Personal Journeys
THE SILENT TREATMENT
Where can you go to find quiet isolation, even in a crowded room? Inside a little-known Ontario retreat, where silence is not only golden, it's paid for.
By Katherine Jacob
Special to The Globe and Mail - Guelph, OntarioSHE places her tray on the table, smiles and says "Hello" before glancing away with a self-reprimanding frown. The rest of us remain silent. I look around at the others. Thirty people standing single-file at the breakfast table, some gazing out the window, others staring at their plates.
We're all here for different reasons. Some to escape a stressful week, others to consider a major career change. I'm drawn to Loyola House to see what a silent retreat is all about. Nature has always been my solitude.
Finding inner peace is an age-old quest. Some reach it through yoga or meditation. For others it's an art form or a long walk. Some seek an evening away from the children or a weekend at a resort. There are many ways to reach inner peace. Silence is one of them.
Located north of Guelph, Loyola House has offered silent retreats since 1964. Some weekends are specialized, such as the retreat for students or for busy people. Other programs are much longer, such as the eight-day art re treat and a 40 day silent retreat.
A silent retreat is as simple as it sounds -- days spent in complete silence. At Loyola, there are two choices. A participant can attend a directed retreat, in which a 15 minute meeting is scheduled twice a day with a spiritual director. Another option is a guided retreat, in which two 85 minute lectures are held.
Other than these brief moments of interaction, the rest of the day at Loyola is spent in silence. The only telephone is in the cloakroom off the main entrance. Them are no radios or TVs. The closest you'll get to sound are relaxation tapes in the yoga mom.
The stillness is enhanced by an austere bareness inside Loyola House. The dormitory wing is filled with a sacrosanct hush. Rooms are sparse with a single bed, sink, small writing table and sitting chair. A row of toilets is located in one room and three stall showers in another. There are no locks on the room doors and no bright lights in the hallway. I put the sheets on my bed, set the temperature for my room and unpack my own amenities. That's all. The external surroundings are kept to a minimum, so the participant can focus internally.
At Loyola, silence is met at every turn. I don't say hello when I see a person. Neither do I greet someone when walking the grounds. This isn't a retreat where you come to meet people, exchange addresses and promise to stay in touch. No small talk is exchanged or "getting-to-know-you" ice breakers. This is a weekend for thought and contemplations. "it's where people encounter an oasis within themselves," says Philip Shano, director of Loyola House. "They're finally able to slow down enough to listen to how tired their body is, how angry they are or how confused they are."
The lack of speech takes some getting used to. The need to communicate is constant. It's during mealtime that the silence is most noticeable. Buffetstyle meals are served at specific times during the day in a large dining ball. Special dietary-need meals wait on a side counter, next to a name card. Retreatants sit six to a table, 30 people in total, and not a word is spoken.
As time wears on, fellow retreatants become accustomed to communicating silently. Gestures assume the place of words. A slight tap on the shoulder be comes a suitable replacement for "excuse me.' A nod of the head means "Thank you" for holding a door open. At first, people abruptly shut a door and stomp down the hallway. Soon they are attentive to closing doors slowly and walking silently through the dormitory wing.
By the second day, retreatants start seeking out other elements of communication. Appreciating paintings on the wall. Watching the trees sway through a picture window. Writing thoughts and feelings.
I grow so accustomed to the silence that I find lectures an intrusion on the day. They break the flow of my own thoughts. So do people who whisper in back halls and stairwells, thinking their sound won't carry.
For some people, silence can be uncomfortable, and Loyola offers ways to enter such an atmosphere. They have a craft room and music tapes as alternative methods to help a person reach further within. A guitar awaits strumming in the yoga room. Nature is another area where silence is accompanied. The wind blows through trees, water gurgles in the creek and songbirds chirp from their treetop lookouts.
Loyola House suited to peace
Loyola House is surrounded by 245 hectares of rolling hills, wetland and forest. Marden Creek flows through an open field and continues onto the Speed river. A walking path crosses the creek and winds into a cedar forest. In the spring apple orchards are in full blossom and cows graze in the pasture.
This state of inner peace is not easy to reach, and often a spiritual centre can offer the framework. Loyola's objective is to create an environment conducive to prayer and to provide a director who can accompany a retreatant through the experience.
The retreats at Loyola are located in a Jesuit community, based on the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius. This saint who lived for 10 full months in a cave in Manresa, Spain, wanted people to discover that God is in all things, from life experiences to relationships, from desire to pain.
St. Ignatius created a program of spiritual exercises that a person could ~ through by withdrawing from the world for 30 days. Loyola House is one of the few Jesuit retreat houses in North America that offers the "40 day Spiritual Exercises Institute," a 30 day retreat with a few days at either end to prepare people upon entering and leaving the program.
Although founded on these beliefs, Loyola is open to people of all faiths. While many of the retreatants are bishops, priests and sisters from religious communities, others come from diverse backgrounds -- from Judaic to Hindu faith, from young to old, from students to business people. Some travel quite a distance to come to Loyola, even from overseas. A walk past cars in the parking lot presents licence plates from Ontario to Alberta and Indiana to New York.
Each person has a different reason for visiting. "You get the full gamut," says Shano. "People come to get peace in a relationship, an abusive relationship in the past, difficult memories or a decision about a new career. People do come if they need quiet time or a time to catch up on prayer and sleeping."
Clearly one weekend -- one full day and two half-days -- is not enough time to make a life changing decision. "People come with high expectations. They discover a retreat centre like this only when they're in need." Often a person will want to deal with a lot of issues in a two-day period. This is where a director can be of assistance. "You might not reach a decision but you're helping them to get equipped to go back to continue their work elsewhere," says Shano. "That might mean just going back with new energy or going back with a new way of looking at a situation. Or a new energy to face it head on or just to be well rested because of having a good night's sleep."
Silence creates an environment for listening to one's own thoughts and feelings. There is time for contemplation, meditation or prayer. Without external distractions, such as the telephone ringing and people demanding attention, it's easier to focus internally.
One weekend won't transform anyone's life, but it sets the stage to develop an inner solitude. One that can stay with you, independent of where you are, what you are doing and whom you are with. If you've experienced silence once, you know how it feels and how it sounds. If you listen closely, you'll find it in many places.
Katherine Jacob is an Ontario writer.
IF YOU GO:
LOYOLA HOUSE
A silent retreat centre north of Guelph
Directions:
From Hwy. 40l, take the Hwy. North exit towards Guelph. continue to follow the signs for Hwy. 6 (toward Fergus and Owen Sound). Look for the "Guelph Centre of Spirituality" sign on the left just past Marymount Cemetery. Loyola House and Ignatius College are on the same property.Directed Retreats Directed Prayer Weekend: $120 June 20-22.
8-Day Directed Retreat: $400. June 12-20. June 25-July 3. July 20-28. August 2-10, 13-2 22-30.
Directed Retreats available from May 8-June 4 and Oct. 1 Nov. 11.Also Integrating Prayer and Art Retreat available. Cost includes accommodation and meals.
Information Loyola House, P.O. Box 245. Guelph, Ont., N1H 6J9, phone (519) 824-1250 ext. 266, fax (519)767-0994.