Presenting the First Week | Conversatio Divina

IGNATIAN SPIRITUAL EXERCISES TRAINING (ISET)

2023-BLOCK TWO – SESSION 16

PRESENTING THE FIRST WEEK

Brenda: Good evening and welcome or good morning and welcome everyone. You are most welcome here this evening. As Annemarie shared last week, she’s in a plane on the way to Spain but the rest of us are here. Russell is also in Spain. You’re welcome as we continue to look at the first week. Kathy is going to be leading Our opening prayer.[00:01:00]

Kathi: Hello everybody. Feel free to turn your video off if you’re more comfortable. I just wanna invite you to settle in to get comfortable. If there’s anything on your mind or heart, just to relax into this space. Pay attention to your breathing and just become present.[00:02:00]

I invite you now just to become present to our God, who is with us, who is loving us, and however you can do that, whether you can see God’s gaze, whether you feel God like a warm blanket or a cool breeze, or as Trevor has shared, that he takes your face with his hands and smiles you into smiling. Just take a couple moments to [00:03:00] rest in the awareness of God’s love for you.

I’m going to lead us now in a scripture contemplation. I’m going to read two verses from Hosea chapter two. [00:04:00] I’ll read them through twice, and then I’ll give time for quiet, and I invite you just to allow God to draw you into a quiet space, where God will speak tenderly to you.

Therefore, I will allure her. I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her. There, I will give her back her vineyards and make the valley of Acor, which means trouble, into a door of hope.

Therefore, I will [00:05:00] allure her. I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her. There, I will give her back her vineyards and make the valley of Acor, which means trouble, into a door of hope.[00:06:00] [00:07:00] [00:08:00] [00:09:00] [00:10:00]

Amen.

Brenda: Welcome to this evening where we continue our journey with the first week. This evening or this morning, we are talking about the very practical elements of how we present the first week. What are we going to give people to pray with as they journey into the third week? So, it’s worth remembering how we got here.

If you remember, Trevor presented the big picture for us, and then Annemarie took us into the text and to the details of what Ignatius gives us in the exercises through that week. Then last week we looked [00:12:00] at the particular and the general examen and then the general confession. And so, this evening we come to the practical this morning—the practical elements.

I do just want to lay that foundation again and I guess the more we repeat it, the more familiar it becomes. So let me just name again some of the core things that we don’t want to forget as we begin accompanying someone into the first week.

The first thing we want to remember is the grace we are asking for. What is it that we are looking for? And if you remember, it is to know myself as a loved sinner. Ignatius uses the words shame and confusion, but it’s not a judgmental shame and it’s not a burdensome confusion. It’s that sense of how can God [00:13:00] love us in the face of all this evil around us—all this that we’re part of.

Howard Gray uses the phrase, “to be sinners at repose in our sinfulness.” So that sense of knowing ourselves loved. When Pope Francis was elected and they were doing all the interviews, a journalist asked him, “so who is Bergoglio?” And his answer was, “I am a sinner who the Lord has looked upon.” That deeply formed sense of being a sinner whom God loves.

So, we want to hold that sense of the grace very much in our consciousness as we accompany people through the week, or the weeks in the 19th annotation.

The second thing from our previous sessions that we [00:14:00] don’t want to lose sight of is the dynamic of the first week. And there’s a few movements happening if you remember. We’ve got the movement from the big picture of sin—that cosmic picture—the sin of the angels, the sin of Adam and Eve, the sin of a particular person somewhere in time, but that sense of sin in the big picture, thought about beyond myself, moving towards and deeper into my own sinfulness, the way in which I am sinful. We’ve got that movement happening.

We’ve got the movement from content and intellectual thinking and a lot of meditating and reflecting upon from that complex praying down to very simple; simply being with the [00:15:00] wonder that we are loved by God. You’ve got that movement from complex to simple, to affective, from thinking about, to simply being with— receiving.

Then we’ve got the affective movement or the feeling movement from the sorrow that we feel for sin and what it does in the world as a whole—our own part in that. So, from sorrow through to gratitude and wonder, as Trevor said, that sense of, wow, God loves.

The first week is probably the part of the exercises that directors adapt the most, but all of the scholars will agree that you don’t want to lose those dynamics. So [00:16:00] however you fashion and shape to make the content accessible to your exercitant, you want to make sure you hold those movements—from big picture down to my individual part in sin, from thinking about complex all the way down to simply being with and receiving God’s grace and mercy—that affective movement from sorrow through to gratitude. We don’t want to lose sight of that—those fundamental movements or dynamics, or part of the dynamic.

The week before, Annemarie stressed for us the importance of the colloquies, and that the colloquies are not just a step in the prayer exercise that gets tagged on the end, but that [00:17:00] our conversation with Mary, Jesus, and Creator God, those colloquies are very much part of the dynamic and we want to be encouraging our exercitants to be engaging with Jesus, with God throughout their praying.

The more I reflect on it, the more we talk about it, the more I’m convinced that the colloquies are the place where those dynamics are taking root. So, we want to make sure that people are engaging in that conversation, remembering that the colloquies are not just me expressing myself to God, but allowing space for God to engage with me. So, it becomes reciprocal.

Noting those three things then, so it’s the grace we’re asking for, the dynamic, and then the importance of the colloquies and that personal engagement. Then we can [00:18:00] go, okay, use what is helpful in what Ignatius offers us, whichever exercises and wording are helpful, but hold lightly that which is not. Feel free to let go of that which is not helpful. Adapt. Apply. Make sure that what we offer is accessible to your exercitant.

So, what are we going to do? How are we going to present them? Remember in the text, Ignatius gives us five exercises. The first one has the three parts, the sin of the angels, the sin of Adam and Eve, the sin of a person.

The second one is my sin, inviting the person, the retreatant to reflect on their own sin and how they have distanced themselves from God.

The third one is then a repetition of not just repeating the content, but [00:19:00] going back to a movement, somewhere where there was a deep connection with them.

