–whether it is related to trusting the catcher, one of the other scenes or ideas, or something else entirely.

Briefly looking ahead, author Carolyn Whitney-Brown will be joining our online discussion group during the 4th Week of Advent beginning next Sunday. She is looking forward to responding to your comments and questions.

We look forward to another week of fruitful discussion.
Ray

Reading: Part II, Falling, Chapter 12 to Part III, Teamwork, Chapter 19;  p. 74 to 124

I realized that my project was not to write the book that Henri would have written, but to tell the story of Henri and the Flying Rodleighs.
—Carolyn Whitney-Brown, Prologue, p.3

First, I’d like to welcome those that joined us during the week and introduced yourselves in the Welcome and Introduction post found here. I also want to thank those of you that provided such moving and insightful comments on the reading from the first week of Advent. Some of you commented on how the interruptions of life, both joyful and painful, have affected your life journey. Henri’s loneliness, restlessness, and search for community that attracted him to the Rodleighs were noted. Another commenter pointed to Henri’s insecurity and the “possibility of being judged harshly by a disappointed audience” (p. 31). This is not as surprising as it seems since, as we will read this week, Henri saw similarities between the life of the Flying Rodleighs as entertainers and his own ministry writing, “travel(ing) here and there giving talks, make people feel safe or excited.” (p. 121)

Next, let’s consider the quote from the Prologue shown in bold above. As we have read, Henri wanted to write a book unlike any he had ever written. And Carolyn told us that her project was to “tell the story of Henri and Flying Rodleighs.” That makes this book different from any we have previously considered here. Flying, Falling, Catching is a story rather than a spiritual meditation (e.g., on a painting), a spiritual journal (e.g., on a portion of Henri’s life journey), or a reflection on some aspect of spiritual life. As longtime book discussion participant Sharon noted in her comment, “I am finding this book to be very intriguingly organized.” Consequently, using selected quotations to prompt discussion as was done last week may not be the best approach.

On her author website Carolyn Whitney-Brown reminds us that Flying, Falling, Catching depicts Henri Nouwen in two key communities: a) the Flying Rodleighs’ world of a traveling circus, and b) Henri’s home in L’Arche Daybreak where people with and without intellectual disabilities share life in community.

In our reading this week, Carolyn describes several formative events in Henri’s life that give us some insight into Henri’s response to the Flying Rodleighs. She describes Henri’s arrival at Daybreak and his challenges in getting to know his housemates, especially Adam. Carolyn discusses Henri’s emotional crisis and recovery from late-1987 until mid-1988. Two of Henri’s most popular and important books—The Return of the Prodigal Son and Life of the Beloved (both published in 1992)—were the fruit of this life-changing experience. Henri’s evolving understanding that he (and all of us) are God’s beloved, provides an interpretive lens through which we view Henri’s rebirth as a clown at his 60th birthday celebration as well as his deepening relationship with Rodleighs. Carolyn points out how Henri rediscovered his body and related that to the physicality that observed in the Rodleighs trapeze act. Finally, she shows us Henri questioning whether in his ministry of traveling and presenting talks he is entertainer like his circus friends. And Henri asks, “Isn’t Jesus the greatest of all entertainers?” (p. 121)

In addition to the reading, you are encouraged to watch the Henri Nouwen Society’s book launch webinar “Under the Big Top with Henri Nouwen” that was released on September 21, 2022, the 26th anniversary of Henri’s death. In this 50 minute webinar you will hear from author Carolyn Whitney-Brown, Rodleigh Stevens, and Bart Gavigan, and you will see film footage of the Flying Rodleighs. You will find it most interesting and well worth your time.

There is so much in this weeks’ reading and the webinar to prompt your reflections. We look forward to hearing what touched your heart—perhaps your thoughts about the Henri’s two worlds, one or more the the events in Henri’s life, or something you glean from the webinar. Please share your thoughts, observations, responses, and questions. The heartbeat of these book discussions is your comments.

