The Eloquence of Silence

The Eloquence of Silence

Silence.

Amen. 

Jesus died and then there was a long, long silence. The silence of his death leaves us uncomfortably bewildered.  

Yesterday, during the March For our Lives, Emma Gonzales stood before the hundreds of thousands and myriads more on Television. She described in excruciating detail the death of the 17; their names and their  “nevermore”.

Then there was a very long awkward and bewildering silence, like the silence in the aftermath of a school shooting.

When my dad died, it was Christmas. I was eight years old at the time. I was bewildered by his death and simply didn’t understand I would never see him again. When I went to bed at night there was nothing but silence. Long, long hours into the night, I cried myself to sleep afraid; “if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take”.

The Death of Jesus.

Death at Parkland.

My dad’s death.

The long, long bewildering Silence.

Christians still March for our Lives showing forth Jesus’ death until he comes again.

Young people March for our Lives until the adult world hears them and protects them from violent death.

I Marched on for my own life, wondering if I would ever see my dad again.

To this very day, Christian folk March for our Lives around the globe with Palm Branches in their hands. I loved church palms when I was a child. I loved gathering with the church in the garden where we blessed the palms then marched around the block and into the holy place.

Years and years ago I marched for civil rights and an end to a senseless war.

And yesterday millions marched and myriads more on Television witnessed the dawning of a new day in American History.

And Emma stood there in silence, perhaps the most eloquent silence ever spoken in the history of American oratory. 

Years ago as a child, I cried myself to sleep in Silence as I prayed. There was no answer. Until one day on the way home from church I pulled a solitary leaf off an unkempt city hedge and pressed my thumb mindlessly into the girth of that leaf. As I looked down at the chlorophyll stain left of my thumbnail, I realized, that leaf gave its life for me and that’s when I heard it.

Something in my heart of hearts; no voices, just a sense within me seemed to say; “Don’t you know there’s a special place in my heart for the love of your dad!” It was then that I gave voice to what I heard in my heart; I spoke out loud. “Don’t you know there’s a special place in my heart for the love of your dad?”. 

Of course, I checked it our with my grandmother; who was the ultimate authority in theological matters in my young life. And so it came to pass that I decided to become a priest.

And to this day, I will tell all who will listen to me and many who won’t; “Don’t you know there’s a special place in God’s heart for you and those you love.? No exceptions. Period!”

There is a long, long bewildering Silence at the death of Jesus, or students at Parkland or my own father.

If you listen closely to the Silence, the Eloquence of God’s Voice will speak. But you must be still, absolutely still to hear The Voice of God. 

It speaks to us from the Cross.

It spoke to us yesterday in Emma’s Silence.

It spoke to me when I was a child on the way home from church one Summer Sunday. 

Be still and learn with me that the Silence has a Name.

I learned that the Name of the Silence is God.

I learned that the Name of the Silence is Jesus.

I learned that the Name of the Silence is The Holy Spirit.

Silence.

Amen. 

Fr. Paul

Politics, Spirituality and Silence

Politics, Spirituality and Silence

Years ago, when I was on retreat at Holy Cross Monastery in West Park, New York, I was walking about keeping the required silence. I came across a simple piece of art in a hallway written in exquisite calligraphy that said “Silence is the guardian of charity”. I stopped and thought about that for a while and wondered about the number of times I had used a hasty word or two and when others in my family or in my circle of friends had also used hasty words. There can be hurt, harm, and worse, there can be insult and injury. Carry that out far enough, and sharp words can lead to even more serious consequences, like actions that incite violence and even warfare.

As I thought about family history and world events I thought about the value of silence and how the keeping of it can guard the peace and kindle compassion and charity among human beings. I thought about the pursuit of justice among and between various races, ethnicities, nationalities, even in our more intimate relationships. Gender relationships are often strained and folks of various orientation can find themselves marginalized by thoughtless, insensitive and hasty words. Yes, silence is indeed the guardian of charity.

I thought of the art of listening to one another, and now, especially after the last two weeks of oratory in Cleveland and Philadelphia, I find myself "listened out". A friend of mine posted a meme on Facebook in which a large red circle was drawn. Green represented the number of times your opinion changed the opinion of someone else who disagrees with you. Red represented the times your opinions changed nothing at all but managed merely to incite anger in both the the writer and the reader. There was only the angry color of red in the circle.

Conversation is a lost art form particularly in our political life, it would seem. And yet, when practiced toward perfection, conversation can become a vehicle in which the ministry of reconciliation can occur. 