The fourth is the resume, so it’s looking back over the whole, and noticing the shifts through the whole period of praying. And then the fifth is that meditation on hell.

So, we’ve got those five exercises, and if you remember Annemarie said the original seems to have been that Ignatius expected that a retreatant would pray all five exercises in one calendar day on the 30-day retreat. So, they would start at midnight and pray those five through the day, and then repeat them the next day, and then they repeat them the next day. However, no one seems to do it that way anymore.

Nowadays, we tend to have a more stretched out or linear approach. Most often, the resources that we’re using, the guides that are [00:20:00] helping us, kind of spread the exercises out over the period that we’re praying the first week. So, for example, in the 19th annotation that we will be guiding folk through, perhaps in the first week, we’ll take the first exercise, and we’ll split out the three parts.

Perhaps we’ll have a Bible text, and then for the next prayer session on the second day, we’ll pray with the sin of the angels. Then on the third day, with the sin of Adam and Eve, and on the fourth day with a person, and then tying up the week towards the end of the week. Then the second week, we would look at that second exercise. Then maybe the third week, we’d go back and look over and pick out particular, and then the fourth week, we would sum it all up and reflect on the movement.

Most often, that’s the approach that people would [00:21:00] use. For example, those of you who know Kevin O’Brien, or will be using O’Brien, the first week he has the Prodigal Son, and then that first exercise, and then a text from Romans and then the second week he’s focusing on our own sin, and he offers the woman who anoints Jesus’ feet, the story of David and how Nathan challenges David about Bathsheba. And then a text from Hosea and he invites the retreatant to then ponder and pray with their own sin going on to the third week and the fourth week of this period.

Veltri, in his suggestions does a little bit more of a circular or spiral route. He takes retreatants or suggests taking them through the first exercise—the sin of the angels, Adam and Eve, a person [00:22:00] in the first week, our own in the second week, but then the third day or the third week of praying, he brings you back to repeating particularly the first exe

You can feel free to look at what works best. The authors that I was reading and have been reading mostly agree that you’re not likely to give someone all five in the first week or in the first day on a 30-day retreat. So, mostly it would be stretched out and the movement from thinking about a big picture all the way through to being with would happen over three, four, five weeks in the 19th annotation.

When Annemarie was speaking, though, I was wondering what it would look like to create a kind of spiral to offer those themes of [00:23:00] the big picture, personal repetition, resume application of senses on a more regular basis in the 19th annotation. So, that’s my wondering about a different approach. Could we repeat the five exercises deepening them week by week? I don’t have an answer for you yet. I have an exercitant coming up to the first week and I’m thinking I might try offering the exercises slightly differently this time round. And if I do, when I do, I shall report back to you.

My point being, feel free, be encouraged to meet your retreatant where they are. This is a week that you’re going to adapt and apply and really hone how you offer the exercises. Most people offer them in a [00:24:00] linear kind of fashion with some repetition towards the end of the period. But if you think differently, let’s chat about what might work.

I’m going to send you two articles this evening. I’ll send them along to Pam. They’re fairly old articles, but they really are very helpful. Veal, in the one that I sent, does have some suggestions of how to structure the flow of what you offer. We’re going to talk some particulars a little later this evening, so I’m just going to leave that picture with you now and talk about some of the challenges that we might face in this first week.

I’ve titled the section on your notes, Adaptation: Things to be Aware Of. What are some of the issues that may come up with our retreatants or exercitants that we need to be [00:25:00] conscious of paying attention to?

It’s important to remember that Ignatius lived 500 years ago at a time when theology was fairly homogenous in his context. He was a Catholic male with a fairly wealth or privileged background. People understood things pretty much the same. There was agreement around the basics of faith. Our world is very different and our exercitants, the people that we will be traveling with come from a range of different backgrounds.

They are Catholic. They are Protestant. They are spiritual but not religious. They are exploring. They are connected to church; they’re not connected to church, and so they come with a range of theological, spiritual, personal [00:26:00] assumptions that we’re going to have to listen for very carefully as we seek to accompany them.

The first thing that I think we need to be aware of as we listen to our retreatants is how they understand sin, because there’s no universal agreement of what is sin; and some people come with really harsh and hard understandings. What is heaven? What is hell? Does it exist? Doesn’t it exist? Theologically, there’ll be in a range of places.

What are the consequences of sin? Does God save everyone? Or are some people definitely going to hell? All of these theological positions are possible, and we are going to need to know or listen very carefully for what our retreatants assume to be [00:27:00] true. Coventry, in his article—again, one I’ll send you—speaks about the reality that if you’re going to talk about sin and hell, you need to have done the work yourself around processing, praying with reflecting on, what’s my position? How do I understand this? In fact, Coventry says, if you haven’t prayed with it yourself, you can’t give it to someone else. You have to really have engaged.

Now, of course, when we’re accompanying someone, it’s not a theological treatise. We’re not trying to do theological teaching, but we have to be alert to very damaging images, very hurtful or harmful theology, and maybe just consciously holding them in prayer as they journey with a trusting God to open up new ways of understanding, maybe even gently offering different interpretations if that [00:28:00] will be healing.

Some of our retreatants, and I find particularly those who come from an evangelical background, will say something like, but my sin is forgiven, why do I have to dredge it all up again? I’ve confessed it, and perhaps those from a Catholic background will do the same, but mine has been with evangelicals–it’s forgiven. God’s forgotten it. Why are we talking about it again?

And in this case, we’re wanting to help people see that the point is not to make them feel guilty again and ask forgiveness again, but rather for us to connect with the sense of the pervasiveness of sin and evil that it is everywhere in everything. And then to connect into that wonder of God’s love that in the face of all this, God still loves us.

It’s to [00:29:00] savor God’s love in our ongoing sinfulness rather than to suggest we’re not forgiven. Perhaps you’ll help them recognize that even though that in the past is forgiven and dealt with daily, in an ongoing way, we don’t embrace the love which God offers. And so, we’re invited to come to engage with the ways in which I am continuing to resist God’s love for me so that God’s healing and grace can penetrate more deeply. So, we may be saying things like that is all dealt with and forgiven, but I wonder if there are still ways that we block God, or you block God’s love. in your life.

