Sisters and brothers, we come this morning into the quiet of Advent’s second week, a season that asks us not to hurry, not to grasp, but to listen. Here at Our Lady of Silence Abbey, the landscape itself teaches us how to wait: the bare trees holding their branches open to the winter sky, the fields resting, creation pausing before spring’s return. Advent is the Church’s invitation to join that stillness and discover what God is shaping within us.
The tradition often speaks of Advent as a time of expectant hope—but hope, for the Christian, is never mere optimism. Hope is a theological virtue: it is a grace, a gift, a way of seeing. It means trusting that God is already doing something beneath the surface, even when our senses cannot yet perceive it. Just as a seed grows unseen in the soil, so the Lord prepares in silence the fulfilment of His promises. And so Advent quietly asks us: Are you willing to trust what you cannot yet see?
At this time of year, the world around us tends to amplify noise—news, advertising, anxieties about the future. Yet the mystery we prepare to celebrate came to us in profound quiet: a young woman in Nazareth listening to an angel’s greeting; a child formed in the hidden shelter of her womb; shepherds watching in the night; a God who chooses obscurity over spectacle. Silence is not merely an absence of sound; it is a spiritual space in which God speaks most clearly. Here at Roscrea, silence is not an escape from the world but a deeper engagement with its true centre—Christ.
The Fathers of the Church often remind us that conversion begins with listening. Saint Benedict in his Rule writes, “Listen, my son, with the ear of your heart.” Advent is a school for that listening. Before we prepare our homes and our celebrations, the Lord asks us to prepare our hearts—that inner dwelling where only truth can reside. The Church, in these purple days, invites us to clear out what has grown cluttered: fear, resentment, presumption, impatience. Advent is gentle, but it is not sentimental. It calls us to repentance, to a renewed tenderness, to a willingness to be changed.
Many people imagine repentance as something grim, but the saints remind us that it is an act of profound hope. Repentance means believing that God has more for us than the life we have settled for. It means accepting that the Lord desires to lift burdens we have grown accustomed to carrying. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux writes that God comes to us in three advents: in history at Bethlehem, in mystery in the present moment, and in majesty at the end of time. The second of these—Christ coming to us now—is the one we most easily overlook. The Lord’s daily advent is quiet, subtle, easily missed. He comes in our longing, in our restlessness, in our ache for something more honest, more whole, more holy. He comes whenever we allow Him room.
Here at the Abbey, the rhythm of prayer teaches us that God’s coming is often experienced in delay. There are days when the psalms feel dry, when silence feels empty. Yet these too are Advent moments: times when faith matures, learning to rest not in feelings but in the fidelity of God. The candles of the Advent wreath grow gradually, one by one. Their slow brightening mirrors the slow brightening of our hearts as we turn again toward the One who is Light from Light.
This year, perhaps more than most, the world is longing for reassurance. Many carry hidden wounds, some carry grief, others feel overwhelmed by uncertainty. Advent does not deny these realities. Instead, it places a single flame in the darkness and says: Watch. Wait. God is coming. Not as a distant idea, but as a presence who knows our humanity from within. The Incarnation assures us that nothing in our lives is too small, too wounded, or too ordinary for God to enter.
As we continue through these Advent days, let us recommit ourselves to the quiet practices that shape the heart: time in prayer, generous listening, patient kindness, a willingness to simplify. Let us ask for the grace to recognise Christ’s nearness in the people we find most difficult, in the tasks we find most tedious, and in the moments we find most wearying. And let us not be afraid to allow the Lord to prepare in us something new—even if we cannot yet imagine what that might be.
Sisters and brothers, Advent is the season in which the Church stands at the doorway of mystery, holding its breath. We know who is coming, yet we stand in wonder at the humility of His arrival. May our waiting this week be holy. May our silence be receptive. And may the God who comes quietly transform our hearts with the promise of His peace.
Amen.