Loneliness and Family

Today I took advantage of my week between classes to learn something not on the curriculum (though I also took some time to get familiar with the text for the next course – go me:P). I listened to a tape by Henri Nouwen called Spirituality of Marriage and the Family. Fred lent it to me a couple weeks back. It was nice to hear what Henri Nouwed sounded like. I didn't imagine he had the accent that he did!

The thing that struck me most is that he saw the primary vocation in marriage being to solitude and intimacy. The idea of a vocation to solitude and of the ministry of honoring and protecting loneliness in each other really grabbed me. Nouwen suggests we should not expect marriage to end our loneliness, as it is our seal of being destined for a greater communion to come. The ministry of marriage is to protect and honor that feeling and minister to it the comfort of intimacy. When intimacy and solitude work together, we give space to each other – we bind up the pain of loneliness through intimacy and give generous space in solitude. The ministry of spacious generosity is hospitality and we offer it to our children and to all who pass through our door that we may bind up their wounds of loneliness while they are with us.