19th Sunday of Ordinary Time (The Whipering Sound)

In a commentary on today's first reading, the author cites how so many ancient cultures distinguished four distinct elements—earth, air, fire and water—as kind of a primitive, intuitive guess at chemistry. These four elements correspond to the three states of matter plus energy: earth is solid, air is gaseous, water is liquid, and fire is like energy. As we hear in our first reading, it was by means of earth, wind, and fire that God showed Elijah both where he was not to be found, but also where he could be found.[1]

I’ve long been fascinated with this reading. The great prophet Elijah—after so powerfully demonstrating the strength of the God of Israel on Mt. Carmel, calling down fire from the sky—suddenly cowers in fear and insecurity, after receiving Queen Jezebel’s murderous threats.

Fearing for his life, he went into hiding. Soon after, he went to Mt. Horeb (aka Mt. Sinai) and like Moses, he remained for forty days and nights, seeking consolation, but also direction from God. As Elijah waited within the cave, he experienced various natural phenomena and was left to discern if it was God. He first heard wind, then crushing rocks, an earthquake and finally fire. None of it was God, but instead merely an echo of the calamity of the world from which he had fled. But Elijah kept listening.

After hearing all the calamitous phenomena, Elijah waited…and waited, until what followed was a tiny whispering sound, like the sound of a soft breeze. We’re told that upon hearing it, Elijah hid his face in his cloak. Why?

It’s been suggested that in the whisper-sound, he heard the voice that spoke at the beginning of creation, the voice that spoke the elements of the universe into being and into harmonious order. Even the prophet Elijah had never received God’s guidance in that manner and it caused him to recoil in humility.[2]

As we know it takes silence and stillness to hear a whisper. In our busy, technological culture we are so immersed in noise and activity throughout our day. Therefore, if we do not intentionally make time and create a quiet place, we will never find the silence our souls so desperately need. Without it, all we will manage to hear is a combination of the noise around us and the noise in our heads. If there’s truth in the notion that silence is where we find God, then He can show up only when we shut up.[3]

The Carthusian monk, Dom Augustin Guillerand (D. 1945), said it this way: “Solitude and silence are guests of the soul. The soul that possesses them carries them with it everywhere. The one that lacks them finds them nowhere…It is not enough to stop the movement of one’s lips and the movement of one’s thoughts. That is only being quiet”. (Voix cartusienne).

When we pray, and endeavor to close our eyes, to put our hands together, bow our heads and bend our knees, these postures give way of quieting our consciousness and informing the body to surrender to the silence and stillness we need and where God likely desires to speak to us.[4]

So, what do we think will happen if we assume these postures? Do we think that God will speak to us in the way we are accustomed to hearing? It wasn’t so with Elijah in the cave on Mt. Horeb, and it will probably not be for us either. Instead, He will more likely speak to you in your heart, something more like the tiny whispering sound, that nonetheless manages to speak peace to you, to communicate love to you, and the joy you bring to Him.[5]

After so much fear and doubt, and then after so much calamitous noise, it was finally, in that gentle mysterious experience that Elijah recovered his sense of self and could then understand how to move forward as God’s servant. I suspect many of us need to discover a truer sense of self, and to know how God wills to move us forward. Will you make the time and space to listen?

I’ll close with the words of Robert Cardinal Sarah: “A tree grows in silence, and springs of water flow at first in the silence of the ground. The sun that rises over the earth in its splendor and grandeur warms us in silence. What is extraordinary is always silent. In his mother’s womb, an infant grows in silence….Our blood flows through our veins without making any noise, and we can hear our heartbeats only in silence.”[6]

[1] Ibid.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Sarah, Robert Cardinal; Diat, Nicolas. The Power of Silence: Against the Dictatorship of Noise (p. 27). Ignatius Press. Kindle Edition.