IGNATIAN SPIRITUAL EXERCISES TRAINING (ISET)
2023-BLOCK THREE – SESSION 22
THE BIG PICTURE OF THE THREE KEY STRUCTURED EXERCISES
Adri-Marie: [00:00:00] Hello everybody. It’s been a while since we’ve seen each other. It is so good to see you all. Lovely to be together. I wonder; just as a fun way of checking in and as we wait for the last few to join. I think we’re [00:01:00] waiting for two or three people. Don’t you just want to, in the chat, maybe put a word of how we’re finding you.
It’s been a while since we saw each other. I wonder if you could offer us a word. How are we finding you to tonight? You look delightful. Wondering how you’re rested?
Rested. Lovely; I know some took a rest.
Grateful
Wonderful
Invigorated
Excited to be back
Energized
Expectant
It’s also Russell’s birthday, so he is not joining us tonight and Annemarie is away with family. Anybody other, other birthdays?
Hopeful
Looking forward
Ready for the next step
Excited
That [00:02:00] was good. Some good energy in the room, it seems, tonight. You have to bring it, Trevor.
So, friends, as per usual, we are a group of people who gather because we sense something about first, personally, we’ve experienced the transformational nature of the spiritual exercises, and we also gather because we have a desire to create a beautiful space for others in this journey. So as per usual, we’re going to start with some opening prayer, and I’m handing over to Brenda for that.
Brenda: Hello everyone; it’s so good to be with you again after me being away for quite a long while. So, it’s lovely to be back. We’re into the second week and the key exercises tonight or the key meditations [00:03:00] I did send out the text that we’re going to be using to pray with. I hope you just had a brief squiz and look at it so let’s get ready for prayer. As usual, if you want to switch off your cameras, you’re welcome to do that as we just pay attention and open ourselves to God.
So, the structure and the invitation, the framework that we have for praying, especially in the second week that helps us so much. We allow ourselves to become still in this moment.
We focus our attention on our breathing as we draw in breath and release it,[00:04:00]
conscious of how we’re feeling in this moment,
both in our body, and in our emotions,
fully present to the gift of this moment, looking at God who looks at us in love,
attending to the sheer silence as God comes close.[00:05:00]
As those called to accompany, we ask the grace that our entire lives may be directed to God, to the goodness of God, to the glory of God, that we might be about God’s work, God’s desire in all that we do.
We ask for the grace that we need for a deeper “yes” to Jesus. We listen to the text, allowing ourselves to be [00:06:00] part of that scene, noticing who we are and how it is that God invites us to share in Jesus’ moment with His disciples.
The prayer was no sooner prayed than it was answered. Jesus called the twelve, called twelve of his followers and sent them into the ripe fields.
He gave them power to kick out the evil spirits and to tenderly care for the bruised and hurt lives. This is the list of the twelve he sent. Simon, they called him Peter or Rock, Andrew His brother, James, Zebedee’s son, John, His brother, Philip, Bartholomew, Thomas, Matthew, the taxman, James, son of Alpheus, Thaddeus, Simon the Canaanite, [00:07:00] Judas Iscariot who later turned on him.
Jesus sent His 12 harvest hands out with this charge. Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood. Tell them that the kingdom is here. Bring health to the sick, raise the dead, touch the untouchables, kick out the demons. You have been treated generously. So, live generously.
Don’t think you have to put on a fundraising campaign before you start. You don’t need a lot of equipment. You are the equipment. And all you need to keep that going is three meals a day. Travel light. When you enter a town or village, don’t insist on staying in a luxury inn. Get a modest place with some modest people and be content there until you leave.
When you [00:08:00] knock on a door, be courteous in your greeting. If they welcome you, be gentle in your conversation. If they don’t welcome you, quietly withdraw. Don’t make a scene. Shrug your shoulders and be on your way.
Allow yourself to be conscious of the setting, the colors, the place. Where is it that Jesus is having this conversation with His disciples?
How does it feel to be there?
Notice how close you are to Jesus.
Where are you [00:09:00] standing as He calls His disciples forward and gives them instruction?
Allow the scene to unfold for you. Be part of it.[00:10:00]
Perhaps you are conscious of Jesus invitation for you, Jesus’ instructions. for you at this moment in your life.[00:11:00]
Notice what stirs in you and what draws back.