I think some people [00:30:00] have had very negative experiences of being judged. The language of sin can include rejection, abandonment, ostracization, you’re not good enough. So, all of those things can trigger an emotional response that leads to resistance.

Some of the language in the exercises is itself not helpful for people in that situation—things like, I’m a running sore, a seeping wound. For people who’ve experienced deep shame and judgment, this can trigger withdrawal. It can spark self-condemnation. We hope that through the disposition days, we’ve really dealt with this, that they’ve soaked in God’s love. that they’ve really engaged with their belovedness. But we need to be alert that if people begin to spiral into self-rejection, we need to help them there. We can [00:31:00] be very intentional about changing unhelpful language. We don’t have to use the language of the seeping sore. We can use scripture and words that are more helpful to help them engage with their own sinfulness. So just to be careful for those people.

If we’re paying attention to sin, it’s helpful to help people engage with the collective dimension of sin. So, for Ignatius, and in the past, there’s this very individual sense of my sin, the things I’ve done wrong, and for many folk who come to us, sin is about the ways in which I have missed the mark. I have I’ve let God down. I’ve done what’s wrong.

In our contemporary theology, there’s always an awareness of [00:32:00] the fact that sin is a collective reality. In an African context, identity is collective. I am because we are, and sin is also part of that. To be aware that, I share in the sin of my community. I benefit from it. I’m part of the sin of my society.

It’s that network, that interconnectedness of humanity, and that, even if I’m going “I’m really not such a bad person. I’ve not really done anything terrible in my life.” I am part of a broken society and a broken collective. And I share in that reality.

And often I am implicit in or benefit from sin that I’m pretty much powerless to even stop. And so, we can sit with God in the face of that and go, I know this is wrong, and yet I have no power to [00:33:00] even make any changes. And so, for exercitants who are kind of going, “well, I’ve always been a good person” to help them broaden their perspective can be really helpful, which then leads us onto systemic and structural sin.

That sense that built into human society is the reality of sinful structures. Exploitation, dominance, power, all of those things are built into the very way our society functions.

I can remember taking someone through the first week in that period in COVID when the vaccines were just being released and in the U. S., people were starting to have their first vaccines, and the Northern Hemisphere had access to vaccines. I remember saying to her something about how our government was not able to afford vaccines and we were [00:34:00] wondering when ever actually we would ever take deliveries as other countries had more than enough at that stage even and we spoke about systemic and structural sin.

We can’t escape it. Just by virtue of where we are located, we benefit from, we are part of. we exacerbate brokenness, destruction in the world. So, helping someone think about some of those things may broaden their perspective of where they fit in the whole picture.

It’s worth noting as well that Coventry makes a distinction, and it’s a really helpful one, between sin and sins. Sins are those individual acts you know the things we do, my decisions, the ones that I have a say over, but sin is this pervasive—in his [00:35:00] language— this pervasive, underlying reality of evil, self-absorption that we get sucked into, that we’re part of, that we collude with. And so, we want to hold that big picture as we journey with people.

In Annemarie’s book with Elizabeth Liebert, they make some really helpful comments about women’s experience of the first week. I want to suggest that in some ways these ideas connect with the experience of other minorities. So, to just hold that in mind as we speak about them.

The first thing that I find really helpful with women that I accompany and some queer folk that I’ve accompanied to name is to remind folk that [00:36:00] Ignatius was writing as a man in his time, a man from privilege, a man from Europe, so it’s not surprising that some of the core sins that he’s dealing with are pride and power.

But feminist theologians, particularly those in the area of spirituality have written quite a bit about how women’s experience is different and the way in which women have been socialized means that there are other sins to also be paid or to be paid attention to. They think about pride and they think about greed and power, but often their issues or their struggles with sin may be more around not valuing the self, not setting appropriate boundaries, hiding themselves away, not sharing their gifts, being smaller than they are, not valuing who God has created them [00:37:00] to be, pleasing, performing to earn love, trying to get acceptance, not standing in her truth, avoiding necessary conflict just to keep the peace, not taking responsibility for their own lives, and self-neglect.

So, sometimes just reframing what sin might be is helpful for women and other minorities perhaps. I use definitions like sin is any time that I try to be God or anything that blocks the flow of God’s love in and through me can be helpful.

Remembering that with women some of the traditional texts and narratives come from a very patriarchal reading, and so they’ve often been damaged by them and that again counts for others who are minorities. Be very careful of texts that [00:38:00] are damaging or alienating. Things like the Genesis story, where women get blamed, or the traditional interpretation is women are blamed. Well, the thing in Timothy, I don’t let a woman speak.

Another aspect for women is the denigration of or the language that denigrates the body. So, for many women, there’s this ambivalent relationship with their body and sexuality, and so we’ve got to just watch some of that language that is in the exercises that can lead to women rejecting their bodies even further.

For some people, their very being has been condemned as sinful. So, if you are going to accompany folk in the LGBTQ, IA plus two spirit community, or if you’re working with [00:39:00] people who identify as queer to be really careful around realizing that they’ve done a lot of work to even get to this place. And so, to watch that the language we offer them is helpful. It’s about helping them be conscious of resting in God’s love, the wonder and the awe, and to be careful of not reinforcing old stuff.

Those who have been sinned against may need to lament. For some people, their experience of sin, before they can even begin to recognize their own part in it, they need to own and lament how they have been wounded by the sinfulness in society. And so, as they look at the big picture, you may need to help them engage with the Psalms of Lament to express their own lament [00:40:00]—how the brokenness and the woundedness and the sinfulness of humanity has damaged them.

It can count for people who’ve experienced racism, violence, sexism; all of those experiences may need to be lamented before they can even begin to think about their own part in brokenness and sinfulness.

