St Ignatius of Loyola.
Through the spiritual exercises developed by the founder of the Jesuits, St Ignatius of Loyola, Roland Ashby has experienced Christ’s loving and healing presence as a physical reality. Roland, who is contributing editor of Living Water (www.thelivingwater.com.au), reflects on how Ignatian spirituality has for him been life-transforming, a spring of living water*.
Only in love can I find you, my God. In love the gates of my soul spring open, allowing me to breathe a new air of freedom and forget my own petty self.
In love my whole being streams forth out of the rigid confines of narrowness and anxious self-assertion, which make me a prisoner of my own poverty and emptiness.
In love all the powers of my soul flow out toward you, wanting never more to return, but to lose themselves completely in you, since by your love you are the inmost centre of my heart, closer to me than I am to myself.
(From ‘Encounters with Silence’, by Karl Rahner SJ)
In the wake of the recent US election, this reading by Karl Rahner is much needed balm for the soul. Rahner was one of the great theologians of the 20th century. He was also a Jesuit, a member of the Society of Jesus, an order founded in 1534 by the Spanish saint Ignatius of Loyola, who has inspired this reflection.
The reading also perfectly encapsulates what for me is at the heart of my faith, and why I have found Ignatian spirituality to be so life-giving, and indeed, a spring of living water.
It was the invitation to be ‘transformed utterly in love’ that started me on my Ignatian adventure in 2017. ‘Transformed utterly in love’ was the title of a retreat offering an introduction to St Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises.
How could I possibly resist the offer to be “transformed utterly in love” I thought, eagerly signing up. And after completing this introductory retreat, I decided to go further – immersing myself in the Exercises over a 30-week period under the guidance of a spiritual director, who I met weekly for the duration.
Jesuits are normally required to complete the Exercises in a retreat of 30 days, but completing them “part-time” over 30 weeks is another option, particularly for lay people who are working.
This “30 weeks in daily life retreat” also seeks to integrate the Exercises into normal daily life, and covers the same material as the 30-day retreat, which is divided into four weeks or segments: God’s love for us despite our sinfulness; Christ’s life and ministry; Christ’s Passion and Death; and finally, the Resurrection and life in the Spirit.
Being transformed utterly in love was a process that began for St Ignatius when he was recovering from severe injuries sustained in battle. For this dashing young man – something of a Brad Pitt type perhaps, with an eye for the ladies and the main chance, and with dreams of fame and glory as a soldier – life was to change dramatically when a cannon ball shattered one of his legs. In the long period of recovery he read about the lives of the saints, and found they inspired him in a way that his military heroes could not.
So began a lifelong and life-changing love affair which would lead him to offer his life in the complete love and service of Christ, and he was able to pray:
Take Lord, and receive all my liberty,
My memory, my understanding,
and my entire will,
All that I have and possess.
You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.
All is yours.
Dispose of it according to your will.
Give me your love and grace,
For this is sufficient for me.
He also wrote: “There are very few who realise what God would make of them if they abandoned themselves entirely into His hands, and let themselves be formed by His Grace.”
The idea of falling in love with God and Christ was explored by St Ignatius’ 20th century successor as Superior General of the Jesuits, Fr Pedro Arrupe, who wrote that:
“Nothing is more practical than finding God, than falling in Love in a quite absolute, final way… Fall in Love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.”
So what are the practicalities of finding God, and “falling in love in a quite absolute, final way” for the Jesuit?
They include what Ignatius called the Principle and Foundation: recognising that I am created by the God who is love, to love, praise and serve God – “I am from love, of love, for love”, as one translation beautifully puts it.
The Daily Examen at the end of each day, which invites you to reflect on how God has loved you, and to give thanks for the many blessings and graces you have received throughout the day.
As part of the Examen, The Discernment of Spirits includes seeking to discern where you have been loving and generous-hearted; and also where you have fallen short in responding to God’s call to love.
Then there is The Imaginative Contemplation, which invites you to place yourself in a Gospel scene as either an observer or as one of the protagonists, imagining the sights, sounds and smells so that you feel physically present, and ending with a colloquy, or conversation, with Christ.
I found this way of engaging with Scripture particularly powerful. One of my journal entries reads:
The Imaginative Contemplations have helped me to experience the physical presence of Christ, to feel his touch and embrace when being held in his arms as one of the children he blesses; to feel his hand holding mine when I was the blind man he led out of the city. Imagining myself as Simeon, I have also experienced the joy of holding him as an infant.
Through the Imaginative Contemplations I have been physically present to witness Christ’s great and healing love for others, and its transforming effects on them.
Falling in love with Christ is also about experiencing the power of forgiveness – for oneself and for others. It is difficult to love and forgive – yourself and others – unless you have experienced being loved and forgiven. Jesus said of Mary of Bethany, who showed him great love by anointing his feet with expensive perfume and washing them with her hair, that the one “who has been forgiven little, loves little” (see Luke 7: 36-50).
The second great commandment – “love others as yourself” – is also difficult unless we know and experience God’s love for us. God has an enormous love for us, writes poet Edwina Gately, and all he wants to do is to “look upon [us] with that love”.
One of the most painful, but cathartic and liberating moments of the 30 weeks came for me when my director suggested I write an apology to someone I had wronged nearly 40 years ago, and then to give the matter up to Christ. Learning to let go of past mistakes, and see them as “buried in the heart of Christ”, as Br Roger of Taize put it, is a critical part of learning to love and forgive – yourself and others.
A significant observation about St Ignatius for me, is that, as Anglican priest, teacher of spirituality and Spiritual Director Grant Bullen has remarked, “It’s in crisis the moment of conversion comes”.[1] This certainly resonates with my own experience in 2022, as I struggled with health issues and confronted my own mortality, frailty and vulnerability. It was in this moment of crisis I discovered my utter dependency on God, and that only in having the heart broken open can we see with the eyes of God.
When the cannon ball shattered Ignatius’s leg, it also shattered his illusions about what constitutes glory and heroism, and the kind of life that is worth pursuing. And in reading about the lives of the saints he was drawn to a deeper reality, and indeed, a deeper desire.
This deeper desire of our True Selves for oneness or union with Divine Love, can be hidden in desires for such things as alcohol, food, sex and drugs, which, when they become addictive, can act temporarily as ‘God substitutes’, but fail to satisfy the hidden deeper desire and become increasingly destructive.
As theologian Matthew Fox says, “When our deeper selves, our truer selves, are ignored, the gaping hole in the soul seeks to be filled by something else. That something else might be drugs or alcohol or compulsive work ... attachments of any kind that allow us to numb our feelings of despair, loss or grief. All such addictions lead us away from our true selves, our inner selves, where the real depth lies.”[2]
He says human beings have to work at finding their deep and true selves. “If we do not, we live superficially out of fear or greed or addiction and set ourselves up for false idols and lies.”[3]
As Grant Bullen describes it, “We live most of our lives out of our egoic/constructed self. The True, God-created self needs to be discovered, and God is a constantly involved participant in this process”.
I have found Ignatian spirituality to be profoundly life-giving and life changing. As Bullen has remarked, “the whole point [of Ignatian Spirituality] is that we need to open ourselves to be loved by God. We are loved, but we are so blocked to it.”
The Daily Examen at the end of each day highlights a key characteristic of Ignatian Spirituality, which is that when we experience God’s love, Bullen says, “it releases our own power to love ... it’s all about service in the world ... it enables me to be loving in the world.”
As part of the Examen, The Discernment of Spirits is also critical to Ignatian Spirituality. This is about “stopping to smell the air”, and “which way smells of life”, Bullen says. And it’s about “watching your interior movements, which are the result of ‘good spirits’ and dark spirits’. Good, healthy voices tell me I’m loved. Bad, unhealthy voices tell me I’m not loved, I’m such a failure.”
How can we discern these good and dark spirits? Fr John Stewart, founder of the Living Well Centre for Christian Spirituality, says they result in a state of either consolation or desolation, with consolation “leading to an increase in faith, hope and love, and drawing us closer to God”; and desolation “leading to a decrease in faith, hope and love, drawing us away from God”.[4]
But the dark spirit, and desolation, can also be instrumental in healing. “Don’t push [this dark emotion] back down,” warns Grant Bullen. “That’s where the danger lies.” Once it’s out in the open, we can ask ourselves, “If you were to act on the dark emotion, where would it take you? To something life-giving or something destructive?
A crisis, he adds, “can be explored as a gift of change with new life in it – rather than a problem to be fixed.”
A danger for me is that I can see it as precisely that – as a problem to be fixed, and quickly, rather than allowing time for something life-giving to emerge, and trusting that God will offer a way forward in God’s time. It’s possible that we may need to spend some time in a state of desolation, before something life-giving can emerge.
Jesuit priest Kevin O’Brien SJ also sounds a note of caution that spiritual consolation does not always mean happiness, and spiritual desolation does not always mean sadness. “Sometimes an experience of sadness, loneliness, or restlessness is a moment of conversion and intimacy with God and others. Times of human suffering can be moments of grace.”[5]
When I was in hospital in 2022 a mood of despair eventually gave way to one of peaceful acceptance in which I was able to see other patients with the eyes of compassion. Profound gratitude also welled up within me for all those who were caring for me. It was a moment of grace indeed.
A friend I know who has suffered serious physical injuries as a result of an accident has certainly experienced deep desolation, but he often speaks of his condition as bringing great consolation, because he feels it has brought him closer to God and has greatly expanded his capacity to love.
Ignatius believed also that desolation can result if we ignore our prayer life, and that God sometimes permitted desolation “so that we can learn more about ourselves and our God”.[6]
O’Brien says that in times of desolation we may feel we have been abandoned by God, but that is not the case. “God is faithful and remains with us; however, the good feelings of spiritual consolation are gone for the time being.” But Ignatius advises us to be patient, O’Brien adds, because consolation will come again.[7]
As I mentioned earlier, a key characteristic of Ignatian Spirituality is the Imaginative Contemplation, which was the way St Ignatius suggested we meditate on Scripture. It invites us to imagine that we are physically present in a Gospel scene.
St Ignatius believed God can use the imagination to reveal Godself just as those of us who meditate using a mantra in the John Main tradition believe that God can also be revealed by going beyond words and the imagination.
The Ignatian Imaginative Contemplation allows the events of Jesus’ life to be present to us right now. Kevin O’Brien SJ says, “Visualise the event as if you were making a movie. Pay attention to the details: sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and feelings of the event. Lose yourself in the story; don’t worry if your imagination is running too wild.”[8]
Author Margaret Silf says:
“Don’t worry if you don’t find it easy to imagine the scene vividly ... Fill out the scene as much as you can ... [including the weather, and the feel of the place (peaceful or threatening) ... Listen inwardly to what God is showing you through your role in the scene [whether as disciple, bystander, or one being healed]. Talk ... to Jesus. Speak from your heart simply and honestly. Tell him what you fear, what you hope for, what troubles you ... Don’t worry if your attention wanders. If you realise this is happening, just bring yourself back to the scene for as you feel drawn to stay there.”
She adds:
“Our purpose [in the imaginative contemplation] is not ... to come up with any kind of analysis or sermon, but simply to respond, from our inmost depths, to what God is sharing with us of God’s own self.”[9]
Just to give you a brief taste of this, I invite you now to imagine yourself as the woman in the following reading from Luke 13:10-13.
10 On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, 11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” 13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.
Visualise yourself as the woman. You are in pain, you are desperate, you are unable to do anything without the help of others. What pain or burden do you bring to Jesus today? What is troubling you or weighing on your heart? For what do you seek his healing? …
Jesus sees you, asks you to come forward and speaks words of healing. Deeply moved by your suffering, he reaches out his hands and touches you. Feel the warmth of his gentle, healing touch … What do you say to Jesus, and what does he say to you? …
Finally, spend some time now simply resting in his healing love …
*This article is based on a talk Roland Ashby gave at The Well on Sunday 10 November 2024. A recording of the talk is available by clicking here:
https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/share/J04fGrhmHbNiRNx4uIREVh8PjqB6QYvr2V9yc10pFDSX2M7y0iRmWZ_WhdPGPme9.utc-1-SjiU0LcW7J (Please Note: Copy and paste passcode: vSijF.h8.)
The Well provides an online opportunity to drink deeply from the Well of Living Water offered by the mystics and poets. These monthly Sunday night sessions consist of a reading, a 20-minute silent meditation, and a talk in which the speaker reflects on how a mystic or poet has been life-giving, a source of Living Water, in their lives.
References:
[1] All quotations cited here from Fr Grant Bullen come from a lecture he gave in 2023, as part of a course in Spiritual Direction at The Living Well Centre for Christian Spirituality in Melbourne Australia.
[2] From his Daily Meditation of 7 March 2023. See https://dailymeditationswithmatthewfox.org/
[3] Obid.
[4] Cited from a lecture he gave in 2023, as part of a course in Spiritual Direction at The Living Well Centre for Christian Spirituality in Melbourne Australia.
[5] Kevin O’Brien SJ, The Ignatian Adventure – Experiencing the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius in Daily Life (Loyola Press 2011) 117
[6] Op.cit., 182
[7] Op.cit., 166
[8] Op.cit., 141
[9] Margaret Silf, Inner Compass: An Introduction to Ignatian Spirituality (Loyola Press: 1999) 152-153