Chris McDonnell CT August 23rd 2019

Often, when I was preparing young children to read at Assembly in school, I would use the phrase "remember the space between words". To make any sense of the written word put into speech, the pauses can be as informative as the words themselves. They lend importance and significance to the idea being put across, they are an essential, structural part of the story.

This is true for any spoken presentation, but especially so when a community comes together to celebrate the Eucharist. The words we share will be appreciated when spoken in the context of a measured, inclusive tone with clear enunciation, rather than rushed and mumbled.

Often we rush speech when we are nervous, not used to speaking in public. Using microphones at Assembly enabled children to concentrate on clear articulation, whatever their age.

There are many occasions when pausing is of benefit, when thinking before acting, is the better part. In many games of skill, the time of reflection increases the chance of success, be it planning a move during a game of chess, or the pause before a ball is put into the scrum during a game of rugby. The pause in the action heightens the impact when the action takes place.

At one time, the word ‘retreat’ was a familiar part of the Catholic lexicon, whether it referred to a group activity, a parish event or time away alone. It was a time of taking stock, of where we were and who we might become. It was usually led by someone we didn’t know, whose voice was unfamiliar and whose fund of stories was new to us. Invariably that someone was a priest.

Now the word ‘retreat’ is often replaced by the words ‘a time of reflection’ under the guidance of a religious sister or brother or, dare we say it, a lay person whose life experience offers each of us something to share and explore on our Christian journey.

This ‘time away’ is shared by many faiths and manifests itself in different ways. There are common threads. There is quiet time, when unnecessary conversations are put to one side. There is an emphasis on prayer within the context of the particular tradition. To help with our focus, wooden beads are fingered, hands held together, or open with upturned palms. The position we assume might involve kneeling or sitting, standing or bowing, or walking. The ultimate goal is the same, a heightened awareness of relationships with each other and with God. Understanding where we are is helped by sharing ourselves with others.

It can have humorous consequences. Many years ago I attended a weekend gathering at La Sainte Union College in Southampton. We had with us a Buddhist monk, who late on the Saturday afternoon, led us in a silent meditation in the College chapel. Concluding after an hour, we found we couldn’t leave, for the doors were locked. When the caretaker finally arrived, he told us that he listened at the door and not hearing anything, locked up! That left 80 of us inside. Silence has its dangers...

Time alone is time without a hiding place, facing a wall without the company of others with whom we might converse, with whom we feel secure. It is a time of risk, when we admit to questions that we have been hiding from, circumstances we would prefer not to face. It is through such a time of reflection that the blank wall becomes a mirror and we face, sometimes for the first time in many years, ourselves staring back. That might not be a comfortable experience, it might demand we consider change that will be difficult to manage.

Monastic life for a small number of people offers a more radical pause, a dedicated community living by groups of women or men who have deliberately chosen a way of a way of life that recognisably sets them apart. A Cistercian nun, Sheryl Chen, writing in her book, ‘Prayer is my business’, wrote:"I entered the Cistercian Monastery because I wanted a life of prayer. I got God instead. I have come to understand a life of prayer as finding God in each moment of the day, not just the times when we are in church."

When we had cassette tape recorders, there were two buttons in the rack of five- one said ‘pause’, the other ‘rewind’. Sometimes both options are of help to us. We can be surprised by a pause in the headlong rush so many of us experience. We live in a swirling pool of continual activity, where one thing follows another without a space to breathe between. We rush and we do, we talk, work and shop, collect children, make meals and finally drop into bed exhausted. Maybe we should pause and just ‘be’ for a few moments of reflective calm each hectic day.