Sitting quietly, doing nothing, Spring comes, and the grass grows.
OK, I know I am always banging on about Silence, and yelling at you all to get some SILENCE into your lives, but I really do believe it is the most important subject of all. Make no mistake though, this is what I am talking about:
Silence is not the absence of sound, it is the absence of self.
Monasteries of all denominations, throughout time and space recognise this unassailable Truth. The closest most of us ever get to absence of self is when we are totally in love with some creature: our spouse, our child, our best friend, our favourite absorbing hobby, or a book or a work of art or piece of music etc. When we are thus entranced, our ego gets forgotten, but alas this is just escapism, and being rooted in creatures, will sadly always end. This is the reason why we are warned against idols.
A Saint is someone who is totally absorbed and in love with God. The great thing about this love is that God wants you to be so empowered by it that you then can love all His creation just as He loves it. Attaining this isn’t as easy as it sounds, but it gets easier with practice.
Here is a spiritual exercise to try: Think of the person who gives you the most grief in your life. Then realise that God loves that person infinitely, and wants you to do so too. By loving that person, I mean fully knowing and understanding them and wishing them well. Forget the grief they have caused you, be forgiving and loving toward them just as God is toward them and you. Persist at this until you break through all the resistances within you. Ask God for help, He knows you will need it.
I guarantee that the next time you meet this person, your relationship will have changed for the better. I wager £1,000,000 that this is the case!
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Silence is also the essential prerequisite to listening. Without it, how can we expect to hear God? The goal of contemplation is achievement of “unselfconsciousness”, a state where we might, like St Catherine of Siena, get to hear Jesus say to us,
“I AM HE WHO IS, YOU ARE SHE WHO IS NOT”
He isn’t being rude, He is merely stating the Truth to one who badly needs to hear it.
God breaks through when we are silent.
You see, we can only make silence in the hope that God will SMASH it, like a stone cast into a silent pool, rousing ripples reverberant!
And this is what the Gospel is. It is the sound of God hitting the ground, running,
To our aid and rescue.
Amen.
(Don’t just take my word for it, read the Holy Father’s meditation.)
Catholicism Pure & Simple 