The cultivation of silence is a prerequisite for a living faith
Posted on December 12th 2010 in Weekly messages
Last week the Diocese arranged for an Advent day of recollection to be given by Fr Tony Philpot a retired spiritual director from the English College in Rome, who spoke about the need to rediscover silence for our spiritual sanity. He explained that during his years of working on the missions in Peru, the presbytery would occasionally host missionary priests who had come down from the mountains. One who worked amongst the high peaks of the Andes would shout out, ‘they are playing our song’, every time he heard ‘Simon and Garfunkel’s ‘Sound of Silence’. Amongst the indigenous peoples he would spend six months enveloped in virtual silence. It would be difficult to find such silence here, and indeed most of us would be frightened by such a prospect. And yet the Incarnation, the birth of Jesus, took place in silence as did the Resurrection, the two pivotal points of our own journey towards salvation.
The opposite of silence is noise and, as measured in decibels, comes in so many forms, piped music, the flickering of background TV and the background ‘noise’ of our own conscience. This makes its presence felt with worrying questions along such lines as ...‘why have I not done so and so’. Verbs of this type of noise include those of duty…should, ought and must. These are not the necessary duties of family life, but relics of past personal experiences that trouble us and have badly informed our consciences. There is also the noise of the militant campaigner within and without the Church whose spiritual life is being destroyed because of an obsession. The consequent lack of judgement and proportion was so evident in last week’s demonstrations about university fees. Was it really necessary to desecrate the Cenotaph, or attack Prince Charles and Camilla’s car to make the point about tuition fees? Finally, there is the noise, or distraction, of fragmented lives, where competing demands make it difficult to concentrate on any one thing for any length of time. The priest gave the example of news interviews where difficult issues have to be commented upon and answered in two minute sound bites. This is the default methodology of many institutions and companies.
The sources of noise might be easily identifiable, but what of the solution, the cultivation of silence? The priest took a phrase from Simone Weil, that of ‘growing the muscles of attention’. This is something she thought began at school with the ever increasing complexity of subjects studied, and the solving of difficult intellectual problems. This form of education may have long vanished from most schools, but the need to cultivate these ‘muscles of attention’ is an absolute requirement for the spiritual life. Part of this formation is not to allow oneself to be metaphorically shaken about so that the water of the soul becomes cloudy once again. The analogy of the soul as a vessel of water needing purification through natural reflection and supernatural grace can be used to explain so much of the latent anger that exists in human society. Every confrontation with those with whom we disagree can so easily become moments when the vessel of our souls is shaken about, and the water become cloudy again. When that happens, anger and resentment take over from the search for common ground with one’s adversary. Peace, external and internal, then becomes impossible.
The season of Advent is the time for patient waiting, and this Sunday’s Gospel shows why this is necessary. John the Baptist had to send messengers to Jesus to ask if He was the one sent by God, because the style of Jesus’ preaching and conduct defied his own categories. The coming of Christ could easily pass unnoticed or be mistaken unless we open our hearts in silence to what His coming portends. The good news is that it the kingdom has arrived; now we must discover its presence in our own lives to live our faith fully.