The author, Henri J.M. Nouwen, is a Catholic Priest and writer. In this book he outlines three stages of spiritual growth: reaching out to one's self, then to others, and, finally, to God. He offers examples from literature, scripture, and life to help listeners through struggles with inner restlessness of faith.

Erik Synnestvedt narrated the unabridged audiotapes I had. Anyone from any walk of life that has an interest in understanding a Christian's spiritual life can benefit from this writting. Do your self a favor and read/listen to this small book. ( )

Nouwen sees the three components of spiritual life in relational terms: God, others and self. He describes each relational axis as a "movement": from illusion to prayer, from hostility to hospitality, and from loneliness to solitude. What I like most about Nouwen's writing is that he is not afraid to delve deeply into tough issues. He describes the movement from illusion to prayer as "a gradual detachment from all false ties and an increasing surrender……to move away from the safe place into the unknown" (p. 149). This, I think, is a courageous description of prayer and one that challenges notions of prayer as a crutch for the weak or as a desperate reaching out by the profoundly troubled. Nouwen writes, "it would be just another illusion to believe that reaching out to God will free us from pain and suffering" (p. 150) and yet so many people reach out to God with just that expectation. Nouwen's understanding of paradox is profound and he writes, "Where God's absence was most loudly expressed, his presence was most profoundly revealed" (p. 127), a notion that speaks to us all in a time of war.

When Nouwen writes of the movement from hostility to hospitality he echoes the theme of creating a safe space where people can explore their spirituality, "more important … is to offer the students the place where they can reveal their great human potential…" (p. 88). He acknowledges that religious instruction must intersect with an individual's own life in order for it have meaning, "so many students do not care for religious instruction … their own life experience is hardly touched" (p. 88). Once again, the themes of "safe space" and "relevancy to life experience" surface as key issues. Indeed, Nouwen writes, "Hospitality, therefore, means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy" (p. 71).

One of my favorite lines in this book is Nouwen's assertion that, "One of the greatest problems of education remains that solutions are offered without the existence of a question" (p. 85). Surely much of what goes on in church education falls into this category. People have real questions and yet the church tends to provide solutions only to the questions that it thinks should be asked. I recall in a class on "Primal and Folk Religions" a story about a group of hunter-gatherers in Africa who approached the local Christian missionary to ask him whether they should go hunting today or tomorrow. It was a critical question because they knew that only sometimes was the hunt a success and they needed guidance because the village was short on food and people would go hungry if the hunt failed. The missionary was taken aback and was unable to answer them. The local witch doctor had no hesitation about giving them exact guidance on when to hunt and when not to hunt. If the hunt failed on the prescribed day it would be because of rival witchcraft by their enemies. They left the witch doctor knowing what to do. They never went back to the missionary who had answers only to questions that they did not ask.

Nouwen's words on the movement from loneliness to solitude seem especially important in a time when, to quote Dawn (p. 164 of her book) we are busy "amusing ourselves to death". Nouwen writes, "As long as we are trying to run away from our loneliness we are constantly looking for distractions with the inexhaustible need to be entertained and kept busy" (p. 49). Surely there is little sadder than two lonely people clinging to each other in the vain hope that each will be able to dispel the loneliness of the other. Nouwen states that "Loneliness is one of the most universal sources of human suffering today" (p. 25) and I suspect that many who go to our churches do so in part because they are lonely and they think that being with others will cure that condition. It will not. Until one is able to be comfortable with one's own self and so be accepting of solitude, as distinct from loneliness, one will never be able to interact in a genuine way with another.

It seems that Nouwen's thesis might be summarized by viewing the human experience in terms of a set of intersecting axes (the x axis stretching from loneliness to solitude; the y axis stretching from illusion to prayer; and the z axis stretching from hostility to hospitality) where each of us is challenged to move from the face defined by loneliness, hostility and illusion to the face defined by solitude, hospitality and prayer. ( )

Henri Nouwen, who died in 1996, was one of the most significant writers on spirituality of the late twentieth century. Reaching Out combines two of his most popular books in one volume. With a foreword of personal appreciation by the ever popular Father Gerard Hughes, this special edition will be treasured by the many admirers of Henri Nouwen. The main part of the book is Reaching Out which answers the question "What does it mean to live a life in the Spirit of Jesus Christ?" The second part is Glimpse Beyond the Mirror which is a very personal account of the author's spiritual life in the aftermath of a terrible accident ( )

Nouwen's essays offer much insight on holy hospitality, making place for God and other people in our lives. ( )