Looking at my time, I’m just going to move fairly quickly. So just to be aware that Veltri says some of our theology may get in the way. You may need to just be conscious of theological assumptions. As I said at the beginning, one that might be quite big or helpful to be aware of is some people think or we often do, think we need to fix ourselves before we can come to God, which is definitely not the point of the first week. [00:41:00] The first week is to know the wonder of being loved; even in our sinfulness, especially in our sinfulness. And so just to hold some of that theology.

I added in that verse from Isaiah one, “woe is me. I’m lost for I’m a person of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips.” My sense is part of the first week is really just this awareness of the pervasiveness of sin and how I collude with it.

Okay, so now, let’s talk the exercises—how we might give them the particular individual exercises. Some tips through the week or through the period that you’re dealing with the first week, you may be inviting your retreatant to put into their own words the grace they are asking for; [00:42:00] invite them to wrestle with that.

Remember, only God can reveal sin, so it’s not our job as the director to be going, “but you haven’t thought about this!” We are gently holding space, so that the person and God can do the work that they need to do. It’s not our job to tell them what’s wrong.

Scripture can be used where it’s helpful. Ignatius doesn’t put scriptural texts in the exercises, but you can use them and the various resources we’ve pointed you to will offer texts that are helpful. Don’t forget the additions. Remember we’ve spoken about the additions, things like darkness and the rhythm of the day and penance. So, you may want to go back and look at that.

The first exercise, what might we be giving people? I like to use Fleming’s interpretation, the contemporary version. Sometimes I’d [00:43:00] start with Fleming and then give a more literal translation or an older translation, but I’m very careful in explaining or engaging with the language. I don’t just dump it on someone because of all the stuff we’ve spoken about.

You could give one point a day, as I’ve said, so split them out. You could offer scripture texts that go along with it. The prodigal son, second Peter, Luke 10. In all your resources as you look, you’ll find different scripture texts. You may go to some of the Psalms of confession.

Tetlow is a very useful resource, so in the sheets that Tetlow has, there’s some very good exercises. A couple of weeks back, I shared the poem by Ron Darwin, The River; that you could offer as a way to think about the pervasiveness of sin. [00:44:00] You could invite retreatants to ponder the potential for sin that exists in all people; the sin that is an attempt to disown my origin. David Smilira quotes Ron Darwin as saying you could invite them to ponder sin as incompetence, a missed opportunity, sinner’s scandal or infidelity.

Interestingly, fairly recently, I had a retreatant whose experience of the first week was around that scandal. He was horrified at what he was seeing and there was a deep sense of being scandalized at how pervasive sin was through church and society. It was supreme for him. I like giving people as a prayer text, as they engage with this first exercise, the invitation [00:45:00] to go and look at the newspapers or the news apps, since no one reads newspapers these days. Go and watch the news channels and ponder the brokenness in the world.

I’ve also sent people on a prayer walk around their neighborhood or they drive through their city to look at how the structural sin and brokenness is part of their community. You may even want to invite them to think of sin as missed opportunities, like Annemarie says for herself, the daffodil bulb that was never planted was an image that accompanied her through her own retreat—that sense of us not taking the opportunity to accept God’s love.

You will need to decide how you present it. Possibly to present the three points, and then give some other [00:46:00] exercises to deepen that awareness of that first exercise, inviting people to deepen and engage with their experience of this big picture of sin.

For the second exercise, again, you could use Fleming’s text. You could invite a person to do a very careful review of their lives, looking at the patterns of sinfulness and sinful tendencies. So, remember, we’re not necessarily wanting them to list every sin, although they may feel the need for that and for general confession, but we’re looking for the patterns, the themes, the trends.

You might invite them to look at who have I loved? Who has loved me? Who have I sinned against? Who has sinned against me?

You could use again scriptures [00:47:00] like the prodigal son, the woman who anoints Jesus’ feet, the sinful woman, the woman caught in adultery, or the penitential psalms. I like using Julian of Norwich’s parable of the Lord and the servant, which is about woundedness and how often our brokenness flows from our wounds, particularly for people who have been hurt by sin. That’s a really helpful parable to use—the Lord and the servant.

Don’t forget that through the second exercise, we are insisting on—don’t forget the grace, don’t forget the colloquy. We’re wanting people to engage with God as they look at sin in their own lives, how they collude, how they benefit, how they choose to block God’s love through them.

The third exercise is our repetition. So, if you haven’t [00:48:00] already explained repetition to your exercitant, you need to make sure they understand what repetition is. It’s not just repeating the whole thing, going back to the whole text and doing it again, because somehow, I haven’t got it right. It’s that focusing in on a consolation or something that really grabbed me.

In the first week though, it’s really important that we also remind folk that the repetitions here maybe need to pay attention as well to places where we felt a resistance, where we didn’t want to engage because we want to work with what’s happening in me. What do I need to notice? What is God inviting me to see about the patterns of sin in my own life? So, what is that resistance or that discomfort or that not being able to pray inviting me to notice?

Remember that the triple colloquy is part of this [00:49:00] exercise so it’s a deepening. While you’re offering the repetition—so you’re explaining and you’re helping people find where they’re going to go back to; maybe there’s that resistance or that desolation that they need to notice. You may want to suggest to them different ways of praying that will help them deepen, because remember, we’re going from the active to the more receptive or quiet. So, going for a walk, doing some art, doodling, walking a prayer labyrinth, or some way to just engage themselves differently. Those may be helpful. If you think that will help your retreatant deepen in the repetition, then offer them those as ways to deepen the praying.

The fourth exercise is the resume. Irrespective of where they’re going to be [00:50:00] praying this, of course, it will be coming at the end of the day or at the end of this whole first week period, the resume is that looking back over the big picture.

So, we are wanting to see how has my perspective changed? How has my response to God changed as I’ve been praying with these things? Was I very resistant at the beginning, not wanting to go into this place of talking about sin, but now I’m more at peace looking up at Christ? Or have I deepened my understanding of the place or the role of sin in my life?

