Arrivals and Departures: The Restless World of Henri Nouwen
Michael Ford (ed.), Darton, Longman and Todd

Michael Ford, what a great idea! Selecting snippets from Henri Nouwen’s many books to create a travel diary that allows us into the inner world of this spiritual guide — priest, pastor, professor, psychologist and pilgrim.

It’s a wonderful way of presenting a kind of “Best of Henri Nouwen”.

Many of Nouwen’s writings have come during his time in the US, as Professor at Yale and then Harvard, or inspired by his visits among the poor in Central and South America.

Ford has chapters on both. But it is clear from the very first of the three chapters on Nouwen’s visits to Russia and Europe that he is a true European, profoundly grounded in his heritage with its thousands of years of art, history and culture.

Immediately we are taken into the realm of the Russian mystics, appreciating icons and being confronted with the meaning of prayer. Immediately we are invited into Nouwen’s restless quest for a deeper life with Jesus — deeper into the heart of God and so deeper into the heart of humanity.

But this is no “how to” book or a book of “answers”. Qualified to teach as he may be, we are not listening to a sermon that would have us rush out to buy an icon, for example — or do anything in particular for that matter.

Rather, we are listening to a confession. We are listening in to the inner thoughts, “warts and all”, of a fellow traveller who is asking human but eternal questions. We are listening in to the vulnerability of a traveller. We are invited to read on holy ground.

If you have the full set of Nouwen’s books, you will still find this cleverly edited and collected “foreign correspondence” worth reading for what it is. Inspirational! And if Nouwen is unknown to you, Arrivals and Departures might be a great introduction.

Geoff Boyce is chaplain to the Flinders University of South Australia.