Remember to talk to Jesus about what is stirring. Share with Hm what you notice about the invitation, what excites you or what frightens you.[00:12:00] [00:13:00] [00:14:00] Maybe this prayer encompasses something of what you want to say to Jesus:
Eternal Lord of all things, I feel your gaze upon me. I sense that your mother and your
disciples stand near, watching, and that with you are all the great beings of heaven, angels and powers and martyrs and saints.
Lord Jesus, I feel you have put a desire in me, if you will help me, please. I would like to make
my offering: I want it to be my desire and my choice, provided that you want it, too, to live my life as you lived [00:15:00] yours.
I know that you lived an insignificant person in a little despised town: I know that you rarely
tasted luxury and never, privilege, and that you resolutely refused to accept power. I know
that you suffered rejection by leaders, abandonment by friends, and failure. I know, I can hardly bear the thought of it all.
But it seems a toweringly wonderful thing that you might call me to follow you and stand
with you. I will labor with you to bring God’s reign, if you will give me the gift to do it. Amen.
Perhaps you just want to sit with that prayer for a moment or two.[00:16:00]
Eternal Lord of all things, I feel your gaze upon me. I sense that your mother and your
disciples stand near, watching, and that with you are all the great beings of heaven, angels and powers and martyrs and saints.
Lord Jesus, I feel you have put a desire in me, if you will help me, please. I would like to make
my offering: I want it to be my desire and my choice, provided that [00:17:00] you want it, too, to live my life as you lived yours.
I know that you lived an insignificant person in a little despised town: I know that you rarely
tasted luxury and never, privilege, and that you resolutely refused to accept power. I know
that you suffered rejection by leaders, abandonment by friends, and failure. I know, I can hardly bear the thought of it all.
But it seems a toweringly wonderful thing that you might call me to follow you and stand
with you. I will labor with you to bring God’s reign, if you will give me the gift to do it. Amen. [00:18:00]
So, as everyone comes back into the space, we hand over to Trevor.
Trevor: Thank you, Brenda, for leading us, and it’s really good to be with each of you and to see your faces. It’s my job today to offer to you a big picture or a kind of wide-angle view of three key meditations in that second week.
I need to give you a quick heads up that Adri-Marie will be giving a follow up lecture on this next week, and she will be paying particular [00:19:00] attention, I’m pretty sure, to questions like when we give them, how do we give them, what does adaptation look like, etc. So, I need to pray for myself that I will stick to my own lane and not move too far into Adri-Marie’s lane next week.
You know the three structured meditations. I’ll just give them to you by name; the two standards; three types, classes of people; three kinds of humility; three kinds of loving.
I think you have the outline before you, and I was saying to the folk just before we all arrived that the outline, I’m sure, looks rather wooden and quite dry, and I hope that I can [00:20:00] match your energy of excitement about being back together.
So, let me begin with my favorite, favorite theologian Peanuts, Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy—most of my theology comes from there, and there’s a lovely conversation once that Linus and Lucy are having together. And Linus says to Lucy, “Lucy, there are two forces at war within us.” And Linus puts hands to the chest and says, “I think I know what you mean. I can feel them fighting myself. I can feel them fighting myself.”
I think of those great, great words of Alexander Solzhenitsyn that kind of echo through the decades and have as much [00:21:00] meaning today as they had when he first spoke to them—
The line separating good and evil passes not through states, not between classes, not between political parties, but through every human heart—through every human heart—and through every human heart this line shifts. Inside of us, it oscillates with the years, and even within hearts, overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained—
Very, very powerful, powerful [00:22:00] statement about the human heart. I think Ignatius would agree with both Linus and Lucy, and I think that Ignatius would agree with Alexander Sholzhenitsyn, because as we enter the two standards, we will see that he puts before us his own faith vision of reality in terms of two value systems. Ignatius’s own faith vision of reality, obviously one heavily influenced by his own context of two value systems—the value system of Christ and the value system of Lucifer, Satan, the evil one. [00:23:00]
So, as we head into it, I’ve got my Fleming before me. Perhaps I can just read the grace to you from Fleming, and I’ll read from the contemporary reading. You may have it before you.
I ask for the gift of being able to recognize the false lights of Lucifer, and for the help not to be led astray, I also ask for what I desire, a grace knowledge of true human living exemplified in Jesus Christ, my Lord and my God, and the grace to live my life in his way.
