I chanced upon the Genesee Diary in a Thriftbooks store somewhere in my travels. It was owned by an ‘Anne Green’, scribbled in pencil on a discreet corner of the first page. The cover was tattered and a little worse for wear, an added attraction to a yet unread book with a strange title and a then unknown
author to me.
The introduction offered a glimpse, “My desire to live for seven months in a Trappist Monastery, not as guest but as a monk, did not develop overnight. It was the outcome of many years of restless searching..” thus began Fr Nouwen.
I had stumbled upon a gem, and an outstanding writer (Fr Nouwen had passed on from a sudden heart attack in 1996), whose works would occupy me for a few years thereafter, including yet another gem in his posthumous monographs collated and published as Finding My Way Home: Pathways to Life and the Spirit
But back to the Genesee Diary.
It has been described as a classic depiction of the monastic life, by a writer of profound subtlety and disarming honesty. He writes: “Contemplative life is a human response to the fundamental fact that the central things in life, although spiritually perceptible, remains invisible in large measure and can very easily be overlooked, by the inattentive busy, distracted person that each of us can so readily become.” (Chapter 1, June 16th Sunday).
The Goodreads.com described this book as follows: “During his seven-month stay in a Trappist monastery, Henri Nouwen had a unique opportunity to explore crucial issues of the spiritual life and discover “a quiet stream underneath the fluctuating affirmations and rejections of my little world.” Nouwen participated fully in the daily life of the Abbey of the Genesee in upstate New York — in work and in prayer. From the early weeks in the abbey — dominated by conflicting desires and concerns — to the final days of Advent, when he finds a new sense of calm expectation, Nouwen never loses his critical honesty. Insightful, compassionate, often humorous, always realistic, The Genesee Diary is both an inspiration and a challenge to those
who are in search of themselves. “The Genesee Diary beautifully lifts the heart and mind to God.”–Christianity Today “This is an extraordinary account of a man seeking inner peace and total commitment to God… a fine portrait of cloistered life, a beautifully written account of one man’s soul-searching.”–Publisher’s Weekly”
Then in his 40’s, Fr Nouwen had already acquired a strong reputation as a spiritual and academic writer and speaker, in great demand, often harried and stressed. One of its most meaningful passages for me came early in the 7-month diary.
He wrote, in June Saturday 20. “Reflecting on my past three years of work, I realize more and more that it lacked unity. The many things I did during those years seem disjointed, not really relating to each other, not coming from one source. I prayed during certain hours or days, but my prayer seemed separated from the lectures I gave, the trips I made, the counselling I did. When I think of the many lecture invitations I declined with the argument that I had no time to prepare, I see now how I looked at every speaking engagement – be it a lecture, sermon, or a commencement address – as a new performance that calls for new preparation. As if I had to entertain a demanding audience that could not tolerate any poor performance. No wonder that this attitude leads to fatigue and eventually to exhaustion. Even small daily tasks such as talking with your own students become an anxiety-provoking burden. Now I see that I was all mixed up, that I had fragmented my life into many sections that I did not really form a unity. The question is not, “Do I have time to prepare?” but, “Do I live in a state of preparedness? When God is my only concern, when God is the centre of my interest, when all my prayers, my reading, my studying, my speaking, and writing serve only to know God better and to make him known better, then there is no basis for anxiety or stage fright. Then I can live in such a state of preparedness and trust that speaking from the heart is also
speaking to the heart….”
Fr Nouwen’s recount of the spiritual guidance of John Eudes Bamburger, the chief abbot of Genesse Monastery, and their many sessions of counselling and spiritual directions, were gems in their own right – of living a life in this world, but not of this world.
His anecdotal recounts of the inspiring stories, writings, or spiritual lives of Charles de Foucauld, the modern desert father, Martin Luther King Jr (and Sr), Thomas Merton, Bernard of Clairvaux, the Spanish matador Mauel Benitez (biography Or I’ll Dress You in Mourning), Buzz Aldrin, and many others, provide a rich palette of learning from a wide spectrum of examined lives.
Whenever I read the Genesse Diary, I am also reminded of Gustave Doré (1832-83) painting, entitled, The Neophyte (First Experience of the Monastery), which hangs in the Cathedral of St Mary of the Angels, Los Angeles. “The light falls on a young Carthusian novice who has recently made his vows. His tense posture and haunted expression suggest that he is now regretting what mist have been a somewhat hasty decision. The melodramatic and rather romantic image of spiritual alienation was one of Dore’s favourite themes (from the painting description at the Cathedral).”
Fr Nouwen had none of the illusion of permanence in his quest for the monastic experience. He would eventually settle with the L’Arche community in France, as recounted in several of his later books and in the epilogue nmonograph Finding My Way Home.
His highly personal and authentic account offers us a gift, a glimpse of contemplative life in 1970’s Catholic America, which remains to date a positive and demystifying account of the Benedictine Rule. Its success is certainly due in no small part to the wisdom imparted throughout the Diary by Abbot Eudes Bamburger, who led the Genesse Monastery from 1971 to 2001, when he resigned at the mandatory age of 75. A trained physician and psychiatrist, he died in 2020, and had maintained a blog till his passing. His story and works, is as inspiring and fascinating as Henri Nouwen’s.
Lumix DMC GM1. 12-35 mm F3.9 2016 Cathedral of St Mary of the Angels, Los Angeles