Davis Marrero (spelling?) adds this as a secondary grace—”A recognition of the pattern or habits of my disordered affections. A recognition that left to myself, I cannot overcome these disordered affections.” So, the fourth exercise is that resume looking for the pattern, [00:51:00] the big picture.

Now the fun one—the fifth exercise—the meditation on hell. Coventry says praying the fifth exercise is only for robust prayers. This can be a slightly hard one to explain or difficult to help people with and the point is, you may choose to leave this particular framing of the prayer out if it’s not going to be helpful to your exercitant. The core of it though is an invitation to engage with what it feels like to be separate from God. Ignatius starts with, think about other people who are separate from God—the sense of what it is to have [00:52:00] chosen my way to such an extent that I am disconnected from God.

The point is not to scare people into conversion. The point is not to scare them into heaven at all, but rather as a confirmation like, “wow, look what I’ve been saved from.” Look what could have happened. It could have been terrible. That’s too small of a word, but you know what I mean. It could have been hell, but God has saved me. This is what comes after we’ve experienced God’s love, and we look back with that wonder.

So, there are various ways you can do this. [It’s Grogan, not Coventry, who says, that the fifth exercise is for the robust.] You may give them Fleming’s translation. [00:53:00] and the emphasis on that total isolation, the absence of God. You might imaginatively—remember when Simon Peter in Luke’s five says to Jesus, Lord, leave me for I am a sinful man. What if Jesus said, okay, and left and Simon Peter never sees Jesus again. What would that be like?

You could use scriptures like Matthew 25. You could invite them to think of an image of what that isolation or separation from God might feel like. Imagine a day where you have no human qualities, no love, a life without any consolation. Imagine your sins without any healing or forgiveness or maybe there’s an image that comes to mind for them, but that sense of inviting them to taste, feel, [00:54:00] touch, see what it’s like to be completely separate from God.

Through the rest of the exercises, as we’ll see in the other weeks, at the end of a day in the 30 days or a week in the 19th annotation, you have a prayer called the Application of Senses, which is a taste, touch, feel, being with and this meditation can be prayed like that. Essentially, we’re inviting people in the fifth exercise to really get a sense of, Wow, God’s mercy has saved me from this. I am a sinner loved by God and I don’t even have to go through this, and others don’t have to go through this.

So how you present it, you will obviously deal with in [00:55:00] supervision; you’ll talk through with those you work with and reflect with. You’ll plan, but you don’t need to feel trapped into, “I must give it like it is in the book.” Feel free to prayerfully consider what you would offer.

So just to finish off, sometimes the first week can be a struggle. Because of the various things I’ve spoken about, it may take a while for people to soak in that grace of knowing themselves a loved sinner, of the shame and the confusion at the sinfulness that pervades our worlds and the wonder of God’s love. As a director,

trust the process. Trust that God is at work in this. Hold your nerve. Be kind, be compassionate, listen deeply, but don’t be tempted to rescue someone from the discomfort [00:56:00] of the week. If there’s no movement, if nothing is happening, just check in that they are praying, that they are asking for the grace, that they’re praying the colloquies. Just check that everything is in place.

Maybe you can use penance or some way of naming and engaging with their sin. As they’re receiving the grace, don’t be tempted to move them along too quickly. Stay there; let the grace deepen. Offer the materials again, which is why I’m wondering about the spiral of offering the exercises. Let it deepen.

You may notice that it’s time to start moving them on when the prayer becomes dry, whereas before there was depth and movement, now It’s getting a little dusty. Then it may be time to move on. You don’t want to keep them there forever though. You’re not going to keep them sitting in the first week kind of going, [00:57:00] “you will get the grace.”

You’re going to engage if it doesn’t seem to be being received. There may come a time where you decide it’s time to move them on. Then you trust that the grace will be received later as they move through the exercises; that the grace will be realized and received as they move through the other weeks of the exercises. In the end, the transformative thing is I am a sinner deeply loved by God and that is enough.

All right. So, there’s time to reflect. I have offered you some questions and I’m really hoping that you will take some time to reflect on your own struggles with the first week. Pam has put them in the chat. Thanks, Pam.

What were some of the challenges you personally dealt with?

What do you think might be coming up [00:58:00] and any adaptations, exercises that were really helpful for you?

We’ll take until 20 past the hour for our break and then come back and go into our discussion groups. See you then. Take time to reflect and we’ll see you just now.

Brenda: Welcome back. I think everyone is back. I hope you’ve had a good conversation and we’re looking forward to what you are bringing up so over to you. If you can’t raise your hand and you’re waving and I don’t see you, then just one of the others will help me notice. Let’s see what needs to be spoken of.[00:59:00] Any comments, questions, wonderings?

Gavin: Brenda, Gavin here. I just want to mention as I said in my group, that if one has an understanding of the Enneagram for yourself, the director can sometimes assume too much about your knowing your underlying patterns. I don’t think that’s a good thing, because looking back, I think my director believed me too much, and I didn’t receive the [01:00:00] grace of the underlying patterns as I have now through going through what isolation and absence of God, etc. meant and the misery that that involved to then have revealed to me, which only God can reveal. Not only the underlying patterns, but how much he loves you despite it. I offer that.

Brenda: So maybe a word of caution to us as directors. Sometimes we’re uncomfortable ourselves with what the sin and reflecting on the patterns brings up and so we assume too much. We assume that people know and so that’s something about holding your nerve, to actually stick with the dynamic and not assume that someone has received the grace. That’s really helpful. [01:01:00] Thanks for that, Gavin. A word of caution; don’t assume.

if you’re waving and I’m not seeing you, feel free to unmute and just speak. Any thoughts or discussion on some of the challenges that come up in the week? Gavin’s named one for us. Assuming that people know what the underlying movements are, I wonder what else has come up for you.

