Four Benefits to Silence in the Mass

In 2003, Pope St. John Paul II, quoting the 1971 General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours, wrote, “We need silence ‘if we are to accept in our hearts the full resonance of the voice of the Holy Spirit and to unite our personal prayer more closely to the Word of God and the public voice of the Church.’” The value of silence in the liturgy has nevertheless remained a controversial and misunderstood topic.

In the Church’s liturgical tradition, the use of silence, or the recitation of texts very quietly, can have four distinct functions. First, for the celebrant to recite a text silently can be a sign that the text is addressed not to the people, but to God. This is why the “priestly prayers” such as the Lavabo (“Wash away my iniquity . . .”) are said silently in both the traditional and the reformed versions of the Mass.

Secondly, the celebrant may say certain texts silently to allow singing to take place. The Offertory prayers are said silently in the traditional Mass, and they may optionally be said silently in the reformed Mass. All or part of this time can be used for singing.

Thirdly, from at least the fifth century, the Eucharistic Prayer (the Canon) came to be said silently. (This practice is not followed in the reformed Mass.) In this case, the silence is a marker of its special holiness, like the disappearance from view of the clergy, behind the icon screen or iconostasis, in the East. If singing a text gives it greater solemnity, then saying it silently is a sign of a still greater level of importance.

Fourthly, there is silence as pause, a silent interval for the worshiper’s private prayer between texts that are proclaimed aloud. This is a feature of the rubrics of the reformed Mass and was introduced in some situations in liturgical reforms before Vatican II, in 1955 and 1960.

When silence in the liturgy is promoted in the context of the reformed Mass, as by John Paul II quoted above, it is most likely that this last type of silence is intended. Another kind of silence that John Paul felt the need to defend was the silence of the congregation, when this is called for: “Active participation does not preclude the active passivity of silence, stillness, and listening” (address to the bishops of the northwestern United States, 1998).

The liturgical reform greatly limited the place of silence in the Mass, in theory, and still more in practice. (The silent Offertory option is not widely used.) Pope St. Paul VI noted that with the reform, “pious persons” and “even priests” would have to adjust their way of participating in Mass: “They will feel shaken out of their usual thoughts and obliged to follow those of others” (general audience, November 26, 1969).

One way of understanding the liturgical reform, then, is this. Instead of having texts recited in silence, to establish a kind of background to our prayers, the texts are to be read aloud, and we are to be silent while listening intently to them, or else we are to reflect on them in a short pause after they have been recited. We will be obliged to follow the thoughts of others.

This, however, is not quite right. As the passage from the General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours, promulgated by Paul VI only two years after the general audience already quoted, indicates, it is not only our own thoughts that are allowed play by periods of silence, but also those of the Holy Spirit. A longer quotation from this document illustrates the dilemma faced by the liturgical reformers.

In order to receive in our hearts the full sound of the voice of the Holy Spirit and to unite our personal prayer more closely with the word of God and the public voice of the Church, it is permissible, as occasion offers and prudence suggests, to have an interval of silence. . . .

Care must be taken to avoid the kind of silence that would disturb the structure of the office or annoy and weary those taking part (General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours 1971, 202).

One the one hand, there is a danger that a torrent of words actually impedes the worshipers’ engagement with the liturgy, which is not, in the last analysis, about following the thoughts of the liturgy planning committee or even those of the composers of the liturgical texts; rather it is a matter primarily of listening to the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, attempting to avoid this problem can lead to another: a series of awkward, artificial gaps interrupting the flow of the liturgy, begetting annoyance or weariness: “molestiam seu tædium.”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church returns to this problem in its section on prayer, where it compares contemplative prayer with liturgical prayer:

Entering into contemplative prayer is like entering into the eucharistic liturgy: we “gather up” the heart, recollect our whole being under the prompting of the Holy Spirit, abide in the dwelling place of the Lord which we are, awaken our faith in order to enter into the presence of him who awaits us (2711).

As the Catechism points out, contemplative prayer is the highest form of prayer, and though it may take its starting point from a text, it is not about following anyone’s thoughts; rather, it is about allowing the Holy Spirit to lead you where he wants to take you. As Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, before his election as Pope Benedict XVI, put it, with great force, referring to the traditional Mass,

anyone who has experienced a church united in the silent praying of the Canon will know what a really filled silence is. It is at once a loud and penetrating cry to God and a Spirit-filled act of prayer (The Spirit of the Liturgy, p. 215).

It seems that the Church’s conversation about silence in the liturgy has not yet drawn to a conclusion.