I would love to attend the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin next month — if for no other reason than to be at the North American premiere of the movie In Pursuit of Silence. Here’s the latest trailer for this “meditative film about our relationship with sound and the impact of noise on our lives.”
So if you live in or near Austin, or are attending SXSW, go see this movie (they haven’t announced time and location yet, so keep an eye on the movie’s website for details.
In honor of In Pursuit of Silence, I thought I’d do something just for fun today — pull together a list of books with either the words “Silent” or “Silence” in the title. Some of these books I’ve already praised on this blog (or elsewhere online), others I haven’t read yet.
In other words, some of these books I can confidently say are wonderful, others are unknown quantities (at least to me). One title I myself wrote. I’ve set in bold a few books that are my personal favorites.
Most are spiritual or philosophical in nature, although representing a variety of traditions and perspectives. Three have the phrase “Silence of God” in the title — how cool is that?
So read with an inquiring mind and a discerning heart. If you have any suggestions of books that should be added to this list, let me know. And happy exploring! (more…)
I’ve been reading Bill Bryson’s charming and delightful book on the English language, The Mother Tongue, and ran across this delicious tidbit:
English speakers dread silence. We are all familiar with the uncomfortable feeling that overcomes us when a conversation palls. Studies have shown that when a pause reaches four seconds, one or more of the conversationalists will invariably blurt something — a fatuous comment on the weather, a startled cry of “Gosh, is that the time?” — rather than let the silence extend to a fifth second.
Why are we afraid of that fifth second of silence? What, exactly, are we afraid of? It is extremely unlikely that anyone present will spontaneously die, or go crazy, or get violent. Likewise, no one is going to laugh at us, criticize us, or reject us. In other words, the silence is safe. When, then, do we dread it?
And should anyone think Bryson is being melodramatic here, I agree with him wholeheartedly. We call such silences “awkward” and “uncomfortable.” We say they are “deafening” (an oxymoron if ever there were one). It seems that our fear of social silence is on a par with a child’s fear of the dark.
And there may be something to that analogy.
George Hoffman writes about “Our Fear of Silence” from a psychological perspective, noting that “the fear of silence is a learned behavior” which can be unlearned. He cites studies that show how uncomfortable college students are with silence — not surprising, given that the lives of youth today are immersed in a world shaped by television, the internet, and portable devices. As Hoffman notes, “If background noise has always been with us, it’s no wonder we can become so uncomfortable when it’s taken away.”
But I think the fear of silence predates the electronic noise of the last 100 years. Even before the rise of the mass media, we human beings have lived in the presence of another kind of noise: internal chatter. What Buddhists call “the monkey mind” or Christian contemplatives have labeled logismoi — the deadly thoughts. We are “distracted from distraction by distraction,” as T. S. Eliot wryly put it — and while external noisemakers like iTunes or Fox news just pile on the distractions, the root cause of both our lack of attentiveness and our fear of silence is the internal noise of our anxious minds.
In chapter 10 of The Cloud of Unknowing we find the suggestion that our minds are restless and prone to distraction because of “the painful effect of original sin.” Which is another way of saying it is not something we can control. Indeed, the brain is a “thought-generator,” working constantly, similar to how the heart ceaselessly keeps pumping life-giving blood throughout the body. A brain without thought is dead (for even a sleeping brain generates dreams). So part of the reason why we fear silence so much is because we have minds that keep trying to shield us from it.
On Patheos recently I’ve written about how contemplative prayer is not about “emptying the mind” (which is impossible). But it is about silence, and so we learn to hold the noises in our lives — whether external or internal — with non-attachment, so that we might learn to pay attention to the silence that is always there, hidden just beneath the din of the screeching monkey. We rest our attention on a prayer word, or a verse of scripture, the Jesus Prayer, an icon, or even just our breath, which encourages “the monkey” to calm down a bit, allowing us to notice the silence that is always luminously present within us — even if we only catch glimpses of it, between the chattering monkey or the soothing rhythm of our prayer word.
I compared our social fear of silence to a child’s fear of the dark. When we give a child a nightlight, isn’t that just like chattering away (i.e., creating noise)? The light masks the darkness, and the noise (whether of thoughts or something external) masks the silence. Yet those are not solutions to the fear, they are merely delay-tactics to allow the frightened person enough time to breathe through their fear and relax. Sooner or later, the child must face the darkness and learn to rest in it. Likewise, we will all face silence at some point (even if it’s only at the hour of our death). Contemplative prayer teaches us to befriend silence rather than to fear it. And this is the pathway to spiritual growth.
What’s important to keep in mind is that the silence is always there. Just because we are distracted, or even afraid of it, doesn’t make it go away. Silence is polite: it doesn’t force itself on us. It waits until we choose to give it our attention. But when we do, we find it is not so scary after all. It is vast, open, luminous, and present. If we let it, silence will teach us — although at a level deeper than words. It also will usher us into that place we all hunger for: the presence of God.
What do you do to cultivate more silence in your life? Please share your thoughts, either in a comment below or on social media (follow me on Twitter or Facebook). Thank you!
Scott Boulevard Baptist Church, Decatur, GA; March 2015. Today this building no longer exists; it was demolished and the land will be developed for retail and/or residential use.
One of my favorite quotations comes from Karl Rahner: “The Christian of the future will be a mystic or will not exist.”
It’s a prophetic statement, from a man who died in 1984. When paired with the demographic realities of the last 30 years (Americans who identify as Christian comprised 85{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7} of the population in 1985, but only 70{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7} of the population today, while the so-called “nones” — people without religious affiliation — grew from 8{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7} in ’85 to 16{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7} today), it’s fair to say that Rahner’s “future” is our “present.” If current trends continue, Christianity could be a minority religion in America by 2075.
Those of us who still believe in the teachings of Jesus — where forgiveness and mercy matter more than law and purity, and love is so central that we are to give it to everyone, even our enemies — are facing a stark choice. Do we embrace the mystery? Or do we just wring our hands while one church after another closes its doors?
