"Peace!" the angel announced. But peace is as much task as gift. Only if we become calm as earth, fluid as water, and blazing as fire will we able to rise to the task of peacemaking, and the air will stir with the rush of wings of angels arriving to help us. This is why I wish you that great inner stillness which alone allows us to speak, even today, without irony, of "peace on earth" and, without despair, to work for it.
~ Brother David Steindl-Rast, OSB, thanks to Toto Rendlen
Being silent means waiting, waiting for the Other to say something to us. Being silent before God means making room for God ... to breathe in the will of God, to listen attentively. The time of silence is a time of responsibility, of blessedness, because it is a time when we live in the peace of God. "For God alone my soul in silence waits."
~ from MEDITATING ON THE WORD by Dietrich Bonhoeffer