Holy Silence at Work

I mentioned Holy Silence in this week's Sunday thought. I want to cultivate Holy Silence this week - and that includes at work. But how to do it at work? Somehow "silence" and work seem opposed - at least much of the time.

An obvious example might be the time during one summer vacation in college when I worked the griddle during the breakfast shift in a company cafeteria: "Two eggs over medium, rye toast"..."Toasted corn muffin, hold the butter"..."No home fries with that please"...it started around 7 AM and continued until 9 AM - nonstop. How to cultivate Holy Silence?

Well, maybe these days it might be easier. I get to spend some time in my home office during the week, where I can keep things as quiet as I want. But is that really "Holy Silence"? Or is it just a quiet work environment?

So what is this "Holy Silence" and can we keep it at work?

If you're a monk you can. Indeed you must, even sometimes when you're at work. But most of us aren't monks, right?

How about us regular Catholics working at jobs "in the world"? We don't have times of strict silence at our jobs like those imposed during certain times of the day and night at monasteries. Yet Holy Silence can indeed play a role in our lives, even at work.

First of all, if you want to make progress in your spiritual life - and what good Catholic doesn't? - you should know that:

All writers on the spiritual life uniformly recommend, nay, command under penalty of total failure, the practice of silence. - Catholic Encyclopedia. 

Okay, so we want to make progress. Indeed some of us understand that - even at work - we can work on making progress in our spiritual lives. And it turns out that, yes, we can use "silence" even in the busiest work places. Here a couple of examples:

Start with the "perils of the tongue." Controlling your tongue - what you say - is a form of silence. The tongue is very powerful. And an unbridled tongue can cause great damage in the work place. Just think about gossip. That why St James says:

"If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man"

Govern your speech at work with moderation and charity and you're engaging in a form of Holy Silence.

Starting to get the idea?

So it would seem that a good place to start Holy Silence at work is by laying off the gossip. Then maybe we can move on to that saying, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." Okay, so "nice" is a bit namby-pamby. But you get the point, right?

There's a place for Holy Silence in the workplace, even for us non-monks.