We collect data, things, people, ideas, 'profound experiences,' never penetrating any of them . . . But there are other times. There are times when we stop. We sit still. We lose ourselves in a pile of leaves or its memory. We listen and breezes from a whole other world begin to whisper.
~ James Carroll, in SILENCE AND SOLITUDE, edited by Eileen Campbell
Those who are learned love to talk about what they know; and as they know much, they talk much. Yet to hear God, they must LISTEN. The learned often make a storage room of their mind, where so much is stored that there is no room left for God to enter and dwell in it ... The learned like to argue for the sake of arguing. It becomes a game, and in the end they love the argument and miss the opportunity to hear God.