I think the answer lies in the writings of the mystics themselves. So for today’s post I’d like to consider the paradox here: Karl Rahner basically said that the key to the faith of the future lies in embracing and following the wisdom of the past. On the surface, that may seem foolish: how can a contemplative or a visionary from the twelfth or fourteenth or sixteenth century speak to the challenges facing Christians (and all people) today?
Here are several ways the spirituality of the past can inspire us to be more faithful here in the present. Perhaps you can think of other ways.
The mystics call us to be still and know. Contemplation — the prayer of gentle waiting — is the heart of mystical spirituality. It’s the countercultural opposite of our aggressive, can-do culture’s way of managing affairs. Mystics know that Christianity is not about control, but about humility and service.
The mystics remind us that silence is praise. E. M. Forster described our faith as “poor little talkative Christianity.” The problem is, when we talk too much we get into trouble, because our words too often are words of judgment and condemnation, not mercy and forgiveness. Mystics recognize that silence is not only a way to praise God (and to enter into mystical consciousness), but it is also the key element to “loving our neighbor” which begins with listening.
The mystics know that the poor and the forgotten are the Body of Christ. I recently heard Doug King of Presence say that Christianity needs to be less about converting others, and more about the contribution we can make to others’ well-being. It sounds like something Jesus himself would have said. Jesus felt that religion worked best when it involved caring for the most vulnerable members of society: the poor, the outcast, the elderly, the sick, the vulnerable, the imprisoned. Mystics from Catherine of Siena to Evelyn Underhill to Simone Weil embodied this truth. The mystics of the future will too.
The mystics understand that humility and kenosis are all about loving your enemy. Traditional religious language with its emphasis on humility, strikes many people — including too many Christians — as old-fashioned or dysfunctional. But mystical Christianity recognizes humility not as humiliation but as self-forgetfulness or earthiness. It’s tied in with a lovely Greek word, kenosis, which means “emptiness.” The Christian of the future will embrace emptiness and humility not as a type of low-self-esteem but as a way to find the openness of heart necessary to follow the most challenging of Christian mandates: to love our “enemies” (I put enemies in quotation marks because a Christian understands that he or she has no enemies; still, there are those who may regard us as enemies or adversaries; those are the ones we are called to humbly love).
The mystics are comfortable with mystery, with unknowing, with not having all the answers. As the Orthodox bishop Kallistos Ware puts it, “It is not the task of Christianity to provide easy answers to every question, but to make us progressively aware of a mystery. God is not so much the object of our knowledge as the cause of our wonder.” Perhaps when Christianity stops being the religion that insists it has all the answers and becomes instead a religion filled with wonder and awe, we can begin to make a real difference in people’s lives — contribution, not conversion.
The mystics remind us that a miracle can happen at any time. Thomas Aquinas beheld God while saying the Mass; Thomas Merton saw everyone shining like the sun on a busy street corner in downtown Louisville, KY; Julian of Norwich received a series of sixteen visions or showings while deathly ill. We never know when God will touch us with wonder, or a vision, or a call. But we do know that such moments of encounter can change people’s lives — and the world.
The mystics understood that being faithful matters more than being successful. Christians are called to heal the sick, feed the poor, clothe the naked, visit the prisoner, shelter the homeless, love the enemy, and pray without ceasing. We will most likely fail at all of the above (and then there’s raising the dead!) — but we are not called to be successful, we are called to be faithful. Perhaps one of the reasons why Christianity as we know it is dying, is because it is the end of a 1700-year long run of Christianity asserting itself as a religion of success, of earthly/political power, and of social dominance and control. That enterprise is clearly sputtering out. But that’s good news, because all that’s left is the mystery — the invitation to faithfulness — and the vocation to love.
I don’t think embracing mystical spirituality will halt the implosion of the institutional churches. But I don’t think God is in the empire-building business, anyway — if he were, Jesus would have been born the son of an emperor, not the child of an unwed teen mother.
Make no mistake: in the years to come, we may watch a lot more churches shrivel away to nothingness, see plenty of monasteries close, and find that the nature of ordained ministry or public worship will be changing as well. I don’t think any of these things are going to disappear altogether. But for many Christians, what it means to follow Jesus will look a lot different in the future than it did in the past. And that’s okay. If we are embracing the mystery of God — which is the best short definition of a mystic that I can think of — then I believe we’ll be okay. The Holy Spirit will do the heavy lifting. Our job will be to wonder, to listen, to spend plenty of time in silence, to live and pray generously, and to embody forgiveness and love.
And what an adventure that will be!
Can you think of more ways that the mystics of Christianity can inspire the faith of the future? If so, please leave a comment here or on social media. Thank you.
If you are active in a church or other faith community, and you are drawn to (or practicing) silent prayer, if you talk about it with others you will likely, sooner or later, hear somebody say something along these lines:
“Isn’t meditation Buddhist? Or Hindu? Christians don’t need to do that sort of thing.”
“Sitting in silence? It’s just a waste of time. We are called to be serving others, not avoiding them.”
“Contemplation and mysticism aren’t in the Bible. Therefore, they aren’t for me.”
“Centering prayer is a Catholic practice, not appropriate for Protestant/Reformed/Evangelical Christians.”
Objections like these can be disheartening. Readers of this blog and others I’ve met at conferences and retreats around the country have told me a lot of sad stories. Lots of folks have told me they couldn’t share their love for contemplation with members of their churches — or even their pastors — because of objections like the ones above. An Episcopal priest told me that the Senior Warden of her church refused to let her begin the Vestry meetings with five minutes of silence, because they had “too much to do” (i.e., it’s a waste of time). I myself once had a priest tell me he wasn’t a “spiritual” person, he was a “practical” person (he’s a bishop now).
If you’ve been discouraged by nay-sayers and contemplative critics, take heart. The church has had a non-contemplative status quo for centuries now. Those of us who are seeking to restore the contemplative heart of our faith will naturally meet with resistance from others who, consciously or subconsciously, want to defend the status quo. Our job is to respond to such persons with kindness and understanding, while not backing down.
