Where is Henri Nouwen buried?

I’m currently staying in Henri Nouwen’s father’s house in Holland on a writing retreat, thanks to the generosity of Laurent Nouwen who owns the house now.  Henri’s parents—Laurent J. M. Nouwen and Maria Nouwen--lived here in Geijsteren--a small, historic, quiet Dutch village in Eastern Holland on the border with Germany—known as a pilgrimage site for St. Willbrorus, a missionary from Ireland who Christianized what is now the Netherlands.

Memorial Marker in Geijsteren

Earlier this week, on crisp autumn day amid leaves falling from the trees, I visited Henri’s parents’ gravesite in the old churchyard of St Willibrordus Church.  Inscribed below their names is Henri Nouwen’s name in memorium.  I breathed a prayer of gratitude for my beloved teacher.  Though he was born in the Netherlands and died here in this beautiful country, Holland is not where his body is buried.  There was a bit of a controversy about where best to lay him to rest.

On September 15, 1996, Henri left Daybreak, his community near Toronto, for St. Petersburg, Russia, to work with a film crew on a Dutch documentary on Rembrandt’s painting “The Return of the Prodigal Son.”  He flew through Europe, making a stopover at Schiphol Amsterdam Airport on September 16^th and checked into a nearby hotel in Hilversum for the night.  Sometime during the day, he had a cardiac arrest and somehow was able to alert the hotel management.  He was brought by ambulance to the hospital at Hilversum, east of Amsterdam. 

“It was from the hospital that we (brother Paul and I) were called with the disturbing news that Henri had suffered a heart attack,” Laurent remembers. “That same day we (Paul, sister Laurien, my father at the age of 93, and I) visited Henri at the hospital.  I stayed with him overnight and every day thereafter…“

While in recovery from the first he suffered a second sudden heart attack during the night. His family was informed by staff shortly after he died in his hospital room on September 21, 1996.  

I remember getting a distressing call from a mutual friend after his first heart seizure, and again after he had died. I was on a faculty retreat in New Jersey at which I could no longer fully participate after hearing the sad news…Henri had been my professor and mentor at Yale Divinity School, and I had kept in touch with him after my graduation and during his journey to South America, Harvard and L’Arche.   But I was unable to attend his funeral.

The first of three funeral Masses for Henri Nouwen was held on September 25th 1996 at St. Catharina Cathedral in Utrecht (the same church where Henri was ordained in 1957) with a eulogy offered by his friend and mentor, Jean Vanier. It was decided by members of his family and representatives of L’Arche Daybreak that Henri should be buried close to his community in Richmond Hill, near Toronto.

Henri’s spiritual home was with his extended family at L’Arche Daybreak.  After the funeral Mass in Holland, his brother Laurent flew Henri’s body to Toronto for a full night wake at Daybreak and the next day for a full-day wake at St. Mary Immaculate Catholic Church in Richmond Hill where more than a thousand people paid their respects.  This was followed by a second funeral Mass at the Slovak Catholic Cathedral of the Transfiguration in Markham, Ontario on September 28.  A third memorial service occurred a month later at St. James' Episcopal Church on the Upper Eastside of Manhattan (which I attended and where I met Robert Jonas, John Dear, Wendy Greer, and many others who were grieving the loss of our great teacher and friend).

Henri’s body was laid to rest in a simple pine coffin built in the Daybreak wood shop, colorfully decorated by members of the L’Arche community.  There was a dispute between the leaders of Daybreak and the Catholic Bishop of Toronto about where Henri should be buried.  The Bishop insisted that Henri as a Catholic priest should be buried at a Catholic cemetery. Indeed, Church Law requires that Roman Catholics in good standing be buried in consecrated ground, blessed by a priest in communion with the Roman Catholic Church. The nearest qualifying cemetery was one in the city of King, about a half-hour drive from Richmond Hill where Daybreak was located.

Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Cemetery 

Henri properly was buried at Sacred Heart Catholic Cemetery in King City north of Toronto on September 28 the after the second funeral Mass. The name of the cemetery--“Sacred Heart”—symbolizes Henri’s spirituality of the heartland the cause of his untimely death from cardiac arrest. However, the restrictions of Sacred Heart Cemetery do not aptly symbolize Henri’s large, open, inclusive, ecumenical heart… 

In his books and in private conversations, Henri expressed his desire to be buried with the friends he lived with at L’Arche Daybreak in Richmond Hill.  Not all of his friends and community members were Roman Catholic.  The right to burial at Sacred Heart Cemetery was restricted to members of the parish, former parishioners and their families, and other members of the Catholic faith.  As a pastoral provision, a new plot of land was purchased and donated by the Augustinian Fathers in 1996, with a plan to expand Sacred Heart Cemetery to include core members of the L’Arche community when they died.  However, the new section was neglected, the plan to expand the Sacred Heart cemetery was scrapped, and no more sites were made available to the community after Henri was buried.

Henri’s brother, Laurent, after visiting the Sacred Heart burial site in Kings, remarked to Sr. Sue Mosteller, executor of Nouwen’s literary estate:  “I just feel badly because we haven’t really done what Henri asked. ”  Namely, to be buried near his Daybreak friends and family members.  

St John's Anglican Cemetery

In July 2010, fourteen years after his death, Henri’s remains were moved from Sacred Heart Catholic Cemetery north of Toronto to St. John’s Anglican Cemetery in Richmond Hill-- closer to L’Arche Daybreak and where the community was able to buy 20 plots to accommodate the needs of an aging group of Catholic and non-Catholic members.  A simple wooden cross was planted, made by a carpenter at Daybreak and inscribed by Laurent with “Henri Nouwen 24 Jan. 1932 -- 21 Sept. 1996.”About 100 community members gathered at the new gravesite to pray, sprinkle holy water, and remember Henri. (I remember being there shortly after with other members of the Henri Nouwen Society board.  How fitting it was for him to be buried in a cemetery named after John the Beloved (the disciple Jesus loved), one of Henri’s favorites saints.

“It would be wonderful if it could have been a Catholic cemetery,” Sr. Sue Mosteller admitted after his body was moved.  “But it was Henri’s desires, and his family’s wish to honor those desires, that made St. John’s the right final resting place,” she said. Laurent Nouwen agreed:  “Indeed family members were not happy with his place at the cemetery at King.  We were very happy when Henri found a final place of rest amid his deceased friends from Daybreak at St. John’s Anglican  (Jefferson) Church Cemetery.

Pastorally motivated rather than institutionally driven, claimed by family and friends on three continents as one of their own, Henri is remembered as a "catholic" (in the sense of universal) priest.  An ecumenical pastor/priest and spiritual director with open hands and a wide heart.  In life and death, he wanted to be close to those in his community, whatever their faith experience or tradition. He now rests among four of his close friends from Daybreak--Bill, Carol, Rosie and Peter--in the south/east section of St. John’s cemetery, 12125 Yonge Street, Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada.  Time for a new Bishop to consecrate the sacred, ecumenical ground.  

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Henri's Native Netherlands

I remember what Henri once said and deeply believed:  “When I die, my spirit will be accessible to my friends…”  Staying in his father’s home, enjoying his brother Laurent, knowing that Henri was with his father, sister and brothers before he died, as well as with community members, I feel particularly close to my beloved teacher today.  In this special place, surrounded by family photographs, framed icons, many books and paintings, I am reminded of Henri. I’m grateful for his life and mission, and very glad he is finally home.--MJC  

Herni's final resting place at St. John's