Did you ever notice how many Christmas carols focus on silence?
“Silent Night,” that most beloved and tender of yuletide lullabies, tells us in a simple way how “all is calm” and “all is bright” on the holy night of Christ’s birth.
“O Little Town of Bethlehem” brings to life a small, backwater town poised to become the center of the universe. The City of David is where the “hopes and fears of all the years” find fulfillment as “silent stars go by.”
The lesser-known but hauntingly beautiful “Let all Mortal Flesh Keep Silence,” which dates to the fifth century, urges us to stand before the newborn king with “fear and trembling.” In the presence of the “Light of Light” we are told to ponder nothing but the mystery of the Incarnation.
Carols such as “Away in a Manger,” “The First Noel” and “O Holy Night” also hint at a calm, peaceful silence.
In reality, I doubt that even the Lamb of God’s nativity was as idyllic as so many Christmas carols suggest.
As a father who has witnessed the birth of my six children, I’m very familiar with the loud, insistent screams that pour out of a baby’s mouth from the moment of birth – cries that serve as a family’s soundtrack for many months to come.
Yet, I think hymn writers are onto something.
Maybe silence, especially at a time of the year so filled with what the Grinch referred to as “NOISE, NOISE, NOISE, NOISE” can be the way we can encounter Christ in a more meaningful way.
As Dominican Father Dominic Koester shared with me in a recent conversation on Catholic Review Radio, silence is much more than the absence of sound. Silence is also an interior quieting of all the distracting thoughts that can bombard us at every turn.
It’s very difficult to know ourselves when our thoughts are all over the place, said Father Koester, associate pastor of Ss. Philip and James in Homewood and assistant chaplain for the Catholic community at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. And if we don’t really know ourselves, he explained, it’s hard to get to know God.
Spending time in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament or by stepping away from the busyness of life for a moment of quiet prayer can help focus our attention on what’s most important.
As Father Koester pointed out, since God created everything and is the cause of everything, we can also encounter the Lord’s presence in the natural world. He may not necessarily speak to us in audible words, but he does speak to us in a beautiful sunset, a gentle snowfall or a cloudless sky.
We need to listen with “ears of faith” to the God who comes to redeem us and set us free, Father Koester said.
A lot of my memories of my childhood Christmases have grown fuzzy over the decades. But I vividly recall one Christmas Eve when I was about 5.
My younger brother, Greg, and I nestled in our father’s arms as the three of us sat on a brown-and-tan plaid cushioned chair in the living room before bedtime. Lights on the Christmas tree danced off tinsel and glass ornaments, while the steady orange glow of plug-in candles shone from behind crimson curtains.
We didn’t say anything. The TV wasn’t on. There weren’t even Christmas carols playing on the stereo.
As a photograph snapped by my mother showed, we just enjoyed the silence – the silence of anticipation, the silence of reveling in the presence of one another, the silence of Christmas wonder.
“How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is giv’n,” proclaim the lyrics to a verse of “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” “So God imparts to human hearts the blessings of his heav’n. No ear may hear his coming, but in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in.”
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