SILENCE – Our Wordy World

Over the last few decades we have been inundated by a torrent of words. Whenever we go we are surrounded by words: words softly whispered, loudly proclaimed, or angrily screamed; words spoken, recited, or sung; words on records, in books, on walls, or in the sky; words in many sounds, many colours, or many forms, words to be heard, read, seen or glanced at, words which flickers off and on, move slowly, dance, jump, wiggle. Words, words, words! They form the floor, the walls, and the ceiling of our existence.

It has not always been this way, There was a time not too long ago without radios and televisions, stop signs, yield signs, merge signs, bumper stickers, and the ever-present announcements indicating price increase or special sales. There was a time without the advertisements which now cover whole cities with words.

All this is to suggest words, my own included, have lost their creative power. Their limitless multiplication has made us lose confidence in words and caused us to think, more often than not, “They are just words.”

Teachers speak to students for six, twelve, eighteen and sometimes twenty four years. But the students often emerge from the experience with the feeling, “They were just words.” Preachers preach their sermons week after week and year after year. But their parishioners remain the same and often think, “They are just words.” Politicians, businessmen, ayatollahs and popes give speeches and make statements “in season and out of seasons,” but those who listened say: “They are just words… just another distraction.”

The result of this is the main function of the word, which is communication, is no longer realized. The word no longer communicates, no longer fosters communion, no longer create community, and therefore no longer gives life. The word no longer offers trustworthy ground on which people can meet each other and build society.

One day Archbishop Theophilus came to the desert to visit Abba Pambo. But Abba Pambo did not speak to him. When the brethren finally said to Pambo, “Father, say something to the archbishop, so that he may be edified.” He replied: “If he is not edified by my silence, he will not be edified by my speech.”


The Way of the Heart – Connecting with God through Prayer, Wisdom and Silence by Henri M Nouwen