Anthropogenic Global Din

But I was glad I had recorded for him
The melancholy. —Patrick Kavanagh, “Wet Evening in April”

“Interior and exterior silence are necessary in order to hear the Word,” Pope Benedict told the massed pilgrims in St Peter’s Square on March 7, 2012, on the last of his catacheses on the personal prayer of Jesus, specifically on Christ’s silence on the cross. He hardly had to point the lesson—“our age does not, in fact, favour reflection and contemplation”. In a civilisation attended by constant noise, the Pope had to tell his audience not be afraid of silence, for when they feel “a sense of abandonment” in the stillness of a prayer, they should be confident that “this silence, as happened to Jesus, does not signify absence”.

Of course, it isn’t just the divine Word which you can’t make out in such Golgotha moments. It can be difficult enough to hear somebody talking right next to you. Ambient noise may leave you on edge, if not on the edge. Sometimes you can’t even hear yourself…