Life can be so busy that our spiritual life often takes a back seat, and sometimes we feel a need to get away from it all – at least for a short time. I recently watched a documentary about an Anglican priest, who travelled to a monastery in Egypt, where St Anthony, the 3rd Century hermit lived. He was searching for a deeper experience of God and also some direction after his marriage had failed. He said he chose the place because, “there’s no escape, there’s no distraction… and we face and deal with our issues.”
One of the monks lived a completely solitary life, in the cave of St Anthony, which was set in a rocky and desolate desert mountain above the monastery. This monk offered him his cave for three weeks and went to live in another cave higher up the mountain.
Here there was complete silence, and the only distractions from a focus on God were all sorts of wandering thoughts. The first week was a very difficult and challenging time, with many disturbing thoughts coming to the surface. It was as if the silence and the isolation were breaking him down. However, by the end of the third week something had happened, something had changed within, and the difficult period where everything was questioned had given way to a deep peace. Something of God had been glimpsed in the silence and solitude of the desert.
Most of us do not have the opportunity, and probably not the desire, to spend a few weeks alone in a desert cave, but in this period of Lent, when we reflect on the forty days that Jesus spent in the wilderness, maybe we should consider spending some time in silence and solitude each day. In the silence and desert of the heart, being aware of the sound of each living breath we take, we can be more conscious of the living, life giving presence of God, who speaks to us in the gentle breeze. 'Be still and know that I am God', says the Lord, and we can be sure he is with us always, even in the busiest moments.
by Brendan Vaughan-Spruce
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