Not long ago, I went on a silent retreat which my high school provides for seniors. It involved about a day of silence, which, while shorter than many silent retreats, was the longest I had ever forced myself to be quiet. There are a few interesting and exciting things that my first silent retreat showed me, but here I want to discuss something fascinating which I came across quite by accident.

Some context: this retreat came at a time that I increasingly think of as a crossroads in my life, involving a couple of traumatic events that led to many joyful ones. I don’t think I’ve left that crossroads yet, so I can’t really comment on how it will end up changing me. It feels very important though, and the things I feel I’m being shown seem to me to have a lot to do with religion. I’ve always loved religion and mythology of all kinds, and it has always been my favorite subject for reading, writing, thought, and discussion. I was raised Roman Catholic, sometimes practicing, sometimes not. I’ve always had a spiritual itch though, a religious need that I have eagerly sought to satiate, especially in the last couple of years as I’ve become more mature. The difficulties of this recent period in my life gave me more material and opportunity for reflection than I’ve had in a long time, maybe ever, and a lot of my subsequent thought and feeling centered on religion and my own spirituality. Due to some providential reading material, I ended up thinking a lot about Islam, and found myself strongly attracted to it. I’ve continued to investigate and learn about Islam, and though I haven’t converted, I am considering it. There are many more questions I must ask, and whatever my faith looks like at the end of this process, I am sure that it will be stronger, tempered for the first time by real hardship.

Anyway, back to the silent retreat. As the retreat began, I thought about trying to perform salat, the five daily prayers of Islam, during the retreat, since being removed from my normal routines and habits would provide a good opportunity for that sort of thing. I didn’t know the words to the prayer, in English or in Arabic, but I figured I could create my own. I also didn’t have more than a vague idea of what the proper motions of the prayer are or even when they are to be performed, but I believe God judges our intentions more than our actions, so I decided to go for it. I expected the prayer to feel like something extra I had to do that day, an added responsibility to be done between the activities of the day. That turned out not to be how it felt at all; the actual experience was something I never would have expected.

I think it was after Asr, the third prayer of the day, that I started to realize what it was that felt so strange about doing salat. I had expected the prayers to feel like something extra, done in addition to everything else that day. In fact, the prayers felt like the primary activity of the day; everything else was done in between prayer-times. I spent more time considering when and how I would pray than I did anticipating any other activity.I realize that feeling was likely due, in part, to the novelty of it, but I found it to carry a profound message about prayer in general, and Islamic prayer in particular.

One of the major reasons I have been drawn to Islam is a desire for a more routine and visible practice of faith, something demanding while at the same time deeply meaningful. I have not found the commonly expected practices of Catholicism to be a demanding responsibility. Going to Mass – which is usually only an hour long, once a week – feels like something extra to be done at my leisure, not something to organize my life or even necessarily my day around. I have found Mass to be a profound and helpful spiritual activity, certainly; it just doesn’t seems like enough.

I believe the type of close bond with God through routine practice that I feel a need for is certainly possible in Christianity, or any other theistic religion. I have not found, however, that it is encouraged or developed in the Catholicism of my upbringing as I wish it could be. C.S. Lewis, one of my favorite writers, talks about the commonly-practiced version of Christianity as “Christianity-and-water,” a religion which loves the idea of a benevolent God in Heaven who makes sure everything will be all right, but leaves out hard truths about sin, Satan, hell and redemption. The phrase “God-fearing” should refer to a virtue, but in Christianity-and-water it becomes a somewhat silly relic of a more primitive time. Fear of God, or reverence, is a virtue that has become very important to me over the last few years, and I cannot now imagine truly held religious faith without it. The Islamic demand of prayer seems to me to satisfy the worship urge which reverence creates, while at the same time creating a reverent mood and attitude in Muslims. It has certainly done that for me, in my limited experience with it.

The experiences I have described here (probably unsatisfyingly) are some of the many reasons for my attraction to Islam of late, and I’m sure I will discuss others on this blog in the coming months. God willing, I will understand Islam and Catholicism more completely, and find some direction towards the right path.

As always, please leave a comment with your thoughts on anything I mentioned! I love to hear what you guys think of my thinking 🙂 Also, please consider sharing this blog with your friends and followers. Thanks!