To those who worry that contemplation seems too “Buddhist” or “Hindu” or “New Age,” remind them that Christianity has a long tradition of saints and mystics who advocated silent prayer as a way to grow closer to God. From Evagrius Ponticus in the fourth century, to Richard of St. Victor in the twelfth century, to The Cloud of Unknowing in the fourteenth century and The Way of a Pilgrim in the nineteenth, Christian history is replete with teachings and instructions for the practice of silent, contemplative prayer.
Granted, many Christian contemplatives do engage in interfaith dialogue or interspiritual practice. That is true. But you can be a Christian contemplative without being involved in interfaith dialogue, and vice versa.
To those who object that contemplation, or mysticism, are too “Catholic” for Protestant or Evangelical Christians to accept, remind them that Catholics and Protestants share the same books of the New Testament, the practice of Baptism and Communion, and the writings of all the great Christian teachers and leaders for fifteen of the last twenty centuries. We worship the same God, trust in the same savior, and are inspired by the same Holy Spirit. Yes, there are real differences between these branches of Christianity, but contemplation, with its emphasis on silence, is perfectly suited for anyone who seeks a closer walk with God.
Often, remaining silent is better than getting into a pointless debate.
When someone insists that contemplation isn’t in the Bible, you can agree that the word itself is not in scripture. But silent prayer is all over the Bible. “For God alone my soul waits in silence” (Psalm 62:1); “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10); “In returning and rest you shall be saved, in quietness and trust shall be your strength” (Isaiah 30:15); “The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him!” (Habakkuk 2:20); “There was silence in heaven for about half an hour” (Revelation 8:1); and my personal favorite, which only makes sense when the original Hebrew is translated literally: “To you, O God, silence is praise” (Psalm 65:1). When Elijah encounters God, he encounters “a still small voice,” or “a light silent sound” or “the sound of sheer silence” (take your pick, these are different translations of I Kings 19:12). Scripture affirms silence as a way to relate to God. There is no Biblical reason for a Christian to avoid silence in prayer.
Finally, the person who insists that silent prayer is a waste of time, or is an indulgence that Christians cannot afford, is using the same argument that Judas used when criticizing Mary’s anointing of Jesus (John 12:1-11). There is always the temptation to assume that spirituality and practicality are at odds. But Jesus didn’t see it that way. Taking time (and expensive ointment!) to care for him was, in his mind, a worthy pursuit. Likewise, as people of faith we need to take time to rest in the love of God, with no agendas, no to-do lists, nothing other than our desire to love and worship the God of Love.
Of course, no true contemplative would say that we should remain silent at all times and simply abandon the commandment to serve others. But the key here is balance. Too much “practicality” can lead to burn-out and bitterness or resentment at how things don’t always go the way we plan them. But when balanced with deep and meaningful contemplation, our efforts to put our faith into action emerge out of a deep place of profound trust in God.
I’ve written this post not to help you change peoples’ minds, or to win debates, or to score points. In fact, as a general rule I think it’s best not to get into arguments with those who see things differently. In fact, the main purpose behind this post is to remind us contemplatives that we have sound reasons for our prayer practice, even when others criticize it. Remember, there is a hidden reason why otherwise well-meaning Christians object to contemplation: usually, they are just too invested in maintaining the status quo. We don’t have to change their minds. But neither do we have to let their objections get in the way of our intentional silent prayer.
I have been reading and tried to practice the way of a contemplative life although poorly I believe. But my hunger for anything on the topic of contemplation continues. Recently I have also been enticed into “mindfulness” practices. Now what or how do you relation contemplation and Mindfulness? They’re beginning to sound that there is a correlation? Thank you!
Thanks for your comment. First of all, we are all “poor” when it comes to contemplation; it is the human condition to have distracted minds, unruly emotions, and fidgety bodies; our fast-paced, hi-tech, entertainment-besotted culture generally makes it worse. So please be gentle with yourself. When you enter your time for silence in the presence of God, seek to be gentle, to relax, to rest in the unseen presence.
Allow every distracting thought and emotion which arises within you to be simply another reminder that you seek the silence and the rest which lies deeper within. There’s an old joke that the princess has to kiss a lot of frogs before she finds her prince — likewise, contemplatives have to gently turn away from many distractions before we find rest in the silence.
Mindfulness comes from a Pali word, sati, which means “mindfulness” or “awareness” and points to an important concept within Buddhist meditation practice — indeed, “right mindfulness” is the seventh of the Buddha’s Noble Eightfold Path. So in a general sense, mindfulness (awareness) is simply a foundational element of a meditation practice: awareness, clarity, attentiveness, these are the core elements of mindfulness.
It implies waking up from the web of distractions that normally cloud human consciousness, so that we may engage with life from a place of intentional, “being present” to what simply and truly is, rather than remaining lost in the funhouse of our never-ending internal commentary and criticism of what we experience.
So, while it has a Buddhist provenance, mindfulness in this sati sense is simply a positive quality that emerges from any kind of disciplined meditation practice (and Christian contemplation or silent prayer does qualify as a meditation practice). But I suspect when you speak of mindfulness, you may be referring to the secularized meditation/wellness practice called “Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction” or MBSR, which was developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in the 1970s.
Kabat-Zinn is a student of Buddhism, but it’s my understanding that MBSR explicitly intends to be a non-religious practice, aimed at mental and physical well-being. I’ve only taken one MBSR class, and was taught several practices, including a generic type of meditation, some gentle yoga postures, meditative walking, and “body scanning” (a relaxation technique involving paying attention in a gentle way to each part of the body while sitting or lying down). It’s my understanding that this has become a hot topic in research circles, looking for measurable benefits that MBSR practice can provide to people who suffer from chronic pain, anxiety, depression, or other concerns.
