A new vision comes when I can stop looking into the blazing sun that blinds me, and I learn to focus more on deeper, more intimate and hidden beauties and light. It's then that I begin to feel a taste and a hunger for a new love and a new vision that calls me further on. It's then that I can begin to hear a quiet gentle voice within calling to me, inviting me, telling me that I have an immense value, because I am loved and wanted -- not for what I possess or what I have achieved, but simply for what I am. And what I am is this unique person, quite unlike anyone else, with my own story and my own very special light shining in my eyes. This uniqueness of mine comes from one source alone. It comes from the loving call to me by my name from the Author, the Creator and the End of my life. This is the road of your life and mine.
~ from A JOURNEY IN THE COMPANY OF GOD by Brother Andrew
What I find distinct about gratitude in the wilderness is its simplicity -- the thankfulness I feel here is for what I usually take for granted: my capacity to breathe, move and see ... For the most part, gratitude here wells up unexpectedly, in the quiet corners of the day, over events small and ordinary. Gratitude is the other side of dependence on God: to take anything for granted in the wilderness seems presumptuous, blasphemous. And so, here in these naves of vaulting stone, prayers of thanksgiving begin to edge out prayers of petition.
GREETINGS IN ABUNDANCE to all friends of Silence this harvest season! As we recollect the gifts of this year, may we also be mindful of the Source of our deepest blessings. Edith Stein, in "Thoughts", a compilation of some of her writings, reminds us of how every moment is to be a time for giving thanks:
In moments of solitude -- awareness enables the mind and spirit to focus through awe and wisdom on a world of indisputable loveliness -- and to evince its eternity ...
Each new season evokes a resurgence of new energy, a new beginning. We know that from the darkness and deep silence of earth life, there springs and flourishes that which flowers in beauty. When we plant bulbs in the Fall, we have faith that from that brown globe rooted in decay will come a creation so charged with beauty as to seem a veritable breath of God. And, we can trust that each of our fears and problems, rooted in God-soil deep within, will bring forth blossoms in due season.
Just as each new seed requires a period of gestation -- a time of deep silence and solitude -- so, too, we need such seasons. "Someone wrote me recently and asked if it wasn't frustrating to have exterior solitude interrupted. Well, you learn to live out of your interior solitude. And perhaps this is one of the keys to living in the madness, the telescoping demands and resulting exhaustion of our society: to explore our own interior solitude and learn not only to be afraid of it but to live out if its self-discipline, its limitless resources and deep silence. Solitude is like a tea ceremony, the celebration of life in all its homely movements taken out of time -- the wonder of the commonplace, the mystery of ordinary life ... Solitude is being poured-out-through. We evolve toward simplicity. We dwell in the Word."
The basic lesson in observing is in learning to really "listen". Unfortunately, most of us whenever we are engaged in conversation with others really only half listen. And when we visit the great outdoors and attempt to get in touch with the Creation of Mother Earth -- do we really try to listen to the messages that are being expressed either audibly or inaudibly therein? Probably not. In all these areas of communication perhaps we need to discipline ourselves to learn the art of truly listening. We each need to rediscover that if we fill the silence, we cannot hear the voice of God. Once we have learned to quiet down and "center in", then we can begin to hear the voices of Creation and also that still, small voice within which can only come through when we are earnestly creating an attitude of "silence".
~ from "The Gift of Silence" by Leslie Wilson in the July 1990 issue of "The Talking Stick" with thanks to Betty Fribance
The following prayer-poem was written by Ernest L. Brown III when he was a teenager many years ago. Our gratitude to Mrs. Fredi Brown, his mother, for sharing it with us:
A shah of Persia used to sit up at night for vigils and prayers. A friend who was visiting wondered at his long meditations after the whole day's work. "It is too much," he said, "you do not need so much prayer."
"Do not say so," was the answer. "You do not know. For at night I pursue God, and during the day God follows me."
