As speaking can be either fruitful and positive or barren and negative, so also can silence be plus or minus.
Here are a few examples of the plusses welcomed by God:
| + | when silence is used as a pure tool in the search for spiritual truth and God. |
| + | when silence is used as a means of communication between people who are otherwise distant and out of touch. |
| + | when silence is kept in the place of words expressing calumny, judgment, condemnation, insult, hate, envy or plain discouragement. |
| + | when silence is not the absence of words but the avoidance of words that do not carry the seeds of life on the wind. |
Silence is not acceptable to God when it is used:
| - | to avoid telling the truth. |
| - | to withhold precious information. |
| - | to abandon a person in danger. |
| - | to avoid witnessing against a powerful person. |
| - | through cowardice as in cases of honor. |
| - | to wash one's hands of a complicated problem. |
| - | to cover up egotism, falsity, or corruption. |
And you: have you decided whether your silence shall be a plus or a minus in your whole life?
Verbania, 20 VI 1991
All good philosophy is but the handmaid to religion.
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, II, xxii.
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