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We need to find God, and He cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass - grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence. We need silence to be able to touch souls.’ (‘Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta
St Benedict, in the Holy Rule, which we still keep after 1500 years, used two words for silence: quies and silentium. Quies is quiet, physical silence, an absence of noise. It is a physical self-restraint that respects the presence of other people.
The second, silentium, however, is not an absence of noise but an attitude of consciousness turned towards others or to God. Lent is the time for turning to our Lord and Savior, but we cannot do this if we are bustling around like ants.
What greater attention can we pay to Jesus at this time, than that which we give in the presence of the Eucharistic. When we place ourselves in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament we place ourselves before the gaze of Christ who loves us and wants us to know that love.