John: I have a comment of the impact of Trevor a few weeks ago talking about going over our sin and if it leads to gratitude and the tension of remembering my spiritual poverty [01:02:00] in a healthy way. It was critically important for me. So, I’ve been wrestling with that—how to hold the tension between being deeply loved, but also being flawed and holding that spiritual poverty in a Godly way, as opposed to just all about myself. So I don’t have answers. I’m just in process.

Brenda: And I suppose that’s what’s important, John, is that sense of holding the tension, the awareness in your words of spiritual poverty and the sorrow that that evokes and the gratitude for the enormity and the wonder around God’s mercy and what it means to hold that.

Trevor: Brenda, if I may add something? Just to respond to John, if I may. John, I guess what is so helpful here is just an awareness of the discernment of spirits, inverted [01:03:00] commas, you know, that when this process begins to head in a desolate area, perhaps the evil spirit or the bad spirit is at the heart of the movement and that fundamentally, if God is involved in revealing the depths of my sinfulness or my attachments, etc., that ultimately will be a consoling movement. I just find that personally so helpful because in terms of my tendency quite easily to move into self-accusation or self-condemnation or, self-rejection. It has always been helpful for me to be aware of, is the movement one of consolation or is it one [01:04:00] of desolation? And ultimately the first week, while it may have moments of desolation and even painful consolation; ultimately, the grace is an experience of deep, deep consolation. So, I just offer that, and I am talking to myself as well as I offer it.

Brenda: That’s so helpful, and that mark of when I turn inwards or when the retreatant is turning inwards in that self-condemnation, when the focus is on me to be alert for desolation, and when the focus is on God, there is consolation and that movement. It might be helpful to have those markers. Tracy?

Tracy: It’s a two-part question. The first [01:05:00] part of the question, because you were talking about special groups that we might work with, whether we’re talking about like the queer community or people with history of abuse or other challenges, I’m wondering about lament; what are some things we can do to help folks lament that are outside of scripture, because I think scripture can also be a tender place at that phase of the exercises potentially. Then the follow up to that is wondering about is there a tendency ever for someone to move into a victim mindset and then miss the grace of a sinner loved by God because they’re so focused on the lament and what’s been done against them and just how do you balance those things?

Brenda: What immediately popped into my mind as you were saying, what could we use outside of scripture? I was wondering about using folk music; [01:06:00] some of the songs of struggle and heartache and loss. Some of those kind of folk tunes are really songs of lament. There’s some really nice poetry around so one could look for poems. There are some contemporary poets that I’m aware of at the moment, so you could be looking for those or inviting people to write their own or paint.

So, finding ways that are part of popular culture even that lament heartbreak. Those are some of my thinking and maybe Adri-Marie or Trevor have got some other ideas, but also then just to pick up on the second question before I hand over. I think that it’s so important that we not go get into the point of I’m the one who’s wronged, and I am simply the one that is broken. So, we lament, but also then help people look at how do I collude with some of [01:07:00] that?

I know in some of the diversity work I’ve been part of people have always been invited to notice, yes, I may be the one who is oppressed in one place, but I have power in another. So, some of those wonderings about where am I, the one with power, as opposed to someone else, shifting those perspectives. Colluding, even to the point of some of my sinfulness, may be in accepting the judgments. Remember some of those feminist spirituality writers; the sense of the sin for women may be not challenging and taking into ourselves some of the judgments that are part of society and remembering that we’re not looking at sin with a sense of guilt, but this is how brokenness and distortion is part of my reality so I may well collude with some of these structures that harm me myself and harm others.

Off the top of [01:08:00] my head, I’m wondering in those two parts, what could we offer and what if we get into a victim mindset? Adri-Marie?

Adri-Marie: Yeah. I find it helpful in week one to keep reminding myself and the person I’m giving the exercises to that the goal, the desire, the cheering on from Ignatius’ side is freedom. So, we’re looking forward and we’re therefore asking for revelation. So, my openness as exercitant is coming from this desire for more freedom—so kind of hold that just as in what way God want to free me. Sometimes I find myself almost cheering on my person in some way, like I wonder what God still would like to show us—show you in terms of [01:09:00] your freedom, greater yes, et cetera.

I think week one more, than any other place, I really would pay attention to the language that the person in front of me uses. And you know what, if you can in disposition days, just really have a little column next door somewhere where you start writing oh, they talk about God in this particular way.

At some stage, if you deal with belovedness, they will start using words for sinfulness and it might be where it’s like, my shadow self or my false self or they might refer to the enneagram and some things or they might attach to the words disordinate attachments. So, if we follow the language that they’ve used, sometimes it’s helpful to just reintroduce that language because there’s something of dots that’s connecting that’s already coming from [01:10:00] early on—just to pick up on that movement.

Then when it comes to the lament side, there’s so many beautiful adaptations to make, especially when you go from the larger to smaller, is to encourage to visit sites that represent perhaps a holocaust museum or and you can do really beautiful digital things in this day and age. It doesn’t need to be in person, but very often those places have these songs attached, like Brenda said or outcries, etc.

Personally, I enjoy using and bringing the prophets in the imagination, how the prophets confessed on behalf of other people, and sometimes I refer to Daniel specifically, and to just get into that imagination to confess on behalf of or sometimes I invite the exercitant to [01:11:00] stand with Jesus at the wailing wall and on little pieces of paper, write things that cannot be seen again and push them in there with Jesus. Especially if the person’s imaginative world is quite rich, sometimes those imagery that spans the test of time takes a little bit further; you bring in the Old Testament and sometimes that could be useful.

Screwtape Letters is the winner. I needed to say that. For those who like C. S. Lewis, it could be a total strange adaptation that can help you a lot in terms of imagination for week one. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, no problem. Go and read and see.

Brenda: Trevor. Thanks, Adri-Marie.