When I lived in Toronto, I remember living with a family while I attended college. In exchange for babysitting, I had a room and meals. It was a good deal. What struck me most about living with this particular family, though, was that during the evening meal there was a lengthy ritual of conversation. As the family sat down to dinner, the father of the family would preside. He happened to be the Department Chair of Greek and Latin Classics at the University of Toronto. He would call upon his children to share the events of the day. Sometimes it required a bit of encouragement. Sometimes it took a great deal of encouragement. But eventually he was able to elicit a good story or two from each of us as we recounted the events of the day. He was a masterful educator. He listened with care, he supported his children, he probed their thoughts he supported them and then he’d often challenge them to think more deeply and more critically about the convictions they were beginning to form. Dinner lasted for hours, particularly as we lingered over tea and biscuits. 

It was not an eat and run kind of family, but we have become more and more, an eat and run kind of society. We are more and more a fast food nation. We are very, very busy. 

Many years after college, I came to learn that in conflict management, listening is a primary skill. It takes time to listen. It takes a willingness to be quiet; to be silent. We have to slow down to hear each other. To listen, we have to suspend our own opinions for a space of time. Listening is hard work.

To help with the management of the communication process, I learned a convenient strategy. We called it the LAPS strategy. The acronym stood for four words:

Listen

Allow 

Probe 

Support

Let me suggest to you that to listen means to repeat what the speaker says and to check that you have heard correctly. You may be surprised how often you will need to hear it repeated because you don’t always listen carefully enough, especially the first time or two.

Perhaps even more difficult will be to allow what the speaker says. You may vehemently disagree for instance, but how can you really show that you care about what anybody says unless you allow them the right to say it?

However, once you get past the first two parts of the strategy then you can probe what the speaker says. This is often when the speaker gets to hear himself/herself and often begins to wonder just a little bit about their convictions. They begin to hear themselves speak. In its better moments, probing, can yield insight to all involved in the communication process.

Then to show that you have the courage to listen, find something to support in what has been said. With any amount of imagination you can find something in what is said with which you can agree.

By the way, this method of communication can be useful in marriage counseling or any other conflict situation. 

Nevertheless what it takes to listen is to:

Listen

Allow 

Probe

Support

Now that you have taken the time to listen to the "other" it is your turn to speak. Can your counterpart extend the same courtesy to you that you extended to them? This is the essential justice question in any conversation.

For a parliamentary system to work we will need to learn how to listen to one another. The word parliament is based, as many of you know, on the French word, “parler”, to speak. It is easy to speak. It is harder by far to listen. Listening requires spiritual discipline. The idea of parliament, whether it is in Britain, Europe, The United States or the United Nations, is to provide a vehicle for us to share ideas, concerns and interests. It is the hope of diplomats the world over, that when we sit down at the table to reason together, we can avoid conflict and warfare. Sometimes that works. Tragically, sometimes it does not.

In today's Gospel, Jesus finds himself in a situation in which he is called upon to be an arbiter in a family dispute. Interestingly he uses the occasion to teach us about our relationship to our worldly goods and verses our relationship to matters of more consequence, such as our accountability to God and to one another. As Jesus clearly says; "Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." Paul follows up with his encouragement to seek the things that are above. He says;  "But now you must get rid of all such things-- anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth." Really? Paul must have been listening in to some political speech making in his own time to come up with that turn of phrase.

There is hope you see. 

It sometimes takes silence. It always takes the skill of listening. Paul says that "There is a better way" when we "seek the things that are above". The ministry of reconciliation has been entrusted to us, according to Paul.~2 Corinthians 5:18. Jesus blessed the peacemakers.~Matthew 5:9. The dangers of these ministries are well documented. And while it is clear to me which of the two presidential candidates more faithfully represents Gospel values, I believe that what is even more important than my conviction is finding the pathway to peace and the route to reconciliation. 

Now that all the hoopla of the political conventions is over, a moment of prayerful silence is in order. After all, “silence is the guardian of charity”. And if we are to make our way back to a viable Golden Age of democracy we’ll need to learn to how to hold conversation. Such a discipline will require all the spiritual resources we can muster. 

May God grant us each a part to play in this sacred and holy ministry.

In the Name of God, the Most Holy, Undivided, and Everlasting Trinity. Amen.

Fr Paul

For God Alone My Soul in Silence Waits

For God Alone My Soul in Silence Waits

Two of the Psalms that speak most closely to my soul are Psalms 62 and 63

You too may listen to the Silence and hear God speak in your heart.

