The Fruit of Silence
St. Augustine famously wrote, “You have made us for yourself and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”
There is a restlessness that is built into our heart. Our hearts are unquiet. I remember when I went on a silent retreat at the Monastery in the Desert for the first time, I was so restless that first day. To sit in silence and have no noise, no distraction, no screens, just alone with my thoughts and the movements of my heart.
The French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”
To be alone with ourselves, with our thoughts, with our heart makes us uncomfortable. Let’s be real, sitting with our thoughts almost never seems like a good time. It can make us think about our failed relationships, it can make us remember all the mistakes we’ve made, or the problems we are struggling with, or we can think about all the difficult realities of the world and of human existence, it can even make you think about how one day your life will come to an end. It sounds like an easy way to ruin a perfectly good day right?
We rather think about the good things, stay positive, ignore those negative thoughts. We let our phones buzz with notifications, we can binge a new series, scroll through a social feed, a news feed or blast some music. We can fill our week with work, chores, yard work, with sports, with school, with social gatherings, just to avoid being alone.
And so our hearts continue to be restless and unquiet. The prophet Isaiah asks, “Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Hearken diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in fatness. Incline your ear, and come to me; hear, that your soul may live...” (Is 55:2-3a).
Jesus says to us today, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.”
Let me get a show of hands real quick… who here could use a little more peace in your life?... raise your hand?
So what does this have to do with sitting quietly in a room alone? What does it have to do with all of humanity’s problems? What on earth is Blaise Pascal talking about?
Well there’s another age-old adage in Latin that goes like this: Nemo dat quod non habet… “You can’t give what you do not have.” How can we give to the world peace? If we first do not have it in our lives? How can I give my family and children peace, if I first do not have peace in me?
Christ desires to give us his peace. It is not the peace of the world. But it is the peace that this world longs for and needs.
As our Pope Leo XIV said powerfully, “It is the peace of the risen Christ. A peace that is unarmed and disarming, humble and persevering. A peace that comes from God, the God who loves us all, unconditionally.”
Let me say this: when you finally are able to sit quietly alone in a room, at first you will feel restless, at first you will encounter all of those parts of you that are fallen and imperfect, you will also encounter a desire for love and fullness that no one you have met can fulfill, and this unfulfilled desire will make you frustrated and restless. But if you stay there, if you fight the temptation to just distract or numb that feeling, what you will find when you are there in the silence, is that you are not alone. That in the solitude and aloneness, there is a presence, a person, God who loves you unconditionally. His love, his Holy Spirit will come to you and dwell with you. He will be your companion, and His love will give you peace. St. Paul in the Letter to the Galatians reminds us: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Gal 5:22-23).
Brother and sisters, peace is not the absence of conflict… peace is fulfillment, completeness, justice, right order, health, life, prosperity, protection. Peace is the fruit of the Holy Spirit, it is something that God produces in individuals and in communities that abide in Him.
St. Teresa of Calcutta, also known as Mother Teresa, left her comfortable home and traveled to a Kolkata, India to live. Kolkata is filled with pollution, there are poor people on every curb and sidewalk of the city and it is dirty and smelly. Yet it is the place Mother Teresa and her sisters, the Missionaries of Charity, chose to call home.
Mother Teresa was a tiny, frail, Catholic nun in a white habit who spent her life tending to the poor, the sick and the dying in India and countries around the world. By the time she died in 1997, there were nearly 4,000 sisters in 610 missions in 123 countries around the world, not to mention the orphanages, schools and hospitals she started.
How did she do it? What was her secret? Well it turns out that the secret of her success was simple. She was committed to making a daily holy hour in adoration before Jesus in the Eucharist. She believed in the power of being silent and alone before the Lord each day. It was so important to her that she made all of her sisters join her every single day no matter how much work they had to do or how tired they were.
In a powerful speech in Philadelphia, she said:
“It has brought us so close to each other. To be able to live this life of vows, these four vows, we need our life to be woven with the Eucharist. That's why we begin our day with Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. With him, we go forward. And when we come back in the evening we have one hour of adoration before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and at this you will be surprised, that we have not had to cut down our work for the poor… It has brought us so close to each other. We love each other better, but I think we love the poor with greater and deeper faith and love.”
In another reflection she says:
“What will convert America and save the world? My answer is prayer. What we need is for every parish to come before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament in Holy Hours of prayer. On the Cross Jesus said “I thirst”. From the Blessed Sacrament Jesus continues to say to each of us “I thirst”. He thirsts for our personal love, our intimacy, our union with Him in the Blessed Sacrament. When the Sisters are exhausted, up to their eyes in work; when all seems to go awry, they spend an hour in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. This practice has never failed to bear fruit: they experience peace and strength.”
“The fruit of silence is prayer, the fruit of prayer is faith, the fruit of faith is love, the fruit of love is service and the fruit of service is peace.”
[WORDS TO GRADUATES]
A few words to the Senior Graduates. If you want to change the world, it starts by coming to Jesus in the Eucharist in silent adoration. If one Mother Teresa can have so much impact on the world, imagine what the world could look like if every one of you made the Eucharist the source of your life. Imagine the peace that would be unleashed into the world.
There’s a story of a priest who visited St. Teresa of Calcutta just to get her advice. He wanted to know how he was to live out his vocation well as a priest. And her response is simple: “Spend one hour a day in adoration of your Lord and never do anything you know is wrong, and you will be alright.”
I don’t think I can give you any advice better than Mother Teresa’s. You know how crazy the world can be, you see the problems that our society has, you feel the pressure of trying to find your place in it, and you’re hesistant to make a choice because you’re afraid of making the wrong one and ruining your life.
What’s the sure and tested way to survive in the world? “Spend one hour a day in adoration of your Lord and never do anything you know is wrong, and you will be alright.”
Today Graduates, I don’t want to just congratulate you. Today I want to commission you. I want to send you as missionaries out into the world. I ask that as you go out in our world, to be Missionaries of Peace. And not just any peace, but the peace of Christ.
I’ll end with a prayer that is pretty well known, but I want to pray it slowly so that the words can sink in a little deeper:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen.