And you can hear echoes of that beautiful prayer that Brenda put up for us in our devotion.
Now in the [00:24:00] literal translation, the grace, as you would know, is the third prelude. If you want to use that language from the literal translation, I will refer to the two other preludes later. But will you please notice simply that the grace is divided into two parts. On the one hand, to recognize the false lights of Lucifer and for help not to be led astray, and then to ask for what we desire, that we really want to come to know the life of Christ. We want to come to know the life of Christ, not as a theory. We want to come to know the life of Christ within us and for the grace to follow His way. So, can we maybe just linger a little bit here with this grace? [00:25:00]
Notice what it’s not about, and this is really, really important. Notice that Ignatius is not inviting the retreatant to make a choice between Christ and the evil one. By the time the retreatant has reached the second week, that choice has been firmly, firmly made in her or his heart. That choice has been settled.
Rather, I want to suggest, Ignatius here is, through the grace inviting us not so much to make a choice, but to grow in awareness, to grow in awareness, [00:26:00] to be enlightened, illuminated around these two strategies, these two value systems that are present in human life. On the one hand, I always find it fascinating how Ignatius describes the evil one as the enemy of human nature, how the enemy of human nature works and how Christ and how Christ works.
Now, I’m pretty sure that Adri-Marie will pick up next week that about how do we give it; for example, this exercise when someone is really unhappy with the personification of evil or Satan or the devil, and he’s really uncomfortable with that [00:27:00] language and I’m sure we will explore together how we can meet retreatants as it were, where they are as they enter this particular exercise.
I’m aware that for many people, you know, talk about the devil, Satan, the evil one, simply doesn’t work, and we may have to work with kind of other language of choices for life and death, choices between maybe light and dark, between creative and destructive.
As I was saying earlier, I find it really significant that Ignatius uses this phrase, enemy of human nature, that the evil one is out to sabotage human life, human relationships. [00:28:00] I think of Jesus’s words, I’ve come to bring you life. The thief comes to kill, to steal, to destroy. You have that sense of the force for life and the force for death.
I think it was Scott Peck when he wrote that rather disturbing book called People of the Lie. He has a throwaway comment that evil is life spelt backwards. Evil is life spelt backwards, and you have the sense how evil sabotages humanity, sabotages human life, sabotages human relationships.
So just to summarize again, this exercise is about growing in [00:29:00] awareness, illumination, and enlightenment. Ignatius wants us to be open eyed. Ignatius wants us to be open eyed—two sets of values, two strategies, two ways of living life, and you will notice that in this exercise, there’s a certain amount of subtlety and I don’t find him obvious. He really invites us to discern how these two ways operate in my own life.
I also picked up, and I get this from, I think it’s Veltri, and [00:30:00] I found this really helpful. You know, when you think of the imagery that Ignatius is using here, the imagery of two groups of knights coming together in battle, both of them have got a banner or a standard, but Veltri makes a very interesting observation.
He says that when these two groups would come together and would engage in hand-to-hand combat, the two factions would become almost inextinguishable, and I find that very, very powerful—that the knights from the two sides get mixed up with each other. That good and evil is often profoundly and deeply [00:31:00] intertwined in our lives. It’s nuanced. I think of Jesus words, “Let the weeds and the wheat grow together.”
So, let’s just explore the content of the exercises broadly speaking, two parts. Notice the description of Lucifer. We see this in the first point—very interesting details. Let them play on your imagination—the throne. He’s on a throne. It’s elevated power. There’s fire; kind of destruction. There’s smoke; darkness and confusion, and he’s seated on an elevated throne in Babylon. [00:32:00] The power of evil is not in hell. The power of evil is in this historical world. It’s situated in this world.
Then at point two of sending demons throughout the world and you have the sense of the pervasiveness of evil, both within the personal and the social context of our lives. That the power of evil, however we may speak about it, operates both personally, relationally, and socially.
