The wisdom of silence

Especially in these toxic days when we hear a lot of noise in talkshows and in the field of politics, where we are bombarded with all sorts of wrangling, bashing, and slamming, it's good to revisit the indispensable role of silence in our life so we can recover our proper bearing in this world that seems to be spinning fast to self-destruction.

Silence actually speaks volumes, a lot more than all the ideas, words, theories, and opinions we can produce. If it is the silence of God, of Christ before Pilate and Herod, then we have the silence that is the best response to all the clacking around.

It is the silence that indicates that one is willing to suffer and even die for whatever, because no matter what we say or do, the world will always be in its erratic ways, and it will only take the death of Christ to resolve everything, a death that leads to his resurrection.

That is why we are told to be patient, to deny ourselves and to carry our daily cross. These are no defeatist divine indications. They contain a lot of wisdom that goes beyond the wisdom of the flesh, the wisdom of the world and of the devil who is the father of lies.

We need to see to it that we keep a firm grip on our emotions. When not guided and inspired by faith, our emotions get easily provoked and can open the gates for pride to come pouring in and dominating us. And we end up with a worse scenario.

Silence can be an expression of great strength, the strength of Christ himself who was willing to suffer for the sins of men in order to deliver death to our sins and conquer them with his resurrection.

We should always be guided by our faith, and more specifically, by the example of Christ, especially in his passion, death and resurrection where we can see the victory of silence over the shouts of the people, "Crucify him, crucify him!"

We have to spend time meditating on this Paschal Mystery of Christ because that is the key that opens the gate of true wisdom. There we will see that evil is properly responded with goodness, anger and hatred with calmness, meekness and humility. There we will see that shouts, screams and all sorts of noise are properly responded with silence.

If we respond evil with evil, anger with anger, then we would just be acting out the primitive Law of Talion of eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, that would only lead us to kill one another, or at least leave us all blind and toothless. Rather, we have to follow what St. John of the Cross once said: "Where there is no love, put love. And you will find love." We should just focus on proclaiming the truth and all good values without engaging in bitter discussions that can attract a lot of unwelcome guests.

The meditation of the Paschal Mystery lays to rest the deceptive reasoning of our flesh, the world and the devil. It gives us the global picture of things, broadening our vision and deepening our understanding of things. It shows us the finer points of charity and bridges the gap between our sinful world and our true definitive home in heaven with God our Father.

We should never underestimate the importance and necessity of silence in our life!

‘We should never underestimate the importance and necessity

of silence in our life.’