chapels

What makes a chapel, a chapel, I ask myself?  I come here seeking peace, silence, tranquility.  I look around the room.  I see the stained glass art hanging on the wall.   Beneath it is a long wood table.  A single vase with a dry arrangement rests at one end.  At the other is a guest book.  I recall turning pages in that book, reading some of the entries, the reasons others had come here.  Some were grieving the illness or loss of a loved one.  Some were seeking solitude, answers or guidance.  I recall reading the entry of an employee who had visited on her last day.  She left a testimony of what her work had meant.  She had come to say goodbye.  She had come to remember and to be remembered.  Feeling inspired, I wrote my own entry that day.  Remembering this makes me smile.  I continue scanning the room.  In front of me is a table made from a tree trunk upon which my water bottle sits.  I am sitting in one of five chairs arranged in a circle around it.  There is a couch against one of the walls with a side table and lamp.  The couch and chairs are upholstered in light shades of blue, the walls painted a calming green.  There is a place for Catholics to kneel and pray and a rug for Muslim prayer.  In one corner is a cabinet made of a warmly stained wood.  The upper half contains a historical display of religious texts.  I take this all in and decide that it is not the things in the room, exactly, which make this a chapel.  It is the subtraction of things.  

There are no discussions to be had here, no meetings, no supporting rationals to be given.  Here, I need not be “on”, ready to go, shoes laced.  The decor, it contributes, but its contribution is in that it is almost meant to go unnoticed.  Yet, I notice this.

I ask myself, is it the absence of things which allows for the presence of God?  If I took any particular moment in my life and subtracted what was going on, would I not find this same space?  Would I not find God?  

I come to the chapel seeking silence.  So then, am I not seeking God?  And when I am seeking God, do I not go to quiet places, to the wilderness?  Do I not go alone?  To give God my attention, I go to quiet places and I go alone. 

Meditation is a place of silence.

Meditation is a place of solitude.

Meditation is a place where I can be with God.

Meditation is where I go now, to seek silence, to seek solitude, to seek God.