deep prayer is not about a physically silent environment, but about the Loving Communion that is Silence itself, and Silence itself is deeper than the presence or absence of sound waves.

any concept that attempts to define God “becomes an idol of God and does not make God known.”

the opposite of the contemplative life is not the active life but the reactive life: highly habituated emotional styles and lifestyles that keep us constantly reacting to life like victimizing victims, ever more convinced that the videos that dominate and shape our awareness are in fact true.

silence does much more than simply tiptoe around; its essence has little to do with the absence of sound waves. For Silence has no opposite. Its embrace is wide and generous enough to receive all, both sound and the absence of sound.

For us to move deeply into God’s deep movement in us, “whose margins are God’s margins,” as R. S. Thomas puts it, the senses must learn to abide in stillness.

ideally we nourish our bodies every day and so likewise we should nourish our spirit.

To get caught up in a buzzing commentary on how irritating the noise is makes for a noisy relationship with noise.

I have not met one dedicated person of prayer who walks a very dry, dark path who does not embody many of the cardinal and theological virtues, as well as many of the gifts of the Holy Spirit.13 By contrast I know many who have had quite explicit contemplative experiences yet have not integrated these experiences into a life of living faith and lov

Contemplation is the soul’s Copernican revolution.