There’s a kind of trendiness to mindfulness practices. And naturally, that has led to a bit of backlash, too. The Spectator in the United Kingdom recently ran an article by Melanie McDonagh called Mindfulness is Something Worse Than Just a Smug Middle Class Trend. It’s well worth reading. Here’s a snippet for you:
An important element of the practice is to eschew judgmentalism; to observe and accept ourselves and our surroundings with compassion. Which sounds dandy, except that there are some things about ourselves and our situation which we jolly well shouldn’t be non-judgmental about, which we should be trying to change… This brings me to what really annoys me about being mindful, which is that as far as I can gather, it’s Mostly About Me. Sitting concentrating on your breathing is a good way to chill out and de-stress, but it’s not a particularly good end in itself. Radiating compassion is fine, but it doesn’t obviously translate into action. Where’s the bit about feeding the hungry, visiting the prisoner, all the virtues that Christianity extols? Where in fact is your neighbour in this practice of self-obsession? … Mindfulness may be the new religion — but it’s no substitute for the old one.
Is she being a bit unfair? You can decide for yourself. But I can tell you, she’s not the only one who worries about this. In fact, I first ran into criticism of the mindfulness movement from Buddhists, who were concerned that it was a “dumbing down” of Buddhism that gave consumeristic Americans a handy little practice for feeling good, but without the ethical and transformational demands of the Buddha’s teachings.
Christians, likewise, recognize that silent prayer needs to be embedded in an entire life oriented to being more Christ-like: in other words, the proof of our spiritual maturity lies not in how good our silent prayer is, but in how good our actions are.
But let me hasten to say that I am hesitant to simply say I agree with McDonagh and that the mindfulness fad is bad news. I don’t go that far, because I do believe MBSR really does have health & wellness benefits. Here’s how I see it: secular mindfulness practices are good, Buddhist and other eastern meditation practices are better, and theo-centric (God-centered) contemplative practices (like Christian silent prayer) are the best of all.
Why do I make this claim? In silent prayer, we seek not only wellness (the purpose of MBSR) and enlightenment (the aim of eastern meditation), but also intimacy with God.
Granted, I am writing as a Christian, with a Christian world-view, and others are free to disagree with me. But what I love about Christian spirituality is that I’m never alone: I’m always invited into the presence of Unconditional Love, who is not just a “force” but a Person. I enter silence because God loves me and because intentional, prayerful silence is a way to respond to that love (Psalm 46:10) and even a way to praise that love (Psalm 65:1).
It’s also about becoming a more Christ-like person, which means a holy person, or at least someone who seeks to be holy. It means self-emptying, or kenosis. It means entering silence not merelyas a means of self-help or personal growth, but in the interest of an ever-deepening relationship — with God, with Love.
But wellness is good, and MBSR is a wonderful way to use meditation and other relaxation/awareness practices in the service of wellness. Likewise, the quest for enlightenment or illumination is good, and eastern spiritual practices like shamatha or zazen are great tools in the service of that kind of spiritual growth or even liberation. What I love about Christian silent prayer — contemplation — is that it includes all of the above, but goes even further, in that it is grounded not just in wellness or in personal enlightenment, but in union with God — union with Divine Love. That’s what keeps me returning to the silence every day.
A couple of years ago Rob Bell wrote a book with the title What We Talk About When We Talk About God. I haven’t read the book, but I love the title. So I suppose this blog post could be called “What we talk about when we talk about contemplation.”
If that seems funny to you, I admit I’m being ironic. Why talk about something that takes us — or at least invites us — to a place beyond language, beyond words, beyond grammar? But as silent as contemplation is, the reality of being human is that we love to talk about, well, everything. We talk about God. We talk about love. We talk about mystery. And yes, we talk about contemplation.
So for today’s post (and next Wednesday’s as well), I’m sharing with you two sets of six quotations, both from sacred scripture and from other writings that I have found useful, that function as a set of “guiding principles” that help me to remain focused on my understanding of contemplation. It’s a total of twelve quotations: six today, and six next week.
I hope you will read over these quotations, and reflect on their meaning, and how they can provide us with a kind of trellis on which we can hang our understanding of this deeply silent way of beholding God and all things. Yes, I know it’s a paradox, and I know that the best way to understand contemplation is simply to do it (which means being silent rather than chattering on about it).
Nevertheless, since it is human nature to think, and to reflect on what gives life meaning, I hope you will reflect on these principles. Just don’t do it until after you’ve spent some time in silence.
Silence is praise. (Psalm 65:1 translated literally) Contemplation is not a practice or a technique; it is a way of seeing, of listening and of paying attention, that is grounded in silence. Silence is more than just the absence of sound, it is the presence of the open present moment, where we make ourselves available to attend to God. This attentiveness is an actual form of praise, of worship.
Know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:19) Contemplation begins in love and takes us beyond thought or knowledge, leading us to that place where we recognize God’s presence in our lives, empowering us to love God and one another, to find meaning in suffering, and to remain grounded in hope and joy.
The Christian of the future will be a mystic or will not exist. (Karl Rahner) We are all called to contemplation. Silent prayer is not just for nuns or monks, priests or ministers, saints or visionaries. It’s for all of us. Christianity is in crisis today at least in part because the church has abandoned its contemplative heritage. It is vital that we reclaim that heritage for ourselves and for the future.
Contemplation is the only ultimate answer to the unreal and insane world that our financial systems and our advertising culture and our chaotic and unexamined emotions encourage us to inhabit. (Archbishop Rowan Williams) Contemplative living provides an alternative to the forces in life that foster consumerism, materialism, low self-worth, and environmental degradation. Contemplation helps us to create a happier, healthier life. It is a spiritual discipline, but even more than that: it is a way of putting our faith into action, with practical, and even social, ramifications.
Contemplatives explore the waste of their own being. It is in the midst of chaos and crisis that they pursue the vision of God and experience the conflict which is at the core of the contemplative search. (Kenneth Leech) Contemplation is not an escape from the messiness of life. Rather, it is a fearless entry into life’s “chaos and crisis” so that we might foster healing, renewal, and wellness for our selves, our relationships, and our world.
