Paper short abstract:

Based on ethnographic fieldwork of a Christian ashram in Italy, this paper aims to explore the question of relationality, communication, and presence through the prism of silence. It also discusses the methodological challenges of doing ‘silent ethnography’ during residential meditation retreats.

Paper long abstract:

This paper is based on ethnographic fieldwork of a Christian ashram in the mountainous hamlet of Malfolle, Italy, accomplished in 2018. The ashram was founded in 1982 by a Catholic priest right beside his church and it hosts various activities, namely silent spiritual retreats over several days. It is a space of ritual experimentation inspired by Hindu and Buddhist ascetic practices that lies at the margins of the Catholic institution and is till today open to all religious affiliations.

Using the ethnography of Malfolle, I approach the question of relationality, communication and presence through the prism of silence. Silence is at the heart of the spiritual experience of Malfolle: it is spatially conceived for the realization of silence which is considered the privileged path for communication with God. Silence characterises heterogeneous spiritual practices that take place in the ashram, and it shapes the relationship between practitioners and divine alterity.

In a context where there is no verbal communication between people during the spiritual retreats, silence also interrogates the methodological challenges of ethnographic participation. In this paper, I will present the successive adaptations I resorted to during my research as listening and speech were supposed to be absent, by for example considering the sensory dimension and corporal experimentations of fieldwork. Immersion in silence offers interesting tools to question how contemporary “spiritual” practices penetrate and transform contemporary Catholicism.