"Silence is the language of God - sanctity's mother tongue" (Lawrence Lovasik, SVD).
Learning to be comfortable and still in silence is possibly the most important thing we can foster in the spiritual life, because Mary shows us that listening comes first in prayer - not speaking - and true listening can only happen in silence.
Is listening simply reading the scriptures? If I read passage after passage, book after book of the Bible, have I really prayed if I have not discerned God as a Person there, and adjusted my life to what I have heard? Mary goes further than simply hearing or reading the Word in a cerebral way that does not penetrate or move her. She teaches us how to listen to the silence, enflamed with the fire of God's love unto contemplation, union, and incarnation.
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NOTE: The new 2025 Mary journal I spoke about in this episode will be out in a few weeks at Advent. Until then, you can download a free 2024 journal and guide page in the margin to the right.
The book I mentioned in the podcast that I wrote with Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers, Ignite, Read the Bible Like Never Before, is also available in the right margin. 
This is a re-released, vintage podcast from 2017, but the complete resource on LOVE the Word® is How to Pray Like Mary, available in the right margin, in which you'll learn to approach Scripture and lectio divina with a more open and receptive disposition versus a checklist mentality.

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Our Monthly Meetup Bible study in John is epic! We're in the Book of Glory! You coming?

LOVE the Word® is a Bible study method based on Mary’s own practice: lectio without the Latin. Get the book based on Sonja’s method in the right margin, How to Pray Like Mary.  
L | Listen (Receive the Word via audio or video.)

O | Observe (Connect the passage to your life and recent events.)
If you haven't done so already, read the Mass readings for today, available every day, right here. To what is your attention drawn - perhaps a word, phrase, or idea? How is God speaking to you through it? How does His word apply to your circumstances, relationships, and concerns today?
V | Verbalize (Pray about your thoughts and emotions.)
Remembering that He loves you and that you are in His presence, talk to God about the particulars of your O – Observe step. You may want to write your reflections in your LOVE the Word® journal. Or, get a free journal page and guide in the right-hand margin.
E | Entrust (Rest in the Word.)
"May it be done to me according to Your Word" (Luke 1:38).
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What We Discussed | Show Notes
“In an address in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis once compared our ability to hear the voice of God with that of the Blessed Mother and her kinswoman Elizabeth.
‘What gave rise to Mary’s act of going to visit her relative Elizabeth? A word of God’s angel. “Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son . . .” (Lk 1:36). Mary knew how to listen to God. Be careful: it was not merely “hearing” a superficial word, but it was “listening,” that consists of attention, acceptance and availability to God. It was not in the distracted way with which we sometimes face the Lord or others: we hear their words, but we do not really listen. Mary is attentive to God. She listens to God.
‘However Mary also listens to the events, that is, she interprets the events of her life, she is attentive to reality itself and does not stop on the surface but goes to the depths t...