Daily Images of God--Lent 2022
Day 17
March 18
SILENCE
“The priest shook his head wildly, putting both fingers into his ears. But the voice of Feirreira together with the groaning of the Christians broke mercifully in. Stop! Stop! Lord, it is now that you should break the silence. you must not remain silent. Prove that you are justice, that you are goodness, that you are love. You must say something to show that you are the august one.
“A great shadow passed over his soul like that of the wings of a bird flying over the mast of a ship. The wings of the bird now brought to his mind the memory of the various ways in which the Christians had died. At that time, too, God had been silent… Why is God continually silent while those groaning voices go on?” --From the novel Silence, by Shusako Endo.
“Elijah came there to a cave, where he took shelter. But the word of Yahweh came to him: Why are you here, Elijah? He answered, “I have been most zealous for Yahweh, God of the heavenly armies. But the Israelites have abandoned your covenant. They have demolished your altars and murdered your prophets by the sword. I alone remain, and they are trying to kill me.” Then Yahweh said: Go out and stand on the mountain before Yahweh. Yahweh will pass by you. There arose a mighty, violent wind that broke the mountains and crushed the rocks in Yahweh’s presence—but Yahweh was no longer in the wind; after the wind, an earthquake—but Yahweh was no longer in the earthquake; after the earthquake, fire—but Yahweh was no longer in the fire; but after the fire, there was only the sound of sheer silence. When he heard it, Elijah hid his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. A voice said to him, ‘Why are you here, Elijah?’” (1 Kings 19:9-13; The Ashland Bible)
“Emptiness is only a disguise for an intimacy of God’s, that God’s silence, the eerie stillness, is filled by the Word without words, by Him who is above all names, by Him who is all in all. And his silence is telling us that He is here.”
— Karl Rahner, SJ
Image: Mount Horeb and Saint Catherine's Monastery.
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