Book excerpt: God's silence during the passion is certainly a silence towards man, but in particular God was silent towards Christ in his perfect and complete humanity. It is also the silence of the Father towards the Son . . . At first sight this silence is troubling and perhaps shocking, suggesting that God is in fact absent. However, the author invites us to go beyond this first impression--and the silence turns out to be of tremendous richness, overwhelming depth, and surprising beauty. We are invited to refocus our attention and discover what the Father is saying in a completely new way. These pages sing with love for God, and our meditation of the passion narratives draws us into deep contemplation of the One they celebrate, the Crucified.