62  Nonne Deo?
 
1 For God alone my soul in silence waits; *
    from him comes my salvation.
 
2 He alone is my rock and my salvation, *
    my stronghold, so that I shall not be greatly shaken.
 
3 How long will you assail me to crush me,
all of you together, *
    as if you were a leaning fence, a toppling wall?
 
4 They seek only to bring me down from my place of honor; *
    lies are their chief delight.
 
5 They bless with their lips, *
    but in their hearts they curse.
 
6 For God alone my soul in silence waits; *
    truly, my hope is in him.
 
7 He alone is my rock and my salvation, *
    my stronghold, so that I shall not be shaken.
 
8 In God is my safety and my honor; *
    God is my strong rock and my refuge.
 
9 Put your trust in him always, O people, *
    pour out your hearts before him, for God is our refuge.




Psalm 62   page 669 and 670 in the Book of Common Prayer.


10 Those of high degree are but a fleeting breath, *
    even those of low estate cannot be trusted.
 
11 On the scales they are lighter than a breath, *
    all of them together.
 
12 Put no trust in extortion;
in robbery take no empty pride; *
    though wealth increase, set not your heart upon it.
 
13 God has spoken once, twice have I heard it, *
    that power belongs to God.
 
14 Steadfast love is yours, O Lord, *
    for you repay everyone according to his deeds.
 
  63  Deus, Deus meus
 
1 O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; *
    my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you,
    as in a barren and dry land where there is no water.
 
2 Therefore I have gazed upon you in your holy place, *
    that I might behold your power and your glory.
 
3 For your loving-kindness is better than life itself; *
    my lips shall give you praise.
 
4 So will I bless you as long as I live *
    and lift up my hands in your Name.
 
5 My soul is content, as with marrow and fatness, *
    and my mouth praises you with joyful lips,
 
6 When I remember you upon my bed, *
    and meditate on you in the night watches.
 
7 For you have been my helper, *
    and under the shadow of your wings I will rejoice.

8 My soul clings to you; *
    your right hand holds me fast.
 
9 May those who seek my life to destroy it *
    go down into the depths of the earth;
 
10 Let them fall upon the edge of the sword, *
    and let them be food for jackals.
 
11 But the king will rejoice in God;
all those who swear by him will be glad; *
    for the mouth of those who speak lies shall be stopped.

Take time to be Holy

Tuesday in Holy Week. If ever there were a time to be holy, this would be it.

Take Time to Be Holy

Take time to be holy,
speak oft with thy Lord;
abide in him always,
and feed on his word.
Make friends of God's children,
help those who are weak,
forgetting in nothing
his blessing to seek.

Take time to be holy,
the world rushes on;
spend much time in secret
with Jesus alone.
By looking to Jesus,
like him thou shalt be;
thy friends in thy conduct
his likeness shall see.

Take time to be holy,
let him be thy guide,
and run not before him,
whatever betide.
In joy or in sorrow,
still follow the Lord,
and, looking to Jesus,
still trust in his word.

Take time to be holy,
be calm in thy soul,
each thought and each motive
beneath his control.
Thus led by his spirit
to fountains of love,
thou soon shalt be fitted
for service above.

   ~A Mennonite Hymn

Silence: The Perfect Place for God

Silent Night

Holy Night

Good evening and Merry Christmas to you! My name is Paul Bresnahan and I come to you as an ordained Episcopal Priest, now celebrating 41 years of ordained service in the church. I have served congregations in the Diocese of Massachusetts, Ohio, South Carolina, West Virginia and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Cindy and I returned to our native Boston area. I have retired three times and now your vestry and I have agreed to a three month time of coverage. So now I am now working on my fourth retirement. I’ve been a rector, a priest in charge, an interim, but this is now the first time I’ve been a “bridge priest”. I suppose if you live long enough, you’ll see just about everything!

We come to Christmas Eve, my favorite service of the year. This is Christmas, literally the Mass of the Nativity of the Christ Child. We celebrate the birth of a child born to an unwed mother, and in a family of modest means. He is born in a stable where the animals surround him, shepherds come to visit, Wise Men begin their journey and heaven and nature sings “Peace on Earth and Goodwill to all.” Here and now in the darkest time of the year the Light of the World dawns upon us in its most vulnerable form.

And the event evokes in us such love and such devotion as to move our hearts in ways any birth of any child moves us. But this is the Holy Child, this is the Mother mild, this is the Holy Family. And so we sing “Silent Night, Holy Night” as radiant beams from heaven afar warm us all.  Often when we sing these song, tears of joy and tears of sorrow so deep begin to fall for some because this Silent Night, this Holy Night touches the deepest part of our souls.

It sure does me, and not just because I’m a sentimental Irishman. This is because of the fact that in the bleak mid winter of my eighth year to heaven, my dad died. There is no easy way to say that. It was on December 27th 1953. That’s 60 years ago this Christmas. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was difficult to understand for an eight year old. It was the signature moment of my early life.

I do remember praying to the silence at night as I listened to the bells toll out the hours from St. John’s Church in Cambridge or as the trolleys along Mass Avenue squealed steel wheels upon steel rails...there were trolleys tin those days. And so it was that I prayed to the silence long into the night and often cried myself to sleep, recognizing increasingly day after day that I would never see my dad again. There were those who said that he couldn’t go to heaven because he didn’t go to church. And so it was that I began to wonder; “Not only will I not see my dad again in this life, neither will I see him in the next.” Some Christians could be awfully mean I thought then, some still are.

On the other hand there was my grandmother; a woman of enormous faith, compassion and love. She sent me to church with a coin to put in the collection plate. It was the most beautiful place I had ever seen in my life. Much like this holy place, there were stained glass windows, beautifully hand carved wood, a choir with the sound of angels, and the magnificent literature of the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. I fell in love with the church then and there. They did ask me to say “Our Father who art in heaven.” I looked high into the clerestory of that magnificent church and could not see my father or Our Father. But there was something about being there that made me mindful of God, of Jesus and what they called the Holy Ghost. That one spooked me a bit, but I was only a child.

In the meantime I prayed to the silence at night. My mom would have me kneel by my bedside and say a prayer that went; “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake....” Egad, not only my dad, now you’r talking about my own last moments and I’ve hardly just begun to live. And so it went night after night; Silent Night after Silent night. By the way Cindy and I changed the language of that prayer; “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. Guard me Jesus through the night, and wake me with the morning light.”

But then one day on my way home from church one very sunny and beautiful day, I found myself sauntering along by an old and shabby city hedge. I mindlessly pulled a solitary leaf off that hedge and pressed my thumb into its girth. As I looked down at the green chlorophyll that now found itself stain my thumb nail, I “heard” something in my heart that seemed to say something. I heard no voice, but there was something like a sense that moved inside the deepest place of my heart. Whatever or Whoever it was that moved in my heart at that moment changed my life, because in the total silence the still small voice said; “Don’t you know there’s a special place in My heart for your dad?”

I stopped dead in my tracks, and gave voice to the sense that spoke deep within. I said it right out loud; “Don’t you know that there’s a special place in My heart for your dad?” My whole being shuddered, my heart raced with excitement and I ran home as fast as I could, burst into the front door, and bounded into the kitchen where my grandmother was busy at here cast iron skillet she called her spider, peppering up something good to eat. 

“Ma”, I said, “is there really a God?

“Of course there is”; a pretty straight forward question and answer that was.

“Ma, is there a heaven?”

Now somewhat irritated, after all she was in the press of providing for the family meal, hardly a time for the pursuit of theology but she did say; “Of course there is”. 

So I dared ask this question; “Ma, is my daddy there?” I knew that I was taking my chances with a question like this. After all, more than once she said that it was the Irish who ruined Boston. Especially in the aftermath of the divorce, my mom has her issues with my dad. So did my grandmother. She did hesitate, I must tell you, but what she did then became an unforgettable moment for me. 

She knelt down and held me close. She folded my head into the nape of her neck and she said; “Of course he is” Even now it is as though I can still smell the scent of her hair, the kind of “odor of God” the Christian mystics write about of their encounters with the Divine . 

Now when I went to bed at night the silence became a Presence. That Presence became Someone I could pour my heart out to. In time I learned that that the Presence had a Name. God, my creator, my dad’s creator, the creator of all that is visible and invisible. The Presence had a Name; Jesus, the savior of the whole world...of all who would turn to him and love him who first loved us. The Presence had a Name; The Holy Spirit, the Holy Wisdom from on High, the gift giver of all that is good and noble and true and pure. 

Now the Silent Night became the Holy Night. I gave myself body and soul to the Holy Trinity. For me this was no doctrine but my living Companion. And as I bound myself to the strong Name of the Holy Trinity day after day, Holy Night after Holy Night, I became a man who from my boyhood wanted to be a priest of the church.

I wanted to stand at the Altar of God and in the pulpit and tell all who wanted to hear, and many who didn’t that there’s a special place in God’s heart for you, each and every one of you, of all those you love both in this life and in the life to come in the ever nearer Presence of God.

So Merry Christmas! God be with you and may you be with God this Holy Night; this Silent Night. It is a joy to be with you tonight in this very, very sacred space. May God bless us everyone.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Fr Paul