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Since Holy Week of 2021 the Seeds of Silence website has posted a weekly quote about silence each Monday.. |
This week's quote: Brother Richard Hendrick
Monday 21st April, 2025
Brother Richard Hendrick, Still Points: A Guide to Living the Mindful, Meditative Way (Dublin: Hachette Books, 2022), 228.
Image: uk.pinterest.com/pin/290060032242744268/
& Jessica Fadel, Denver, USA, unsplash.com/@jessicafadel
& Jessica Fadel, Denver, USA, unsplash.com/@jessicafadel
The short, image-backed quote, above, is taken from this week’s longer quote, below, from pages 228-229 of Br. Richard Hendrick's book. To read more about his book from which this month’s quotes are taken, click here.
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Guided meditation for the short quote
For a 5 minute audio guided meditation to accompany this week’s short image-backed quote, click the play button on the image above. To pause, click the same place.
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Listen to the longer quote
To hear this week’s longer quotation being read, click the play button on the image above. To see the image full-screen as you listen, click the expand screen icon in the corner.
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Lectio Divina for long quote
For an audio guided Lectio Divina to use with this week’s longer quote, click the play button on the image. Allow 10-15 minutes. For a text version of the meditation, click here.
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'In both the East and the West, one of the most important practices taught to monastics is that of bowing. It is meditation in movement and, when done mindfully and with deep awareness and breath, it has the power as a practice to bring all of the mental, physical and spiritual faculties together in one action of unified attention. We bow simply in greeting or profoundly to mark moments of deep grace when we are visited by Divine Love in the liturgy, in prayer and meditation, or simply before the beauty of creation.
It is an act of vulnerability and humility in which the monastic acknowledges that we are not at the centre of the universe, we are not the most important, we are simply a mirror reflecting back to that other their Divine origin and seeing in them the presence of Divine Love and compassion. We acknowledge in the other their unique giftedness, their necessity of being for the completeness of the kingdom. Bowing says, "Let me learn from you, be open to you, listen to you, recognise in you the hand and voice of the divine teacher."
Bowing empties us so that we might be filled. It is an act of thanksgiving for, and solidarity with, the other. Even when we disagree with the other, we can come to silence and simply bow, reverencing the best in the other, seeing them as a sacrament of Divine presence, even if their view is opposed to ours.
Leave aside words, look deeply at them as brother or sister, and bow. At a time when so many refuse to give or yield or acknowledge the needs and rights of others in the world, perhaps the simple wisdom of the monastic bow needs to be learned again.'
The Quoting Silence Collection
To go to the collection of more than 50 different image-backed quotes about silence, each from a different author, and with links to associated resources, please click the button below.
The 'Quoting Silence:
A month with ... ' Collection
From May 2022 the 'Quoting Silence: A month with ... ' quotes are building into a new collection over the year. From this collection, you'll be able to access all the quotes and resources from any month by clicking the button.
To go to this new collection, click the button below.
To go to this new collection, click the button below.
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