TEN OBSERVATIONS ABOUT CATHOLICISM FOR THOSE NEW TO CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICE (5 of 10) 

The language of God is silence; the language of contemplative practice (Trappist) is silence, solitude, work, prayer, and community. My energy for the silence I need to wait for God to respond comes from God. I must learn to speak God’s language (not any earthly language). Words are important in communication with God because Christ, being human, taught us how to pray and showed us that our earthly life overlaps with our spiritual life, which is only accessible through free will. Here is just one thought about contemplative practices (Trappist) that has helped put the interior life into perspective.

SILENCE IS THE LANGUAGE OF GOD, ONE THAT IS AN AQUIRED SKILL

Contemplative practices, especially the one I follow, Cistercian practices and charisms, as I understand them, have five core aims for monks, nuns, and Lay Cistercians: silence, solitude, work, prayer, and community.

Being a Lay Cistercian, my focus is on placing myself in a condition where I can speak to God. But, what language does God (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) use to speak to me as I try to stay grounded in that upper room of my inner self? (Matthew 6:5) I call that waiting for Christ to show up. Even when he does show up, do I know the language of silence that God uses to communicate with me?

To do this takes work and a lifetime of trying. I must abandon everything I know and, in humility and obedience, wait for silence to overshadow me.

To get ready to wait for the Lord, there are two ways I look at silence, solitude, prayer, work, and community.

THE KINGDOM OF THE EARTH –– This earthly dimension is like the heads of a coin to the tails of the kingdom of God on earth (and later on in heaven). When I use the word silence, I can think of trying to go into a bathroom where no phones or people are interrupting; it could mean physical and mental silence, but there is another level of silence, one that is in the sanctuary of our hearts, that upper room of my inner self.

THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN ON EARTH WHILE I LIVE AND LATER ON IN HEAVEN AFTER I DIE.

Because of my baptism and thus adopted son (daughter) of the Father, when I use the term “Silence”, I add the dimension of that second citizenship, the kingdom of heaven on earth (and its fulfillment later on in heaven).

• Trying to pick up the whispers of God in Lectio Divina, Eucharist, Rosary, Stations of the Cross, and Sacrament of Penance requires work, not only belief. It may take me years to gradually learn and practice what it means to be a Catholic, using the silence of The Cistercian Way, only to find that each day I do not wait for the Lord to come into my heart now, I can become a recidivist and resort to my earthly self. It’s a struggle.
• Silence for me is not only a refrain from talking but purposefully placing myself in the presence of God, first through my Morning Offering of the day to the Father, through Christ, to be present to the Holy Spirit, in all I think, do, or do not do.
• Silence requires discipline and a strict form of Catholicism. Eucharist is not an end in itself, but allows me to consciously bring Christ into my temple of the Holy Spirit. It is a meal shared with others, all with the same purpose, to give glory to the Father through Christ. This is not a memorial meal but “real food and real drink”, but for that kingdom of heaven on earth, not for the body.
• Silence can be fleeting if I don’t have the strength and endurance to sustain that link that yearns to listen for the whispers of God. Original Sin, that great corruptor of spirituality, fights to have its own way by throwing distractions, factions, gossip, coveting my neighbor’s wife, and goods.
• There seem to be two types of Christians (I am presupposing sincerity in both);
• The first type says, “Christ is responsible with his grace and whatever I do, I should ‘sin bravely” when I fail, because I am certain the grace of God saves me. All I need to do is believe.
• The second type says: Jesus saved and sanctified me with his death on the cross, but I must be like Christ and bear responsibility for my actions. God doesn’t save me from my mistakes, but gives me the tools (Eucharist and Penance) so I can take up my unique cross and follow Him once more. I am responsible for my sins after baptism and will give an account to God after my death. If I deny God, even if I was religious during my lifetime, God judges me on that. If I don’t deny God, then I follow the path of the cross in my lifetime of struggle to keep Christ as my center. God does not take away my free will and assume the responsibility for my poor choices. God does give me the grace to try to overcome the onslaughts of the Devil, couched in human weaknesses as they are.
• Silence is a process of success and failure, but I need to be in the presence of God and abandon myself to whatever the Holy Spirit has for me this day.
• Being Catholic means I carry the cross daily.

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