God of Silence: Bukas Palad Music Ministry’s 2005 CD album

“The God of Silence calls us to journey to His heart.

To rest in His embrace.

To stop.

To be still.

To listen, and to hear the beauty of His quiet voice that brings us peace.”

Bukas Palad

Every so often you hear a song or a set of songs in just one album that really touches your heart. In local liturgical music, other than the Jesuit Music Ministry, songs by the Bukas Palad Music Ministry have time and again struck a chord in me.

Even after a string of well loved worship songs compiled in two volumes of their “Best of Bukas Palad” in 1999, they continued to sing and render new inspiring songs for the Lord. In 2005, they released God of Silence, a CD album that featured 15 songs “inspired by psalms, prayers, and stories of real people who have experienced the faithful love of Christ deeply and intimately.”

Bukas Palad wishes that their songs bring about solace and consolation to all those who are weary and seek rest. They pray that as we find hope and healing for ourselves that we keep in mind that the God we discover in silence is the same Lord who leads our “broken world and history.” They hope that finding God’s peace and love may also give us the fortitude and power to proclaim His good news of justice and truth to those who continue to live in the darkness.

On this post, I decided to highlight a dear song from the CD album with the same title.

Dedicated to the Carmelite sisters, words and music were crafted by gifted Jesuit composer Manoling Francisco, S.J. and interpreted by soloists Candice Cabutihan and Lou Grant Tan.

May you also seek and find the God of silence as I did. As we quiet down we soon realize He is not far away. The Holy Spirit moves within us and resides in the hearts of His people…there He awaits your coming.

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GOD OF SILENCE

The God of silence beckons me

To journey to my heart, where He awaits.

O Lord I hear You calling tenderly,

To You I come to gaze at the beauty of Your face I cannot see.

To rest in Your embrace I cannot feel,

To dwell in Your love, hurting but sweet,

To be with You, to glimpse eternity.

REFRAIN God of night, fount of all my delight,

Show Your light, that my heart, like Yours, burn bright.

Be still, the torment of the night

Shall not encumber you, if you believe.

My child, this darkness isn’t emptiness,

For here I mold your heart into My image, painfully you long to see.

The self you yearn to be, but fear to know,

The world from which you flee, in Me find home.

All these I give you, if you remain in Me.

CONTERPOINT I am ever here. My child, you need not fear.

The dark will set you free and bring your heart to Me.

CODA The God of silence beckons me

To journey to my heart where He awaits me.

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