Old traditions used to say that wisdom consists in the knowledge of the Word. Give us this wisdom to be able to listen, to accept, to receive, to practice the hospitality of the words, paying attention, reacting consequently, being struck, touched, or caressed by the words that come to us. And let us also learn, in turn, to speak the right words, to affirm people who speak in a life-giving way, to recreate ourselves with our own words, because each of them sprouts from the same dynamism from which the plants grow, life unfolds, the universe comes into being. The word is word when it has a speaker, when it speaks about something; the word is word when it speaks with something. Give us, O Creator of Life, this depth, this awareness, and this tremendous joy to discover in ourselves that creative power that we can speak, emit, and receive living words, words of eternal life, words that come of the peace, of the silence, of the transparency of everything. And then we may be able, more and more, to understand the language of many other speaking beings that may not articulate as we do.
True silence is a key to the immense and flaming heart of God. It is the beginning of a divine courtship that will end only in the immense, creative, fruitful, loving silence of final union with the Beloved... This silence, then, will break forth in a charity that overflows in the service of the neighbor without counting the cost. Availability will become delightsome and easy, for in each person the soul will see the face of love. Hospitality will e deep and real, for a silent heart is a loving heart, and a loving heart is a hospice to the world.