The Quality of Silence

Normally my posts here are addressed to a Quaker audience.   Recently talking to someone I had just met about the silence in Meeting for Worship, I realized I had something to write to those who are trying to figure out online what Quakerism is like and if it is something they want to explore further.

My tag line says I am an unprogrammed Friend.   What does that mean?  Quakerism like many other churches has had splits – the first and most significant split was between programmed and unprogrammed Friends,  or between having a minister and not having a minister.   Unprogrammed Friends (those is Friends General Conference, in Friends Conservative and truth be told almost all Independent yearly meetings) keep an hour of silence for worship as did George Fox, the founder of Quakerism, and the Valient 60 – those original Quakers that spread the new born religion.

Throughout my life when I have told someone in conversation that the format of my weekly church service is an hour of silence the most common response is amazed disbelief.   At least some state “that would be very hard”.   Others inquire about the purpose of the silence.  I explain that Friends  believe that in the silence we wait to hear God’s voice, that God can and will speak to us directly.  (that we do not need an intermediator as in so many religions.)  

This belief comes directly from the original opening of George Fox:  “But as I had forsaken the priests, so I left the Separate preachers also, and those called the most experienced people; for I saw there was none among them all that could speak to my condition. And when all my hopes in them and in all men were gone, so that I had nothing outwardly to help me, nor could I tell what to do; then, oh! then I heard a voice which said, 'There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition': and when I heard it, my heart did leap for joy. ...and this I knew experimentally. My desires after the Lord grew stronger, and zeal in the pure knowledge of God, and of Christ alone, without the help of any man, book, or writing. For though I read the Scriptures that spake of Christ and of God, yet I knew Him not, but by revelation, as He who hath the key did open, and as the Father of Life drew me to His Son by His Spirit. Then the Lord gently led me along, and let me see his love, which was endless and eternal, surpassing all knowledge that men have in the natural state, or can get by history or books; and that love let me see myself, as I was without Him. I was afraid of all company, for I saw them perfectly where they were, through the love of God, which let me see myself.”

So we sit in the silence and we wait to hear God’s voice and sometimes those hearing a message receive an inward prompting that the message is for sharing and they are moved to (stand and) share it.   Depending upon the size of a Meeting there maybe between 1 message or 6.  It is called a “popcorn” meeting when too many messages are given.  This phrase also implies that as a group we did not ground and so there was a lot of popping up and speaking, but not from spirit!  It is also possible that there are no messages given.  No messages could be just , or it represent a failure equal to the popcorn meeting for the group to ground in spirit.

Which brings me to the subject of this post: the quality of silence.   On one level we think of all silence as the same –the simple absence of noise.   Someone told me there is a language (don’t recall which) that had multiple words for snow:  snow that has just fallen, snow that is crunchy, snow that is slushy, snow that is powery, snow that is old and dirty, etc.   Certainly how many words we have says something about the cultures focus upon that which it names in so many ways.   Apparently English speaking cultures do not pay much attention to silence because we have only one word for it and yet there are many kinds of silence.   For example outside of worship think of an akward silence.   Oh yes we have all had that experience!  Think also of board silence and think of silence in nature alive with crickets or birds but also almost the sound of a branch falling.  Think of the angry silence.   And think of the rich silence that you can go into as a respite and refuge – a place of dreams, reflection and imagination. 

So the quality of silence in worship also varies greatly.  Recently I drove away from my Meeting with a Quaker who was visiting from another Meeting.   She told me that she was drawn to my Meeting because she had experience very good vocal ministry at my Meeting.  There had been none that morning, and so I said:  “Normally we have about 3 message but recently we have had a lot of dead silence.”  She understood immediately what I meant and we began to talk about the difference between a dead silence and a living silence.  For me the dead silence comes when most of the members of the Meeting for worship are not centering – when the main activity in the room is people making to do lists in their brain, fighting inside their head with their boss or their spouse, or daydreaming or problem solving.    We all probably need to do that sort of thing sometimes (That is what the drive to Meeting is for??) but it is not what Meeting for worship is for.  It is certainly not the case that all messages do come from spirit as suppose to be the case.   Quaker’s have jokes about the NYTimes message – which refers to the person who read the paper before coming and feels compelled to make commentary on current events.  There are also Friends who are known for speaking to frequently who compulsively feel the need to fill the silence and may speak almost every week with or without anything to say!

But a Living Silence is an entirely other thing:  it is a silence so rich and so centered and grounded that it is palpable to all but the spiritually dead and can be completely fulfilling even if no message is ever given.  “How interesting” the person I was telling this to said “and the place you listen from that you can discern the difference between a living and a dead silence”.

Out of a living silence can come what Friends call a covered meeting or a gathered meeting (both short for covered by Spirit or gathered in God).   In this living silence the Presence of the Holy One is so palpable that both with or without words, we can feel our connection to each othe,r and we can speak effortlessly to each other’s inward condition.  At its best I liken this living silence to a symphony where different instruments come in at different moments, sounding different notes through the unique resonace which is their instrument, and yet together they create one song, one body of work, one amazing harmony.   While on face value the messages are on different topics, one may discern none-the-less a sort of theme that runs throughout.  This is my finest experience of Quaker Meeting for worship.   In such meeting for worship it is not uncommon that at least some are moved to tears. 

Friends have the saying: “This Friend speaks my mind” which is for use in Meeting for business to indicate that one agrees with the previous speaker and thus avoid the trap of speaking simply to re-emphasize a point.   However this saying goes well also for the experience in a really Gathered Meeting where a message can speak deeply to one’s condition, or even saying what one was going to say.   I have very literally had the experience of asking in silent prayer for guidance from God and having someone rise a few minutes later in worship and give a message that I knew was the answer I had asked for!

“So what” a despairing Friend has asked me, “are we to do about a Meeting where there is repeated dead silence?”  To me that is what we have religious ed, Ministry and Worship, or Ministry and Oversite for (various names for committees in different Meetings which do the same work.)  If Meetings are becoming uncentered, it is time to spend some time in worship sharing during second hour, or to study Quaker history, or to have discussion about spiritual practice….in short it is time to stoke the fires of our collective spirit life!

It is also time to tell the truth to each other about the current spiritual condition of our Meeting.  I remember many years ago when my Meeting was writing its’ annual state of the Meeting report my suggesting we add the sentence “We have been going through a period of spiritual dryness”.   Oh my goodness the dirty looks I got and objections that this was not true.  Despite our Quaker commitment to integrity it is apparently hard for us to tell the truth sometimes about our dry spells.  I shortly thereafter went on M&W and addressed the issue that way.   So it is possible to return to a Living Silence through many means.