So let that just be there imaginatively. Notice the [00:33:00] address, and I could have also said strategy, but I’ll use the word. Notice the address of Lucifer. There’s a strong theme of enslavement; an enslavement to three things, and these always work together in Ignatius’s thought—to riches, to honor, and to pride. Kind of moving from the attachment to riches, an attachment to honor and an attachment to establish myself as the ultimate frame of reference, as the absolute.[00:34:00]
We may want to pause here a little bit. I don’t know about you, but this takes me into that line that passes through my human heart. It really does. my own entanglement out of my need for security, to my attachments to material resource, my attachments to reputation, how other people see me, my attachment to playing God.
Notice the description of Jesus. Did you notice in that picture that Brenda showed? Where was Christ standing? He wasn’t on an [00:35:00] elevated throne. He was standing on the ground, standing on the plane. Ignatius makes that very, very clear. And in stark contrast to the smokiness and to the darkness, Christ is portrayed attractively. Attractively, winsomely,
“ What do you find most attractive about Jesus at the moment?” So just hold that contrast of throne and plane,[00:36:00] throne and plane. Sometimes we need to be reminded to get off our thrones. and to stand on the ground.
I’ll never forget my very first visit overseas to the USA and I had to speak at a conference. My friend, Tom Smith phoned me just before I was due to speak, and he said to me, “Trevor, just remember when you go onto that platform that you really are a basement speaker. You belong in the basement.” That’s where Methodists did their work when they started, in the basements, and I’ve never forgotten that.
Notice the address or strategy of Christ. It’s the opposite. Christ seeks [00:37:00] to draw us, and this is a very big phrase for Ignatius, and we need to be careful we don’t go wrong. Christ wants to draw us into the highest spiritual poverty, and this is a critical phrase for Ignatius. He’s not asking you and me to be a doormat. He’s not asking you and me to self-depreciate. He’s not asking you and me to say we are nothing. In an Ignatian sense to be spiritually poor is to find our identity ultimately in God. I’m going to read to you some words from Jerry Hughes, who is often my teacher in these things, and he gives a wonderful description of spiritual poverty in God [00:38:00] of Surprises. He says,
Spiritual poverty is the opposite of diffidence, timidity, self-depreciation, and crawling civility. It is the possession of all things in Christ. while being possessed by none. The ability to enjoy and delight in God’s creation without being trapped by it. It is the discovery of our true identity that we live in and through and with Christ in the life of the Father. Spiritual poverty is spiritual freedom.
Spiritual poverty is spiritual freedom. And so, Christ is calling us in the opposite [00:39:00] direction. Remember the strategy, the address of Satan—riches, honor, pride. The way of Christ—spiritual poverty, a willingness to be insulted, and then that big word for Ignatius, humility. So that’s the content.
Notice the colloquy. It consists of the triple colloquy, and I’m sure that Adri-Marie will pay attention to that. For Ignatius, triple colloquy, you remember—first, we come to Mary, then to Jesus, and then to the Father. We go with Mary to Jesus, and then with Mary and Jesus to the Father.
Now that might create a lot of discomfort for some people, and we can look at how we can adapt that perhaps next week. But [00:40:00] the principle of the triple colloquy is intensity. And I’ve been struck again, as I take a person through the exercises right now at this moment, how the triple colloquy intensifies prayer.
It just intensifies our asking, and we’re asking here for the gift of that spiritual poverty, that spiritual freedom. We’re asking for a deeper identification with Christ and the way of Christ and all that that may mean in terms of maybe insult or contempt.
You will also find it interesting that in the colloquy, and I’m not going to go too far down this route, there is the invitation to pray the soul of [00:41:00] Christ, to pray the prayer which is called The Soul of Christ. Usually, you find that at the beginning of the exercises. It’s a very beautiful prayer. I’d never prayed it before I did the exercises. Never. And it became a very deep part of my own journey. So, that’s the exercise on the two standards. Three classes of persons.
Let’s move on and I’ll try to be a little sharper here. Let me again, because I just want to situate this exercise. I don’t want it to be just hanging there as it were in the air. Go right back to the purpose of the exercises. Remember that little bird trapped in the stare of [00:42:00] the snake on the branch that had a voice and couldn’t sing, had wings and couldn’t fly—the human condition of attachment, of addiction, of unfreedom, of enslavement, and Ignatius is always after freedom— always.
The purpose of the exercises is to find greater freedom so that we are available wholeheartedly for Christ. And the background to this particular exercise, it really zones in on this invitation to grow in freedom, the freedom to follow Christ’s call more wholeheartedly. This is where this particular exercise, as it were, is [00:43:00] situated in the journey. It’s there to help us begin to identify, to put names, to become more aware of our own areas of unfreedom and of enslavement. It’s almost as if in this exercise, we are moving from the general vision of the two standards to the details of specific examples.
