“For God alone my soul waits in silence.” (Ps. 61:1)
“When the Lamb opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour.” (Rev. 8:1)
“Silence is the sacrament of the world to come.” (St. Isaac the Syrian)
Silence is not just the absence of ambient noise. Nor does it mean the lack of laughter or music or shared reflection. Silence is a state of mind and heart, a condition of the soul. It is inner stillness.
Silence in heaven reigns amidst joyous song and ceaseless celebration. It is awe in the presence of the Divine.
Silence in this world leads us beyond earthquake, storm and fire, beyond stress, anguish and pain. It makes audible, words of ineffable beauty. Silence lets us hear the still small voice of God.
Many years ago I had such an experience [of silence], and it left a mark on me that I hope and pray will never be totally lost. With my wife and children, I visited a community of contemplative sisters who, with their bishop’s blessing, had taken up residence in la Petite Chartreuse. Although their liturgy and spiritual pathway had been very much influenced by Orthodoxy, they owed their gift of silence to St Bruno and to the environment he created.
Standing still in that place, I felt the walls permeated with prayer. Countless monks, unknown to the world but cherished by God, had passed along that corridor, moving with measured steps toward the chapel and the communal office. For a moment, I longed to be with them, to pull a cowl down over my head and spend long moments or hours in silence.
I left that place with a certain sadness, knowing full well that I could never acquire the depths of inner stillness that authentic monasticism, of East or West, requires. I, too, talk too much, am too distracted, too spoiled by the glitter of this world, too impatient, too vulnerable, too weak, too proud…. And above all, I lack silence—silence of the kind that comes with genuine inner struggle against all I have just named, and so much more that I dare not mention outside of confession.
I still feel that sadness, and for the same reasons. But by the grace of God, I have tasted the beauty and the power of silence, at least a little. And I am grateful.
If there is one gift I could offer…to all of us including myself, it would be the gift of silence. Silence in the outward conditions of our life, that encourages the growth of deep inner stillness. Silence that stifles the perpetual noise that fills the mind and tenses the nerves. Silence that opens both the mind and the heart to otherwise unattainable heights of prayer. Silence that lets us hear the still small voice of God.
~Adapted from Father John Breck, Life in Christ, February 1, 2003, website of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA): http://oca.org/reflections/fr.-john-breck.
