Not only does silence give us a chance to understand ourselves better, to get a truer and more balanced perspective on our own lives in relation to the lives of others: silence makes us whole if we let it. Silence helps draw together the scattered and dissipated energies of a fragmented existence.
–Thomas Merton (1915-1968)
When we desire to commune with God to strengthen our souls for combat in the battles of life, we can close our eyes. When we have done that, we have closed the “doors” of our senses. We have for a few moments closed out the world around us. Now..it is dark, and if we are quiet and become aware of this silence in our souls, we suddenly realize He is there.
–Mother Angelica (1923-2016)
Listen in silence because if your heart is full of other things you cannot hear the voice of God.
–Saint Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997)
Before you speak, it is necessary for you to listen; for God speaks in the silence of the heart.
–Saint Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997)
As an audience maintains silence to hear better the voice of an orator, as music lovers keep silence during a symphony to admire its artistic beauty, so the silence of contemplation is nothing other than the indispensable condition for hearing the voice of God and addressing to Him our heartfelt words.
–Luis M. Martinez (1881-1956)
If we want to attain silence in the interior of our hearts, we ought to begin by investigating the causes of the clamor within us. Ordinarily there are two causes of interior noise: the imagination and the heart. How often it happens that we enter the presence of Jesus to converse sweetly with Him, and then the imagination begins to skip around, carrying us hither and thither… At other times, the source of the din is in the heart. Except in cases of abnormal agitation, the imagination never produces the clamor that the heart produces. When we are under the stress of some particular emotion, such as love, fear, desire, or anger, we cannot compose our spirit; our soul seems like a city full of noise.
–Luis M. Martinez (1881-1956)
