I have been blessed over the years to visit the Trappist community at the Abbey of the Genesee in Piffard, N.Y. - to take time to enjoy the counsel, peace, quiet and solitude they offer. I have shared some of the spiritual insight I have been blessed to receive during my retreats there. Here is one example.
But I have not been able to get there as often as I would like. In between visits, I have treasured a homily given by Father Justin Sheehan, OCSO in 2008. I received his permission to share it with you. May God use it to stir your hearts and souls.
By the way, the next best thing to visiting this special place in person is to do so online. Missing their Monks' Bread and other delights? Fear not! You can have them sent directly to your home with a click of a button or two. Check them out. They would appreciate your support.Now for Father's Homily:
Silence and Solitude
– Homily by Father Justin Sheehan, OCSO, Abbey at Genesee: August
10, 2008
Every human life has a religious
dimension, something in us that responds to the overwhelming presence of
God. The context is different for
everyone, but also there is something in common. We heard Elijah spent the night alone on
Horeb, the mountain
of God, and that Jesus
went up into the hills by himself to pray.
They seem to have felt a call to meet God, and knew that God can only be
met in solitude.
It might seem that this solitude
can’t be experienced by ordinary people living outside the monastery. Somehow we think that we precede God in
solitude, but actually it is God who waits for us as he waits for Elijah to
reach the mountain
of God, he waits for
Jesus to go up into the hills, and Jesus waits for Peter to come to him across
the water. In finding God, each of these
people found solitude, because true solitude is Spirit, like “the sound of a
gentle breeze”. True solitude lies not in the absence of other people but in
the presence of God.
When we place our lives face to
face with God, and surrender our lives to him, all at once we find ourselves in
the land of solitude and at home in it. Solitude is wherever our soul encounters
God, as Elijah did on Horeb, and Jesus in the hills. A sure sign that it is God whom we encounter
in solitude is that the experience leaves us calm and steady. Elijah simply went out and stood at the
entrance of the cave. Jesus calmly
walked across the waters. The experience of God in solitude is an individual
experience, but it is not an isolating one.
It leaves us radically at one with the entire human family, our own
flesh and blood, descended from Adam and Eve, and each of whom is an image of
Christ, the human face of God.
There is no solitude without
silence. Silence sometimes means keeping
quiet; but always it means listening. As
the psalm this morning puts it, “I will hear what the Lord God has to say”. There can be an absence of noise, but if
there is no listening to what the Lord God has to say, then it does not count
as silence. And a day full of noise and
people’s voices can be a day of silence if the noise becomes for us an echo of
the presence of God, “a voice that speaks of peace”.
When we speak just about
ourselves and on our own initiative, we leave the land of silence behind
us. But when we repeat with our lips
what the Lord God has to say to us in the depths of our hearts, then silence is
not broken. St. Paul did not break silence when speaking
about the Jewish people, because he spoke from the solitude of his soul where
God dwelt and his words were charged with life.
St. Peter did not break silence because
his words were a prayer: “Lord, if it is you, tell me to come to you across the
water”. Silence is not like a deer that disappears at the least little sound.
It’s like an eagle soaring in the air, flying high above earthquakes and fire
and storms on the lake.
The way to reach the mountain of God, the land of solitude and silence,
is Jesus Christ, who is himself in the presence of God. He says to us what he said to Peter, “Come.”
Let us hear what the Lord has to say, and come to eat his Body and drink his
Blood. This is the only food that can
make us more sensitive to the presence of God, and able to hear his voice among
all the noises of the earth. And when
our ears no longer hear any earthly noise, may we recognize the voice of the
eternal Word, saying to us, “Courage! It is I!”
(Photos©Michael Seagriff)
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