The Healing Touch
Touch, yes, touch, speaks the wordless words of love. We receive so much touch when We are babies and so little when we are adults. Still, in friendship, touch often gives more life than words. A friend’s hand stroking our back, a friend’s arms resting on our shoulder, a friend’s fingers wiping our tears away, a friend’s lips kissing our forehead— these bring true consolation. These moments of touch are truly sacred. They restore, they reconcile, they reassure, they forgive, they heal.
Everyone who touched Jesus and everyone whom Jesus touched were healed. God’s love and power went out from him (see Luke 6:19). When a friend touches us with free, nonpossessive love, it is God’s incarnate love that touches us and God’s power that heals us.
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Becoming Friends of Our Children
Can fathers and mothers become friends of their children? Many children leave their parents to find freedom and independence and return to them only occasionally. When they return they often feel like children again and, therefore, do not want to stay long. Many parents worry about their children’s well-being after they have left home. When their children visit they want to be caring parents again.
But a mother can also become the daughter of her daughter and a father the son of his son. A mother can be- come the daughter of her son and a father the son of his daughter Father and mother become brother and sister of their own children, and they all can become friends. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does it is as beautiful to watch as the dawn of a new day.
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Living Faithfully in an Ambiguous World
Our hearts and minds desire clarity. We like to have a clear picture of a situation, a clear view of how things fit together, and clear insight into our own and the world’s problems. But just as in nature colors and shapes mingle without clear-cut distinctions, human life doesn’t offer the clarity we are looking for. The borders between love and hate, evil and good, beauty and ugliness, heroism and cowardice, care and neglect, guilt and blamelessness are mostly vague, ambiguous, and hard to discern.
It is not easy to live faithfully in a world full of ambiguities. We have to learn to make wise choices without needing to be entirely sure.
~From Henri J.M. Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith
