Toronto graffiti, August 2015. Photo by Pádraig Ó Tuama
Psalm 46:10 Be still [relax grip, let go], and know that I am God.
Luke 5:16 But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.
Mark 1:35 Very early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.
[ if Jesus needed this rhythm in his life, and did it, how much more do we? - Prh ]
Pausing and being still enough to notice love within and around is a deeply powerful and countercultural act…. In the case of most of contemporary society, stillness is a prophetic act, defying that which demands that we move quickly and move upward. It challenges the notion that it is better to be busy and occupied. It refuses the call to be constantly distracted and perpetually plugged in. —–charles lattimore howard
You walk, and one day you enter the spread heart of silence, where lands dissolve and seas become vapor and ices sublime under unknown stars. This is the end of the Via Negativa, the lightless edge where the slopes of knowledge dwindle, and love for its own sake, lacking an object, begins. —- Annie Dillard, from An Expedition to the Pole, from Teaching a Stone to Talk [ this quote remembers Annie Dillard, who passed from this earth that she witnessed so well, September 15th, 2026; and who taught us to practice stillness, silence, and awareness in solitude and meet the ever-present outspoken ebullient Creator there. - Prh ]
Presence is experienced in a participative way, not by thinking about it. The mind, by nature, is intent on judging, controlling, and analyzing instead of seeing, tasting, and loving. This is exactly why the mind cannot be present or live in the naked now. The mind wants a job and believes that its job is to process things by its own criteria. The key to stopping this obsessive game is, quite simply, peace, silence, or stillness. Silence is God’s primary language; everything else is a poor translation. The silence of the Creator is thunderous, drowning out everything else, and hiding in endless creativity. —- Attentiveness to Silence & Presence from Fr. Thomas Keating, from Out of a Stone.
Be quiet enough to find that God has already found us… strip away the distractions, so that God already looks out of our own eyes and gazes at us. -—Silence: from Martin Laird’s into the Silent Land
Solitude well practiced will break the power of busyness, haste, isolation, and loneliness. You will see that the world is not on your shoulders after all. You will find yourself, and God will find you in new ways. Silence also brings Sabbath to you. It completes solitude, for without it you cannot be alone. Far from being a mere absence, silence allows the reality of God to stand in the midst of your life. God does not ordinarily compete for our attention. In silence we come to attend. ---The Great Omission, Dallas Willard
Sabbath is a ‘palace outside of time’; [ in attending a space for sabbath rest and stillness, we are ] welcoming a bride, companioning it… —Abraham Joshua Heschel
Without solitude, it is virtually impossible to live the spiritual life.--- Henri Nouwen Making All Things New, pg. 69
Silence is so accurate. ---Mark Rothko
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