Contemplative practice is not a technique but a surrendering of deeply imbedded resistances that allows the sacred within gradually to reveal itself as a simple, fundamental fact. (Martin Laird) What Orthodox Christianity calls theosis is the summit of the spiritual life: the recognition that “God and I are not two” and that our destiny as children of God is nothing less than union with God.
In his sermon On Conversion, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux quotes Acts 26:24, only he paraphrases it like this: “Too much thinking has made you mad!”
Whenever I see a verse like this rendered in an unusual or thought-provoking way, I like to check out the original Greek or Hebrew, even though I’m strictly an amateur when it comes to Biblical languages.
These words were spoken by Festus, who is criticizing Paul when the saint is addressing Agrippa. Festus says, in Greek, πολλα σε γραμματα εις μανιαν περιτρεπει, or “Much learning turns you to madness.” The word for learning, γραμματα (grammata), is the word from which we get “grammar,” while the word for madness, μανιαν (manian) comes into English as, well, mania.
So I decided to get to know γραμματα a little bit better. Here are some other verses where it appears in the writings of Paul himself:
“God has qualified us as ministers of a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit, for the letter brings death, but the Spirit gives life.” (II Corinthians 3:6)
“Circumcision (for Christians) is of the heart, in the spirit, not the letter.” (Romans 2:29)
“Now we are released from the law, dead to what held us captive, so that we may serve in the newness of the spirit and not under the obsolete letter.” (Romans 7:6)
In each of these verses Paul is suggesting that life as a follower of Christ means turning away from the letter (gramma) and toward the Spirit (pneuma, which means not only “spirit” but also “breath”). In the freedom of the Spirit, we turn away from the letter which is dead, obsolete, unfree. In the freedom of our breath, we are liberated from the shackles of grammar, of language, of thought.
Do you see where I’m going?
Paul understood that the written word — the letter — is anchored in grammar, in thought, in that which by its very nature limits and divides. As great a gift as the Jewish law was, it also could be oppressive (we could say the same thing about any legal code or thought-system, including much of our contemporary religious language). Language is not evil, per se, but neither does it give life the way the Spirit does. Language is limiting. Thought is limiting. Propositional argument, as powerful as it can be, ultimately is limiting, when compared to the vast, open, free movement of the Spirit — the giver of life, of breath — in our lives.
Clearly, Paul is not arguing that Christians should do away with all language. After all, he is using grammar to convey his critique of grammar. I think his point is very simple: there comes a point when words fail us, when they cannot contain the fullness of the Spirit, the freedom of the breath, the possibilities of love and life. When we reach that point, we are called out of the prison of grammar and into the freedom of the Spirit.
And that is the point when contemplation begins.
Contemplation, at least speaking as a Christian, is a form of prayer: of making ourselves available to the Spirit. We do this by attending to our spirit, our pneuma, our breath. We do this by setting grammar aside, letting go of the letter, being present to the silence. Breath is silent. Thought is grammar. In silence we make ourselves available to the Spirit. In silence, we turn from the letter of our thoughts to the breath of the Spirit.
I don’t know if that’s how Paul would have understood all this or not. But I suspect that we moderns/postmoderns have a tendency to think of “letter” and “Spirit” as abstract principles, which is to say, as something outside of ourselves. Paul, being a first century Jew, may have had a much more embodied and interior understanding of letter and Spirit. And if he did, his understanding may not have been that far off from how contemplatives distinguish between thought and silence.
Because too much thought, after all, can lead to mania. Whereas the breath — the wordless Spirit — simply leads to life.
If a picture is worth 1000 words, how many words is silence worth?
Does language always limit the way we talk about, think about, or even pray to, God?
This question has been on my mind for the past few days.
This past weekend I attended a service at a nearby Episcopal Church. The liturgy came from Enriching Our Worship, a contemporary, inclusive language resource approved for use in Episcopal Churches. For the most part it was poetic and lovely. However, one phrase during the Eucharistic prayer startled me — and not in a good way.
Glory and honor are yours, Creator of all,
your Word has never been silent;
you call a people to yourself, as a light to the nations…
“Your Word has never been silent.”
I was stunned. It felt like a slap in the face to the practice of contemplative prayer.
Is this prayer implying that God lacks the power to speak to us through silence, or values silence so little that it is always overrun by the noise of the “Word”? Or perhaps it is implying that God’s Word (i.e., Christ) never prayed in silence?
Because on the surface, it appears to be saying one if not both of these things.
Now, I can do a kind of interpretive dance around this. It’s not meant to be anti-contemplative, it’s just an affirmation of God’s loving word spoken throughout all times and all places. God’s Word is Christ, and Christ is never silent, because Christ always calls us to reconciliation and renewal.
In other words, blah blah blah.
This reminds me of how defenders of gendered language in liturgy make their case. When we call God “Father” this does not mean God is male, in a human biological sense. And when we call humans “mankind” that’s not meant to exclude women either. Yada yada yada.
Now, I doubt that the author(s) of the Enriching Our Worship Eucharistic prayer were setting out to write something that seems to attack contemplation. They were just trying to make a poetic statement abut the pervasive presence of God’s Word, Christ, in our lives. But by doing so, they inadvertently said something that sounds like bad theology (at least to me).
Maybe the idea that God’s Word is never silent is not a big deal to most people. But as someone who believes the problems in Christianity mostly stem from its rejection of its own contemplative heritage, language like that is stunning in its implication. Likewise, a lot of people don’t understand the importance of inclusive language, mainly because they enjoy and find comfort in traditional language, gender bias and all. But to others, such kind of language leaves them feeling excluded, or unhappy because it appears to exclude others.
My point is this: whether we’re talking about something as obvious as gender bias or even something as seemingly innocuous as “Your Word is never silent,” language — even the best, most traditional, most poetic language — always seems to fail us when it comes to talking about, or praying to, God. God is greater than language, so when we try to talk about (or to) God, we are trying to fit something infinite into the finite container of human speech and syntax. And the result is always messy.
So what should we do? Should we give up on talking about God? I don’t think so, although arguably that’s what atheism is all about. When an atheist says “I don’t believe in God” he or she is saying, by implication, “God is not worth talking about.”
A better approach, what I believe to be the more contemplative approach, is to continue to talk about God, since God is love, and justice, and mercy and forgiveness, and we live in a world that is starving for all these things. But we need to talk about God with great humility and non-attachment. Our language about God will sooner or later fail.
What we believe reveals God may inadvertently conceal God. Our human sin — our capacity to hurt one another, oppress one another, impinge on each other’s freedom — will creep into even the most mindful ways of talking about God. Knowing this can be an important step toward refusing to let our human language of God become an idol.
Remain Silent. Stay Calm.
The essential key, of course, is silence. “Silence is praise” muses the Psalmist; and Elijah encountered God in “the sound of sheer silence.” Silence does not make language obsolete or unnecessary, but it does help us to hold our language lightly. This not only can keep us from turning our language into an idol, but can also help us to be forgiving when we hear God-talk that is limiting or exclusionary or oppressive.
In other words, I know that “Your Word is never silent” is a limiting way to talk about God. But when I pray in silence, I am reminded that I do not need to let that kind of language impact my own spirituality. As the Quakers say, “better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.”
Perhaps this blog post has been a bit heavy on the cursing-the-darkness side — so I’ll be silent now. For silence — praying contemplatively — is a way of lighting a candle for God.
Is there language about God that you find limiting or exclusionary? Or language that you think is important to retain? Leave a comment to share your thoughts on this topic.
O Divine Beloved, you are the source of life and the fountain of all goodness.
In the mystery of your silence we recognize who we are, for we are created in your image. You are beautiful, for you are Love. You are wisdom, for you are Truth. We worship you and ask that you restore in us the fullness of your likeness. Forgive us for all the ways that we have failed to embody your love, and heal us so that we may bring your mercy to others.
Grant us the grace of discipline in prayer, that we may tend to you in stillness and silent praise, every day of our lives.
Grant us the grace of authentic humility, that we may truly know ourselves, with humor and compassion, and respond to your universal call to holiness.
Grant us the grace of deep interior silence, that our chattering minds and anxious hearts may rest in your limitless love.
Grant us the grace of quiet confidence, that we may fully trust in you and allow that trust to form us in joyful hope.
Grant us the grace of caring discernment, that we may avoid the temptation to judge one another and instead bring insight and compassion to all our relationships.
Grant us the grace to grow in the fruit of the spirit, so that love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and mindfulness may form the character of our lives.
And finally, grant us the grace to love you with our entire being, and to love our neighbors and our enemies as we love ourselves, so that in all that we say, all that we do, and indeed in the fullness of who we are, you might be glorified and adored, for truly your beauty is our joy, your heart is our love, and your silence is our peace.
All this we ask in the name of Christ, the savior of the world.
Amen.
Update, March 2018: I’ve written a new and shorter version of this prayer. Click here to see it.
A reader named Monika wrote the following comment and left it on one of my blog posts:
I recently lost my husband of 49 years to a sudden brain tumor. I sold our home and cafe for economic reasons. I always wanted to live in quiet contemplation when the right time came. I think that it is here and I have nothing but grief blocking any inner peace I am looking for. Where do I start?
All your posts seem so moving and joyful.
Thanks
Thank you, Monika, for your comment. I am so sorry to hear about the loss of your husband. And I suspect that selling your property may compound the feelings of disorientation and dislocation that are a normal part of grieving. I hope you can find the stability that is in God, who is the source of all our stability, no matter what we may be thinking or feeling or going through.
Allow the grief to be there. Try to welcome it, to offer it hospitality, as painful as that may seem. If you cry throughout your prayer, remember that the Desert Fathers and Mothers saw tears as a gift from God.
Whether we are sobbing disconsolately, crying quietly, or simply noticing the aching presence of our mourning, those of us who have welcomed grief into our lives know exactly what you mean when you say it is blocking the inner peace you seek. What is so frustrating about silent prayer is that almost anything that is going on inside us — any distracting thoughts, any tumultuous emotion, any deeply-seated passion — will likewise seem to block the peace we hunger for. I think this is why one of my favorite teachers, Kenneth Leech, says that contemplatives “explore the waste of their own being.” That doesn’t sound very inviting! But I think it’s honest. And I think honesty, authenticity, is so important in all prayer, including contemplative prayer. When we are grieving, we pray our grief, we pray through our grief. When we are joyous, we pray our joy. When we are fidgety and distracted, we pray through our fidgety distractions. And on it goes.
And once in a while, by the sheer grace of the Holy Spirit, we touch the peace we seek. And we realize that it is always, already there, hidden beneath and between all the static and noise of our ordinary awareness. What Buddhists call “the monkey mind.”
Prayer — all prayer, not just contemplative prayer — is a dance of attention and distraction. Sometimes our distractions are silly, such as when we keep thinking about a funny movie we saw last week. But at other times our “distractions” are really all about what’s going on in the deepest places in our hearts: our grief, our longing, our hope. And if that isn’t the heart of prayer, then I don’t know what is.
So pray your grief. Cry your tears. Keep breathing and try to find moments of silence and rest between the ache and the cascade of thoughts and images and feelings. If it helps, use a short prayer like the Jesus prayer (“Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me”) or a favorite Bible verse (“Be still and know God,” “God, come to my assistance; Lord, make haste to help me”) or, what The Cloud of Unknowingrecommends: a single, short word that in itself is a prayer: “God” or “Love” or “Grace.”
The prayer word or verse is helpful because it gives us a lifeline back to the restful attentiveness we seek to cultivate. When we get lost in the maelström of our grief or our distracted mind, then we return to the prayer as a way to return to the intention of simply resting in God’s silent presence. And when we relax into the deep silence that is there, beneath the chattering mind, beneath the passions of the heart, we can let the prayer words go too, and simply be still. And know.
You asked where to start. Start where you are. One day at a time. But I recommend making space in your life every day for silence, even if it’s just a few minutes. At first, the dailiness matters more than how long you sit. So give it five or ten minutes. When you hunger for more, you can give it more. But start with making it a daily practice.
I like to begin and end with a brief prayer, like the Lord’s Prayer, the Glory Be, or this lovely prayer from Julian of Norwich:
God, of your goodness, give me yourself, for you are enough for me. I may ask nothing less that is fully to your worship, and if I do ask anything less, ever shall I be in want. Only in you I have all.
Of course, if you have another favorite prayer go with that, or even pray briefly in your own words.
Allow your prayer time to be imperfect. Prayer is about love, and love is always messy and imperfect. Love flows best when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable, so we have to learn to be vulnerable in prayer, too. Fortunately, God is safe, and it really is okay to be vulnerable in God’s presence. Even to the point of crying or sobbing.
I hope some of this is helpful for you, Monika (or for anyone else who is seeking to pray through powerful emotions). Thank you for the privilege of reflecting together with you on the mystery of prayer. Please let me know how it’s going.
A Silent, Restful Place: Monastery of the Holy Spirit, photo by Haven Sweet.
Sometimes I get asked “Where is contemplation in the Bible?”
One obvious answer to this question is Psalm 131.
It’s a short Psalm, only three verses. Here it is in its entirety from the Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (but every translation works):
O Lord, my heart is not lifted up,
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a child quieted at its mother’s breast;
like a child that is quieted is my soul.
O Israel, hope in the Lord
from this time forth and for evermore.
Let’s reflect on this lovely Psalm.
Verse one is a statement of humility. Throughout the western contemplative tradition we learn that humility is a prerequisite for meaningful prayer. Not humility in the sense of self-denigration (which is not true humility, but actually a form of pride); rather, humility in its original, earthy sense of remaining down-to-earth and even being a bit self-forgetful. It’s keeping our eyes on God rather than ourselves — or, as so beautifully expressed in this Psalm, keeping our eyes (and heart) trained toward how God comes to us in the ordinary, down-to-earth places in our lives, thus liberating us from having to master arcane theology or esoteric principles in order to pray. Christian contemplation is down to earth, and the first verse of this Psalm affirms this.
Likewise, Christian contemplation recognizes that our mind/intellect can only take us so far in our quest to respond to God. As the Cloud of Unknowing states it, “Everything you are thinking of is between you and your God. And you are further from God to the extent that anything is in your mind but God alone.” In other words, “things too great and marvelous for me” can actually get in the way of fostering real intimacy with God. Don’t get me wrong — theology and philosophy have their place. But when it comes to deep, contemplative prayer, it’s time to set aside those “great and marvelous” thoughts and simply love God in silence.
Verse 2 gets to the heart of the matter: contemplation is about silence, about calmness and quiet — letting go of our thoughts and interior chatter, and resting in God, the way a baby rests on her mother’s breast. Interestingly, the Hebrew word גָּמוּל (gamul) in this verse means “weaned” but also has connotations of completeness or ripeness. So the baby quieted at its mother’s breast is a baby weaned — no longer relying on the “milk” of theology, it rests in a “meat” of contemplative silence — but also a baby that is complete and whole; that the silence of calm quiet prayer is full and complete in itself.
Finally, verse 3 of this Psalm calls Israel (and by extension, all who read and pray it) to a place of hope and trust, beginning in the present moment and extending forth throughout eternity.
So in Psalm 131 we find a basic trinitarian model of contemplative prayer:
Begin with humility, letting go of the temptation to relate to God through clever thoughts or complicated ideas;
Move into silence, finding calmness and rest in God like a baby finds resting on its mother’s breast;
Finally embrace hope, that in the down-to-earth quiet of contemplative prayer we learn to fully trust God.
So there you have it: instructions for contemplative prayer, straight out of the Bible.
Ss. Teresa of Ávila and Brigid of Kildare, St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Macon, GA. Saint Teresa and Saint Brigid were two great contemplatives engaged in making the world a better place.I am troubled by the idea that it’s harder to be a child today than it was when I was young. Is that just my personal angst, the anxiety of someone moving rapidly through midlife? Or is there some truth to my worrisome intuition?
Well, consider the following sobering statements, all culled from recent articles on respectable news websites.
It is reported that one in three children is the victim of bullying at school, and with a growing number of young people online today, cyber bullying is enabling the terror to continue outside of school and into the night. (Source: Yahoo News)
One in four girls is sexually abused before the age of 18. The global market for child trafficking is more than $12 billion a year, with more than 1.2 million child victims. More than 100,000 children are currently involved in prostitution in the U.S. (Source: Wellspring Living)
The higher the level of income inequality in a county, the higher the reported rate of maltreatment of children tends to be. That is true no matter what the average family income happens to be. (Source: Journalist’s Resource)
In the United States alone, childhood lead poisoning costs an estimated $50-billion (U.S.) a year, while methylmercury toxicity alone costs $5-billion… The vast majority of the more than 80,000 industrial chemicals in widespread use in the U.S. have never been tested for their toxic effects on the developing fetus or child. The real impact on children’s health is just beginning to be uncovered. (Source: The Globe and Mail)
A total of 13{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7}–20{b583bb596bb2c84984aee1f32e70a80b80285001a0226212b58cbda01f2115e7} of children living in the United States experience a mental disorder in a given year, and surveillance during 1994–2011 has shown the prevalence of these conditions to be increasing. (Source: Alternet)
Some might argue that these statements are overblown. I’m not knowledgeable enough to be able to make a definitive statement for or against any of these statistics. But it seems to me that even if these statistics are exaggerated — which I have no reason to believe they are, but just for the sake of argument — even so, I think most reasonable people will agree that ours is a seriously toxic culture. And it seems to be getting worse, not better.
While we worry about the size of our television screen and how many gigabytes of space our electronic devices contain, our children and youth are suffering. We debate endlessly about how we perceive colors in a photograph of a dress on the Internet, while our kids are killing themselves or interacting with their peers through bullying and hostility.
