Deafening Silence

Have you ever experienced a silence so profound, that it is almost deafening to your ears? It's overpowering. Silence is not the mere absence of sound, but the presence of something powerful.

I learned this this weekend, for I stayed back on campus to do a mini retreat for myself while the rest of the students went on a trip to Salzburg. I'm already going there when my family comes in the spring, so figured this weekend would be a perfect opportunity to explore Gaming, catch up on sleep, and most importantly grow in my prayer life.

The looming halls of the Kartause are so silent that it's almost eerie. I wonder if this is what it was like when the Carthusians lived and prayed here, in complete silence. It makes me feel so small, like I am in the presence of something greater than me. And that I definitely am.

This weekend turned out a lot different than I thought it would. Instead of being all rainbows and butterflies in prayer, like I thought it might be given the events of this past week, it was hard. It was confusing. It was almost as if God clouded up all of the beautiful things that had just happened in my soul and left me grasping for understanding. But there was growth, and growth hurts sometimes. As much as I thought I was failing at it, I grew in trust and faith that God is always with me, even when I can't feel Him in the ways I'm used to. I grew in obedience, to stay faithful to prayer even when it feels empty. I think He's doing a sort of spiritual detox in me. He's cleaning out of my heart all the gunk that has been stuck there for years, in order to make more room for more grace and love. Scraping all of this up is painful, but it's necessary in order to get rid of it. So I must stay faithful, and have hope that He has something great in mind.

However, God broke the silence this morning. Especially in the "Kartause kids", as we call them. They are the kids of all the professors, who are always running around and just being plain old cute. I didn't see them at all this weekend, until at Mass this morning. Almost all of them were dressed in their snowpants, in order to make the snowy walk from their houses to the chapel. One family has a young boy with Downs Syndrome. His face just beams with the joy of Christ. Every time the priests and servers line up at the end of Mass to process down the aisle, he shreiks with joy, runs up to stand with them, and walks proudly down the aisle next to them. It melts my heart. Two of Dr. Asci's little kids brought up the gifts today, in their snowpants. And as I was leaving the chapel, Professor Cassidy's kids were outside already on top of one of the big snowpiles. They were screaming words like "attack!" in their adorable Scottish accents, like something out of a kids version of Braveheart.

Living truly on my own for the first time in Gaming- knowing only the words "hello", "thank you", "please", and "coffee" in German- brought its laughs and lessons. Like how at the grocery store, they don't weigh your fruit for you at the checkout. You have to weigh it on a scale on your own back where the fruit is, and stick the little sticker that prints out onto it to show how much it is. Thank God the cashier spoke some English. I bought enough food to last me the weekend, even though the labels were all in German. I learned very quickly the importance of pictures when cooking instructions are in a foreign language ;) I even learned how to be resourceful, using olive oil when cooking a grilled cheese instead of butter because the kitchen didn't have any. It ended up tasting pretty darn good, and is probably how the Italians do it anyway!

This morning after Mass I walked down to the local cafe. Austrians have an innate ability to walk on ice without slipping, and therefore don't put salt on their sidewalks. To a clumsy American like me, this proves a problem and is a cause for embarassment. But I made it in one piece, learning how to grip with my toes. I ordered a pastry and an espresso, and sat there writing in my journal. I couldn't help but smile, because I felt so European. I felt like I fit in. Even though it was all in my head because of course everyone in there knew I was American. But it's the little things in life that keep us smiling :)