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After several recommendations, I finally watched The Two Popes on Netflix.
Following an argumentative afternoon, Pope Benedict and Cardinal Bergoglio retire to a chamber in the evening, the Cardinal wanting to talk more about their disagreement. The Pope waves him off complaining he's tired, and then says,
"Let us be quiet together."
The line seemed to hang in the air. I wondered how often I, or any of us, are quiet with each other.
To be quiet with another is to choose to be still.
To prove nothing about oneself, tell nothing about oneself, sell oneself or need agreement from the other.
It's a compelling proposition, to be present to another, without the pressure or temptation to use the time for one's own ends.
Author Frederick Buechner says that silence is a given, "… like an empty room – it can't be anything but silent."
Yet quiet chooses to be still.
It waits.
It listens.
We live in a noisy world.
In politics, spirituality, cultural mores and social justice – we sound off frequently and loudly in person, print and social media.
Our books are filled with didactic and opinionated writers. Our media becomes more sensationalistic while the internet plumbs new depths of 'sound and fury, signifying nothing.'
There seems to be a sparsity of quiet.
Where there is space to listen and be listened to, to hear and be heard.
Where silence isn't an emptiness to be filled with judgment, but in quiet we choose to hear the heart of each other in all our joy, pain and diversity.
And maybe, as the poet Emerson suggests, "…hear the whispers of God."
Come.
Let us be quiet together.
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