What are we doing about this?
There’s a great slogan: “If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention.” It’s a call to action, of course. But it’s also about being a contemplative as much as about being an activist. The truth is simple: we live in outrageous times. We have so much work to do. Everyone of us has a part to play in healing our broken society, our broken culture, our broken way of life. Even if we aren’t political activists, we still need to be taking care of our family and our homes, to safeguard against the troubles we face.
But being outraged is only half the job. It’s just as important to be paying attention. And that’s where contemplation comes in.
Yes, we all need to work for a better world. This post is not about specific solutions to any of the above problems, but thankfully people of good will are already hard at work — and they need our support and engagement. But is that all we need to do? Or do we need to begin to create a better soul for our world? In other words, does the healing need to come from the inside out?
I think the answer is obvious. “I can’t change the world, but I can change the world in me,” sang Bono on the U2 song “Rejoice.” I think that song suffers from a wee bit of Irish pessimism, because if we change our inner worlds, then we are empowered to actually make a difference in the outer world as well.
This is why I believe that contemplation is essential for the future of humanity. Not by itself: contemplation without action can be a type of escape, so it’s important that our contemplative practice be embedded in healthy values and positive action — both at the personal and the societal level. We need contemplation to support the action we take to care for our immediate family and loved ones, and we also need contemplation to support the political, economic, and lifestyle choices that nurture our children, that help preserve our ecosystem, and that help to foster a just world. We need both contemplation and action. If contemplation without action is a form of escape, then likewise, action without contemplation can lead to burnout and hostility, even in the hearts of those who are working for positive change. When we lack contemplation, we more likely see those who disagree with us as our enemies rather than our loyal opposition. Action without contemplation runs the risk of being activity founded in anger or hate rather than love.
Everyone knows that when communism triumphed in Russia and China, it just created a new hell to replace the old. Our political and social activism must arise out of a deep inner conversion, and contemplation is a key to that interior transfiguration: one person, one spirit at a time. Likewise, our efforts to love our family and friends must arise out of that same inner transfiguration, or else we run the risk of polluting our most important relationships with the toxicity of our culture at large.
So why do we need contemplation, in a society where so many of us are suffering? Here are just a few answers to this question.
1. We need contemplation to remember who we really are. Our consumer/entertainment society dazzles us with things to buy and amusements to distract us, and we become so overwhelmed by stuff and fun that we forget our deepest identity. We forget our innate dignity as children of God, and our compassionate nature that refuses to accept the suffering of others. Contemplation is a way to short-circuit our cultural amnesia and re-calibrate our hearts to the love of God.
2. We need contemplation to safeguard against despair. The line between outrage and overwhelm is thin indeed, and it’s easy to find the challenges in our world today simply too much to bear. Taking time for silence, reflection, and cultivating inner peace is an important way to prevent burning out or freaking out over the enormity of our problems. Contemplation refreshes us and empowers us to face our tasks with hope and God-given strength.
3. We need contemplation to slow down and think clearly. Daily time given to silence is like a “reset” button for the mind. It cleanses the frenzy of over-stimulated thoughts and feelings, and opens up a spaciousness where we can consider how to most wisely and effectively respond to the work we need to do. This is true whether our task is changing the world or changing the diapers of our newborn. Both tasks are essential, of course, and both must be done with love if they are to be done well.
4. We need contemplation to keep from demonizing our opponents. Jesus was blunt: “Love your enemies.” This doesn’t mean we ignore threats like ISIS, but it does mean our response to any adversaries needs to be grounded in respect for their God-given worth as human beings. So we seek to neutralize military threats, to rehabilitate criminals, and to work with political opponents in whatever way we can. This is profoundly counter-cultural. Read any political blog, left or right, and it’s obvious that our cultural tendency is to hate our opponents, not engage with them or seek reconciliation. But if we cannot figure out a way beyond political gridlock, the problems that really matter (see the quotes at the head of this post) will remain un-addressed. A contemplative stance recognizes that the common good matters more than abstract ideological purity, and so it can help us to find creative ways to work together for the benefit of all.
5. We need contemplation to help us find different solutions to the same old problems. Albert Einstein defined insanity as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” If mental illness, income inequality, environmental toxins, human trafficking, and child-t0-child violence are all on the rise, then we need to be doing some things differently — radically differently. Different doesn’t always mean new — perhaps what we need is a return to some old values (like civic duty, or valuing family before wealth). But maybe we do need some new ideas, new ways to teach values to our children or to instill such values in our economy and technology. I certainly don’t have all the answers. But one thing’s for sure: we need creative thought to deal with our challenges, both on a personal and a societal level. And such creativity can be fostered — and needs to be fostered — by restful silence.
6. We need contemplation for our own sake. Contemplative practice has been linked to health benefits, such as easing depression, helping to manage stress, and alleviation of pain. Contemplation doesn’t just feel good, it’s good for us. Taking good care of ourselves is essential if we want to make the world a better place.
7. We need contemplation for our children’s sake. Contemplation is not about making more money or improving our standard of living (at whatever cost). Rather, it is about fostering love and compassion and connectedness. Once basic human needs are met, there is no correlation between income level and level of happiness. If we want to do the best we can for our children, we need to balance our running the rat race with a heartful/mindful approach to life and love.
So why do we need contemplation? We need it because we live in a toxic, chaotic society, and many, perhaps most, of us lead toxic, chaotic lives — so whether we are trying just to manage our own little corner of the world, or trying to make a difference in society at large, we need contemplation to nurture us on the way. We need contemplation to reconnect with the place in our hearts that belongs to God. We need contemplation to keep us from despair in the face of all of life’s challenges, whether personal or political. We need contemplation to find joy and purpose amidst life’s many challenges. And we need contemplation to nurture faith in God, even with all the anger and hatred that seems so prevalent in today’s world.
Can you think of other reasons why we need contemplation? Please leave a comment if you have any thoughts.