As St. Francis of Assisi (Henri’s favorite saint) said to those he met,
“May the Lord give you peace.”
Ray

Reading: Part I, The Call, Chapter 1 to Part II, Falling, Chapter 11; p. 9 to 73

The trapeze act gave rise to a desire in me that no other art form could
evoke; the desire to belong to a community of love that can break
through the boundaries of ordinariness. – Henri Nouwen, p. 19

A warm welcome to everyone and special thanks to the many people who introduced yourselves. Our virtual global community includes participants from across the United States and Canada, Australia, the Philippines, and the United Kingdom—with a mix of new participants and veterans of previous Henri Nouwen Society book discussions. We’re glad that you are here and we look forward to your contributions as we journey together through what promises to be a blessed and fruitful time of preparation for Christmas. 

As a work of creative non-fiction and a collaboration by co-authors Henri Nouwen and Carolyn Whitney-Brown, Flying, Falling, Catching is a distinctive addition to the Henri Nouwen canon. Writing 25 years after Henri’s death, Carolyn uses the details of Henri’s rescue through a hospital window in September 1996, together with notes from Henri’s unfinished attempt to write a story about The Flying Rodleighs, and her understanding of many of the experiences of Henri’s life journey to tell a compelling story about the life journey of a spiritual master. In doing so she, along with Henri, paint a picture that gives us new insights into Henri’s life and spirituality that are meaningful today.

As always in these book discussions, we are most interested in learning what touched your heart in the reading. What points did you find interesting and why? What insights did you gain and how may those insights affect your life? What did you find comforting, or enlightening, or challenging, and why? What questions arose in the reading? Or simply share what you read and how and why it affected you. Here are several quotations or thoughts that that may prompt your reflections.

a) “This is, Henri thinks to himself, an interruption. . . . There have been many interruptions in his life. Some have turned out well.” (Whitney-Brown, p. 10)
What interruptions have you had in your life? How did you respond?

b) “. . . the residents of Daybreak have helped me to rediscover the simple but profound truth that all people, handicapped or not, are the beloved daughters and sons of God and that they can find true inner meaning by claiming that truth for themselves. . . This spiritual insight touched me so deeply I wanted to . . . be able to help myself and others to overcome the deep-seated temptation of self-rejection.” (Nouwen, p. 15).
You are the Beloved is Henri’s central spiritual insight and one of his most important books. How might this insight have prepared Henri to encounter The Flying Rodleighs at this point in his spiritual journey?

c) “(Henri thought) Flying and catching. It’s everything I have always desired.” (Whitney-Brown, p. 18); “. . . (T)he high-flyers in any field, held a particular fascination for Henri.” (Whitney-Brown, p. 25)
As we begin this discussion, do you share Henri’s fascination with flying and catching and the high-flyers in the world? Why or why not?

d) “. . . I was suddenly confronted with the other side of this air-ballet, not simply the dangers of physical harm, but the experience of failure, shame, guilt, frustration, and anger.” (Nouwen, p. 31)
Why do you think this “other side” affected Nouwen to the degree that it did?

e) “I was convinced that the encounter with these five artists had indeed opened a new window in my life and that it would be very sad if I didn’t look through it as long and as attentively as I could.” (Nouwen, p. 51)
Based the story that Carolyn is weaving, do you see these artists and the new window in the same way Henri does? Why or why not? How would you respond?

f) In Chapter 8, Henri describes watching two performances, one by Tina Turner and David Bowie and the other a choir singing Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion. He explores how he is attracted to both. Which performance would attract you more at this point in your life? Why?

g) Henri longed to “join a community of people on the move together.”
(Whitney-Brown, p. 68)
In Chapter 11 we learn of Henri’s participation in the communities that participated in the second march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama in 1965 and in the funeral procession for Martin Luther King, Jr. in 1968.
How does Chapter 11 influence your understanding of Henri and his ministry? How do you think it relates to overall story of Flying, Falling, Catching?

h) “You know in this world where there is so much division. . . the Rodleighs are in a way peacemakers. They create community. . . . You know, it’s all there in one act—what life is all about, what the world is all about.” (Nouwen, p. 73)
At this point in the book, do you see the Rodleighs the same way as Henri? Why or why not?

Again, the paragraphs above are just to prompt your thinking. You can respond to one or more of the prompts or share whatever is on your heart. We want to benefit from whatever you choose to share. We also welcome participants that choose to follow along silently without posting. We look forward to an illuminating and fruitful discussion for all participants.

Peace and all good.
Ray

P.S. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me, either by posting a comment or email at ray.glennon@1972.usna.com.