Sacred Silence

Homily for the First Sunday of Advent, Year A
Are you ready? There are only 23 shopping days left until Christmas! Are you ready?

Our lives today often seem to be a brief interlude between rushing and waiting. We rush to airports two hours before our flight leaves, only to wait in line; we hurry to take advantage of the pre-Christmas sales, and again wait in line to check out; we even rush around to get to Church, and then wait in long lines to receive the Eucharist. Especially for the next 23 days, our lives have the potential to be so busy that it just becomes one big blur. But the season of Advent calls us in a different direction. For the next 23 days, our Church calls us to step away from the hustle and bustle of the Christmas rush to slow down. For the next 23 days, our faith challenges us to spend more time waiting than rushing – to watch, to stay awake – preparing for the coming of Christ. The waiting that we do so often in our daily lives – in the doctor’s office, the grocery store line, and countless other places – the waiting that we are so used to out in the world becomes the basis of this season, and becomes holy. Advent is all about a holy waiting.

Now, I admit – that’s hard to do. Especially at this time of year when our minds are a-buzz with presents to buy and wrap, houses to decorate, and parties to plan or attend, it’s hard to silence our thoughts and wait for Christ. But that is all the more reason that we need to do it. Our Scriptures during this season give us great guides in our waiting, people like Isaiah, John the Baptist, and Mary. Our music this season is a bit more subdued – no Christmas carols yet, but instead the great songs of waiting, like O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, or The King Shall Come When Morning Dawns. But perhaps the greatest gift that the Church can give to us in these days is the opportunity to quiet our lives, to spend some time in prayerful silence.

For many of us, silence has become such a foreign concept that we’re not exactly sure what to do when we find everything around us quiet. But every time we gather for the Eucharist, the Church invites us to include periods of sacred silence throughout our liturgy. This is a special kind of silence – a silence that should lead to prayer and reflection. There is a short silence following each of the readings in the Liturgy of the Word, and a longer silence following the homily, to give us “an opportunity to take the word of God to heart and to prepare a response to it in prayer” (Lectionary for Mass: Introduction, 28). The silence after the homily is a chance for each of us to make the Scripture readings our own – to reflect on how the word of God speaks to our lives. That’s something that can’t be done in 10 or 15 seconds, it takes time. There is another lengthy silence following communion, but this time of quiet has a different purpose: this is a time for prayer, thanking God for the gift we have received in the Eucharist and asking for the strength to become a Eucharistic people. There are also some brief silences scattered throughout the liturgy, like after the priest says, “Let us pray,” to give everyone an opportunity to gather their thoughts and hearts into a spirit of prayer.

Our world is in desperate need of silence, and the sacred silence of the liturgy can be a gift – a gift to help us unite our own prayers to the prayers of the Church. Sacred silence can help us focus on God’s presence among us as we leave the buzz of the world outside. Throughout the year, but especially during these next 23 days of Christmas frenzy, sacred silence can calm our hearts so that we are ready to welcome Christ once more.