• On Being and Becoming: Henri J. M. Nouwen's
  Life of the Beloved

-April Renee Lynch

Priest and spiritual writer Henri J. M. Nouwen's Life of the Beloved is subtitled "Spiritual Living in a Secular World." Written mainly in the second person, the work speaks to that secular world in the person of Nouwen's friend Fred Bratman; Nouwen met Bratman while Nouwen was teaching at Yale Divinity School. Their friendship grew out of both mens' frustration with Bratman's New York Times writing job. He wanted to write a novel: Nouwen helped him toward that end. As their tie strengthened and Bratman began to discuss more his deepest feelings, he asked Nouwen to write a book especially for "non-spiritual" people searching for God. Nouwen's response was threefold: He writes of Being the Beloved, Becoming the Beloved, and Living as the Beloved.

Nouwen says that when one is the Beloved s/he accepts, in fact, Jesus' own baptism. When the heavens opened over John the Baptist and Jesus, the voice spoke: "You are my Son, the Beloved; my favor rests on you." The person accepts this dictum in spite of a world that tries to convince her of her worthlessness-"unless [she] can demonstrate the opposite. [p. 26]"

After one accepts being the Beloved, that person must become the Beloved: They go hand-in-hand, Nouwen states. "Becoming the beloved is pulling the truth revealed to me from above down into the ordinariness of what I am, in fact, thinking of, talking about and doing from hour to hour. [p. 39]" It means identifying the movements of the Spirit. In those movements, as Nouwen puts it, we are "taken, blessed, broken and given," just as the Bread of the Eucharist is. Being taken, "compassionately chosen," means that we constantly look for support as such in synagogue, church, faith groups, and with family and friends. Being blessed means affirming our own and others' Belovedness (through prayer, accepting and giving compliments, etc.). Brokenness involves the heartbreak of personal rejection: We must embrace our pain in order to bring about our own healing. In being given, Nouwen says that humankind's greatest fulfillment lies in becoming bread for the world. We express ourselves most intimately when we give ourselves to each other.

Living as the Beloved involves saying "Yes" to a God who wants to be loved. It means realizing our selfhood in a spiritual life that "counteracts the countless divisions that pervade our daily life" (Nouwen's words), destroying our Godliness, our childhood in Him.

When Nouwen gave the text of this book to Bratman, the latter's response was not what Nouwen had hoped for. Basically, Bratman told Nouwen that he had written a kind, well-intentioned book for believers. To paraphrase Nouwen, it was as if the priest were writing excitedly about sailing, but had forgotten that his audience had never seen water or a sailboat. I agree. The book is tremendously moving, but only to people who are already "converted," as it were. It gives those who feel that they are already loved and validated ample reasoning for their feelings; it offers very little to those who are confused and feel rejected. Perhaps the answer for this lies in something Nouwen wrote toward the book's end: "I feel within myself a deep-rooted resistance to proving anything to anybody. I don't want to say: 'I will show you that you need God to live a full life.' I can only say: 'For me, God is the one who calls me the Beloved, and I have a desire to express to others how I try to become more fully who I already am. [p. 117]'"

Nouwen was at first doubtful about publishing the book (based on Bratman's reaction); he was in the end more sanguine. Colleagues praised the book, said that it had helped them in academia, and asked him to publish it as written. He did so: I think that that was a good choice on his part. Perhaps even now Nouwen's book is having a concentric-circle effect radiating out from those closest to the source of belief in the Beloved of God to those who do not believe yet. My hope is that whoever reads this book and finds him or herself unsatisfied will not be unsettled by the experience: I hope the person's doubts will draw them into the circle, leading them to a real search for his or her place in God's plan.

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April Lynch recently received her M.A. in Art History from U.C. Irvine: she hopes soon to enjoy a career as an art historian. She has been a member of St. Agnes since 1990.