Trevor: Tracy, just that second part of your question—I guess if I picked up in myself [01:12:00] an awareness that this person maybe is like—and I’m so cautious here with language—that maybe their sense of being a victim has kind of stopped them from maybe owning, and I want to be respectful of that at one level because that’s maybe where they are, but I also would want to just, I think, trust the process. You know, let’s come back to the grace, and let’s take the grace into the new week. I’m not going to be the person who convicts anyone of their.,,,,,

So, it’s really just facilitating the movement with maybe careful scriptural passages and then just that letting the grace be the engine that drives the prayer. [01:13:00] That grace is very powerful, even if we use very simple words for the grace, rather than maybe Ignatius’s long sentences.

Brenda: Thanks, Trevor.

Becky: Can I hop in and offer . . .

Brenda: I’m sorry, I’ve got Jaco, and then I’ll come to you, Becky.

Jaco: Thanks so much, Brenda. I appreciate it. I was wondering. I think it’s a quote from Teresa of Avila, saying there’s no knowledge of God without knowledge of self. Is this kind of part of week one to help a person discern his blind spots for his own faults and his own deeper delve into self-knowledge. Is that part of this aim for this week one?

Brenda: I’m pondering, Jaco. I think there may be a danger in becoming too self [01:14:00] focused. So, we are wanting to be aware of patterns certainly, and if God brings them up, then obviously we’re going to notice. We’re going to want to notice where we are resistant to seeing ourselves, but really the focus has to be on God who loves us in the midst of this brokenness.

So certainly, God does reveal stuff to us and exercitants will see patterns and there will be awareness. The focus is actually on looking at God and God’s response to our sinfulness would be my response. So, it’s going to happen. I think God will bring it up, but we’re not going to specifically direct someone to that deep self-reflection.

It’s that “a sinner loved by God,” part of the grace that is really important and that freedom that Adri-Marie is talking about. So yes, the patterns will come up, but it’s how God loves [01:15:00] us into freedom that’s perhaps the focus. Let’s see. Trevor’s unmuted.

Trevor: I’m just wondering, Jaco, could there be a sense in what you are saying that as we discover maybe the depths of God’s mercy, it leads me into an awareness of my lack of mercy.

So, my deepening awareness of God’s love exposes. Is this what you’re saying? That this deeper knowing of God’s love, that those raids, as it were, expose at a greater depth. my own perhaps self-centeredness or selfishness. Is that what you’re suggesting could be?

Gavin: You’re so right. That’s what I’m angling at, but there are typical emotional reaction patterns that people have, and they don’t often even [01:16:00] experience it as such—distancing yourself from others when being hurt or a knee jerk reaction. Yeah, I was wondering how you can help people to just uncover that and to see that for what it is that this is part of my sinful reaction to the sins happening to me as well

Trevor: Okay; yeah. I would want to keep some trust Jaco in God’s ongoing work of revealing myself to myself, and that work is going to continue until I die kind of thing; you know this deepening work. Being at another level of my failure to love God and to love [01:17:00] others and to love myself.

Jaco: But I understand also the danger of being self-focused and that’s not where we are aiming to go.

Brenda: That’s a balancing. Adri-Marie?

Adri-Marie: It makes me think now of, and I really hope I don’t falsely accredit this to Ignatius. You guys must tell me if I do. Sometimes it’s helpful to define what SIN is for that their person, their understanding. But I then sometimes say that for Ignatius, it’s really relational.

Sometimes it’s about the breakdown in relationships, those have so many levels and dimensions. Sometimes we can help folk just broaden the play field of what that then means. What are some of the things that [01:18:00] are perhaps breakdown in relationship with between me and God or between me and others or me and myself or me and the earth or creation?

So, sometimes the play field that we’re playing in within week one has so many dimensions. I like what you’re saying also, Jaco, about the blind spots and that’s a dimension, but ultimately, it’s about all of these interrelatedness and how is that affecting God as well?

So, it’s almost also a little bit tapping into what is all of this river that we’re into, which is an adaptation, but it’s very helpful. If you can remember, I think it was last week or the week before that, that was used as prayer. How is that also affecting God perhaps?

Brenda: Okay, Jaco?

Gavin: I appreciate it very much. Thanks. Yeah.

[01:19:00] Thank you, Becky.

Becky: I just want to piggyback on to Tracy and Adri-Marie back with lament. One other idea—and Adri-Marie alluded to it with the little papers in the wailing wall where you put your lament into there. You can also use a jar, and you can put little pieces of paper in it. I have found it to be super helpful for people to have a place for it to go outside of themselves and to actually be able to name it and then fold it and you put it in the jar and that’s where it belongs, and it gets it out of inside and it has a place to go.

Lament needs to be named and it [01:20:00] needs to have a place to go. I think. People find it helpful if they need to lament to have a place to go and to be able to name what it is. And if they’re really dire and they really need to lament, I suggest they can tear a piece of cotton cloth—just this physical sense of the loss that was there or paper towels if you don’t have a piece of cloth work really well with those kind—just to be able to name, identify, and have a place for it to go might be helpful.

Brenda: Thank you for those ideas, Becky. Those are really helpful.

Brenda: I think we’ve still got quite a bit of time. We’ve got [01:21:00] about 10 minutes still to chat. Gavin?

Gavin: I just wanted to ask you, Brenda, having really appreciated your incisive and insightful teaching for us. As directors, we are trusting God to see if our exercitant is receiving the grace. But sometimes—and I’m talking about myself—I’m not so switched on to discern and isn’t it difficult sometimes to pick up if the exercitant is kind of running the process, or if God is, because people can talk consolation language. I’ve got a blessing, the scripture helped me, etc. and you believe that. But I found in my own life sometimes that you can take over the process and think you’re going to give God a hand and therefore you actually are [01:22:00] receiving what you’re not. Am I making sense?

Brenda: You are. So, I suppose what you’re wondering is what are we listening for? Are there any markers that will help us know that the grace is being received, and it’s not just the right language being spoken? I think that’s what you’re wondering, Gavin?

Gavin: Yeah, I think that helps me put it in words.

