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 In Praise of Silence
by Edmond Eh

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About four months ago, I started going down to the Christian Meditation Centre (located at the Church of the Holy Family) to join in the Beginner classes. I attended a few sessions and learnt the basics regarding the “John Main” method of meditation. Each session, we all got to remain silent, sit still and meditate on a prayer-word, maranatha (which means “Come, Lord Jesus”), for twenty minutes. One of the memorable things which one of the teachers mentioned was that “we contribute to the silence” during the twenty minutes of meditation. In addition, repeating the prayer-word required effort on our part during the meditation, and so it is “holy labour”, as defined by the Desert Fathers.

Having a greater appreciation of silence has had a profound effect on my prayer life, as I began to realize its importance in all the different forms of prayer in my daily life. For example, it has greatly enriched my understanding of the need to pause for silence at different points when praying the Divine Office.  Those of us who pray the Liturgy of the Hours will know that we pause in silence after praying each psalm, the Scripture reading and the intercessions. The place of The Sacred Silence is as follows: 
 99 Since as a general rule in liturgical functions, care must be taken that 'at the proper times all should observe a reverent silence' (Sacrosantum Concilium n. 30), opportunity for silence should be given in the recitation of the Liturgy of the Hours[1].  
100 The purpose of this silence is to allow the voice of the Holy Spirit to be heard more fully in our hearts, and to unite our personal prayer more closely with the Word of God and the public voice of the Church[2].   


And this is explained below:

 

The silence following the psalms and readings is an integral part of the prayer. In any attentive conversation between friends, after our friend has spoken we often pause, to absorb what they have said before we reply. To pause, to be silent after each psalm, allows the word of God to germinate in us. It gives us time to meditate on the word of God, and to listen to the voice of the Spirit in our hearts[3].  

As time passed, my prayer with God improved tremendously, simply because I began to have better conversations with Him. The conscious effort to keep quiet during prayer has helped me to be more open to listening to what God has to say to me, instead of only focussing on what I want to say to Him. In addition, with the increased silence came greater reverence on my part. I am sure some of us are familiar with verse 10 of Psalm 46, which is frequently found on the door of Adoration rooms:  

            Be still, and know that I am God. 
            I am exalted among the nations,  
            I am exalted in the earth![4]

Indeed, the human effort to remain silent gives us a greater sense of the sacred. It is no wonder, then, that it is getting increasingly harder to sense God's presence when we are surrounded by handphones, music and television, even in public places, not to mention public transport! An excellent truth is proclaimed when our separated brothers and sisters from other Christian denominations refer to their prayerful reading of the Scriptures as “Quiet Time”.

[1] Anthony B. Boylan, “Introduction”, Morning and Evening Prayer from the Divine Office, Collins, London, p. xxxiii.

[2] Anthony B. Boylan, “Introduction”, Morning and Evening Prayer from the Divine Office, Collins, London, p. xxxiv.

[3] John Brook, The School of Prayer: An Introduction to the Divine Office for All Christians, Liturgical Press, 1991.  

[4] Revised Standard Version. 

It is getting harder to sense God’s presence when we are surrounded by handphones, music and television, even in public places, not to mention public transport!

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