Deep silences: reclaiming silence as a locus of the sacred

ABSTRACT

This paper describes my journey as a hospice chaplain, from being out of my depth, in awkward silences, to embracing deep silences, as the locus of the sacred. By recovering the original vision of hospice pioneers, by embracing spiritual artistry and by discovering an innovative methodology – spiritual autoethnography – I uncover silences. Silences – traumatic, shameful, communicative, of betrayal and in grief – are prevalent in hospices, yet rarely spoken of. New insights from the spiritual tradition enables me to no longer see silences solely as a litany of losses, or as an absence, something to be fearful of. Rather the key learning is that threshold silences, are often a presence, a locus of sacred awakenings. My research journey has allowed me to create a heuristic concept of deep silence as the locus of the sacred. This concept reconfigures hospice chaplaincy, and reclaims the sacred in palliative care.

KEYWORDS:

• Silence
• sacred
• spiritual care
• autoethnography
• palliative care
• poetics

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Ian Stirling, having spent over a decade in hospice chaplaincy, has returned to his roots as a parish minister in the Church of Scotland. Working in the churches of Fisherton and Kirkoswald, Ayrshire he enjoys the freedom of spiritual artistry, and continues to interrogate the silences. This paper captures the essence of his doctoral thesis – Stirling, I. (2018). “Deep Silences: A Spiritual Autoethnography Reclaiming Inner Space and Silence as a Locus of the Sacred.” DPT Thesis, University of Glasgow, Glasgow.

Notes

1 Spiritual care is that care which recognizes and responds to the needs of the human spirit when faced with trauma, ill health or sadness and can include the need for meaning, for self-worth, to express oneself, for faith support, perhaps for rites or prayer or sacrament, or simply for a sensitive listener. Spiritual care begins with encouraging human contact in compassionate relationship, and moves in whatever direction need requires (NHS Education for Scotland 2009, 6).

2 I am indebted to Zoe Bennett (Bennett and Rowland 2016, 108–136), for this introducing me to the concept of finding a critical space, as it emerges from her work on John Ruskin, who once said: ‘The greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and tell what it saw in a plain way. Hundreds of people can talk for one who can think, but thousands can think for one who can see. To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion—all in one’ (in Bennett and Rowland 2016, 1). A critical space is created in the interweave of a relational life, attuned to self, other and Other.

3 The Dalai Lama, in his foreword to The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying (Rinpoche 2002), describes dying as putting on new clothes.