Brenda: So maybe from my side, some of the things I’m looking for, are the dynamics that we’ve been talking about? So that shift from lots of thinking through to the more simple, affective, quiet. You are actually seeing that dynamic in process. We are wanting to practice ourselves as directors that noticing—has this person got lots of ideas, lots of talking about and thinking. Sometimes I can feel it in my head as I listen to them. There’s a lot of [01:23:00] talking. You’ll notice the movement of the grace as it’s received into a stiller space. The dynamic is at work. Not everyone uses feeling language so easily, but you may notice a shift in the type of feelings that are evoked as the dynamic works.

So, you’re listening very deeply with your active listening, but what feelings am I hearing? Is it that shift to the gratitude that the Wow, God is still here with us in this mess? God could have gone. So, you’re listening for that shift in feeling that is different.

I think the dynamic for me is really helpful in illuminating the grace is being received. So I’m noticing that shift to simplicity, the movement from sin out there. So instead of them talking all about the brokenness in the world, maybe they begin to wonder about the sinfulness in [01:24:00] themselves, the dynamic within themselves. So, they’re using more personal language to reflect on things, not in a self-judgmental way, but in an awareness of I’m part of this.

So, the dynamics can help us. I think those are what I would use. I don’t know if the rest of the others in the team have anything to add with that. Adri-Marie.

Adri-Marie: I think I would just like to give an encouragement that we are all different as givers, but very often you will feel it in your bones, and I love saying that and you might think, what am I talking about? I really want to encourage you. You can feel it in your bones the same way that when somebody’s with you and they are mourning, or if somebody’s with you and they are having a sincere moment of joy. [01:25:00] There’s something that is about the quality of an authentic experience that we feel in our bones.

So, I do want to encourage you that as a giver, there’s something beautiful about what we feel about the authenticity of somebody’s experience. Week one gives us so many good reasons to go to supervision because it’s helpful to sometimes talk about it and find our way through it. We’re dealing with our own stuff while we’re dealing with their stuff. Be kind to yourself and it’s okay to even just use it exactly the way it is.

I just want to say that side point—maybe first time around, don’t worry too much about all the extras. God does God’s own thing. He brings the creativity, but there’s something about that we feel the quality of the grace in our bones if [01:26:00] they have experienced it and if you are not feeling anything when they are speaking, that’s sometimes where your supervisor can help you just unpack because sometimes we feel something is missing and then it might be that they’re not praying or maybe they are withholding something or they’re not ready to speak or it could be many things, but that’s where It’s very helpful to discuss those things with our supervisor, but you’re gonna feel it in your bones.

It’s quite a hectic grace to pray for, to start off with. I always tell folks in supervision, congratulations, if they’ve done week one, I’m like, there’s only one first time doing week one. So yeah, but you’re not going it alone. You’ll feel it in your bones.

Brenda: Thanks, Adri-Marie. Thanks for the wondering, Gavin.[01:27:00] We have time for one more question, thought, wondering. Shirley?

Shirley: I think I want to go off of something that Adri- Marie said. There’s a lot of stuff that has been given to us, but when I went through the exercises, I did O’Brien, and I went through the scripture and the prayers. I wasn’t given pictures, I wasn’t given places to lament, although I guess at one point my, my director said maybe you want to lament that and then spend some time with that.

Is that what all the information that’s been given us to is for is an explicit [01:28:00] situation or situations where something deeper needs to be gone into, or should we be incorporating this into just our weekly time? It seems like a lot to do and the phrase that keeps going, trust the creator with the creature keeps going through my brain. How does this all fit together, I guess is my question.

Brenda: I guess what we’re wanting to do is give you a sense of the breadth. Because most of us that were exposed to one of the models—O’Brien or Veltri or Tetlow. That was what took us through, and the temptation is to think that’s the way; that’s it. So, we want to say to you, there are a variety of adaptations; there’s different resources that you can offer depending on your exercitant. Some will respond to [01:29:00] art and some won’t or whatever.

So, we want to give you a sense of the breadth. But we are, as Adri-Marie has so beautifully said, you’re not going to be able to apply that all in your first time so don’t get yourself in a knot thinking you have to apply everything that you’ve heard. You’ll be scattered.

So, it’s okay to begin and have a sense of this is the steps I’m going to take. But if Tetlow doesn’t connect with your exercitant, you know there are other options to help them pray in ways that connect with them. So, we are kind of going, here’s what you could use. And then as you decide, you’re probably going to choose one approach and stick with it.

I’ve been giving the exercises for, I think it’s 10 years now, and only now am I starting to create and craft differently. For every exercitant, it [01:30:00] takes time to get to grips so don’t feel stressed. We’re just offering you possibilities to help with particular exercitants. I think I’ve said that clearly.

Just looking at Trevor and Adri-Marie; they’re nodding. Don’t feel like you have to now sit for three hours every week trying to work out which of these ideas you’re going to apply. Be at peace. It’s okay.

Any last-minute comments or questions before we hand over to Trevor for closing prayer?

Thank you for the engagement and we’ll hand over to Trevor to close the evening or the morning.

Trevor: Well [01:31:00] friends, just to invite you into a receptive posture, just to relax as we come to the end of this moment of the session.

And I simply want to invite you, if I may, to imagine Jesus saying to you personally, the words that the prophet Joel puts into God’s mouth.

Come back to me with all your heart. Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn. Turn to Yahweh your God again, for God is [01:32:00] all tenderness and compassion. Slow to anger, rich in graciousness. and ready to relent.

You could just hear those words deeply within your heart and mind. From Christ,

Come back to me with all your heart. Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn. Turn to Yahweh your God again, for God is all tenderness and compassion. Slow to anger, rich in graciousness. and ready to relent. [01:33:00]

And maybe you can just simply notice your own response of your heart to those words as we end the session.

And I invite you to offer your heart’s response to the living and loving God in this moment of quiet.

So may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, the friendship, fellowship, the communion of the Holy Spirit be with each [01:34:00] one of us, now and forevermore, and we say together. Amen.

Footnotes