“Silence is God’s first language.”   Thomas Keating

“If you take time to just sit in silence and listen, you may begin to realize that in the ‘emptiness’ there is something there, something profound.  There is a fullness, closeness, a presence behind all the outer acoustic and visual activity.”  Erik Stensland

“Ascetic solitude involves silence.  And silence is one of the great victims of modern culture.” John O’Donohue

How much time do you spend in solitude?  Not enforced solitude as the result of living alone.  Rather the intentional solitude that comes from creating space where only you, and God, reside.

How much time do you spend in silence?  Silence which limits the noise and distractions of life, and permits one the opportunity to listen to something, or Someone, who has something truly valuable to communicate.

When we the last time that you spent time in silent solitude? 

Silence and solitude are practices essential to faith and life.  I find it fascinating that worship, prayer, bible reading, acts of service, reading—or listening– to books, and a host of other activities are prescribed for a healthy or growing spirituality. But seldom, if ever, is solitude and silence mentioned.  I NEVER heard teaching on it in the seminary, nor throughout my previous pastoral life.  It wasn’t until I went on an individual silent retreat by myself that I discovered the gift of solitude and silence.  I might add that it came during one of my darkest personal times in life, and only as a last result because I had tried everything else.

Solitude and silence are two sides of the same coin, both inviting communion with The Presence of God which cannot be experienced while immersed in the noise of daily life. Solitude and Silence are powerful elixirs for people who are suffering from afflictions of body and illnesses in the soul.

“One of the reasons so many people are suffering from stress is not that they are doing stressful things, but that they allow so little time for silence. . . Silence is one of the major thresholds of the world. The spirituality of the Desert Fathers greatly influenced Celtic spirituality.  For these ascetics, silence was the teacher.”[1]

It wasn’t only the early Desert Fathers, and Mothers, who practiced silence in order to listen to God.  It was Paul, who went into the desert for three years, and John the Baptist, who lived in the desert, and Jesus himself, whom, we are told, frequently went off by himself to pray.

There are places we can go for solitude and silence.  And we should.  Places like nature, as Stenslund writes, and retreat centers or monasteries.  Some of the most powerful “God experiences” that I had were on the Isle of Iona, both on the beaches and in the Abbey.  But one doesn’t have to get away in order to have solitude and silence.  In fact, the furthest journey into a distant land that any of us may ever make is into the interior of our Being.  It is far more beneficial for to foster a daily practice which allows one to cultivate the inner silence by going into a quiet space, or creating one.

Meister Echardt wrote that there is nothing in the world that resembles God so much as silence. If this is true, then one must ask themselves “How much of God am I missing by not creating space for solitude and silence?”  It is in the primordial silence that God existed before creation, as we know it, and which came to be through God’s speaking.  And it is in too often in the unexplored darkness of our deepest selves where God continues to exist.

I invite you to initiate an intentional practice of solitude and silence, and by so doing experience the divine riches waiting to be revealed.

A Blessing of Solitude[2]

May you recognize in your life the presence, power, and light of your soul.

May you realize that you are never alone, that your soul in its brightness and belonging connects you intimately with the rhythm of the universe.

May you have respect for your own individuality and difference.

May you realize that the shape of your soul is unique, that you have a special destiny here, that behind the façade of your life there is something beautiful, good, and eternal happening.

May you learn to see yourself with the same delight, pride, and expectation with which God sees you in every moment.

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[1] “Anam Cara” by John O’Donohue, p. 109

[2] IBID., p. 125