So, let’s explore the content quickly. There is always the preparatory prayer. I hope that that is how we always start our prayer—”Lord, would you direct my whole being to your praise and glory.” That preparatory prayer is critical and 30 years down the line, I start every [00:44:00] time of prayer with my preparatory prayer.
Again, the grace is stated in the third prelude, and the grace is to be free enough to choose however God may be calling me at this moment in our life. It’s coming. It’s election time; we’re coming to that. I want to point out that in the literal translation of the grace, we are invited into the margins. Fleming misses it a little bit in the contemporary translation, but in the literal translation, we are invited to choose what is going to be more conducive to our bringing glory to God in our life.
Notice three categories of people. They’ve all come [00:45:00] into a fortune. I don’t know what your fortune is. Each of them—none of these are baddies. They all want to do the right thing. They all want to serve God, and they all want to be free. The central issue is how are they going to come to a free decision. Debbie and I at the moment are in the process of a massive discernment and I just can’t get free enough of all the options. I lean so strongly to one option that I can’t even consider the other options. So, I’ve got to get free enough to at least be open to however God may be calling.
And notice in terms of the second prelude that they’re going to make this decision in the company of God and the saints. You will know that from Brenda’s prayer as well today. The first category of people—they really want to be free, but they put off [00:46:00] the decision. All talk, as Fleming says, no action. You could call this group the procrastinators. I find it significant that when you look at this group, they don’t talk to God at all. No conversation with God happens.
Second group—they want to be free of attachments, but they want to stay in control. They want to stay in control. They want to stay in control of how they serve God. You could call them the compromisers. They do talk with God about it, but mainly about getting God to bless the decision that they’ve made.
Then that third group is this group who’ve moved from willfulness [00:47:00] to willingness, who are willing to let God be God in their life, and that’s such a long journey. Their deepest desire is whatever is for the greatest glory of God. This is their deepest desire. They are not trying to crank up, through gritted teeth, a wholehearted response to God. It is their heart’s desire. It has been evoked.
Let me quickly move on with a few minutes left to the last exercise. which is the three degrees of humility, or three kinds of loving. By now you have noticed humility is a big word for Ignatius. [00:48:00] It’s foundational, absolutely foundational. We know that he battled with vainglory, with reputation. He battled with this. We know that he went down a lot of unhelpful pathways to try to find freedom and ultimately discovered that freedom from vainglory is a gift and not an achievement.
Those of you who’ve been influenced by Dallas Willard will know, that by his own admission, battled with vainglory and he came up with his own little recipe for moving in the direction of humility. He always would say, “If you want to go in the direction of humility, don’t ever pretend, don’t ever push, and don’t ever presume.” Don’t ever pretend to be who you’re not. Don’t ever push your way [00:49:00] into anything. And don’t presume, don’t presume. I have found that quite helpful.
He was quite blunt. I remember him saying to me once, “Hey, don’t ever look for a place to preach. Don’t ever look for a place to preach. Just make sure that if anyone invites you to preach, you’ve got something to say.” I think there was wisdom in that.
Notice the background to the content. Perhaps to situate ourselves where we are, I’m just locating us—background location—we’ve come through the call of the king, the infancy narratives, growing up years of [00:50:00] Jesus, etc. Now we’ve just before the public ministry of Jesus, we have the two standards, the awareness of the two values systems, the three kinds of persons where we explore our attachments and ask for greater freedom. So, I just want to locate things for you.
We could see this exercise as a consideration, and I don’t know how to put this, but this exercise is really a focus on the nature of our relationship with Christ.[00:51:00]
Just notice the structure. There’s a simple description of three kinds of humility—just three kinds. So, it’s almost to situate yourself. I think they are all at work within us at some stage or another. The first kind of humility is when we really seek to conform ourselves to God’s law. We kind of know that God’s way is best, and we want to conform ourselves to God’s law. Now that is not an easy task. I think of God’s law in Micah. This is what God requires— Do justice. love mercy, walk humbly. That’s massive. That’s really massive.[00:52:00]
But Ignatius doesn’t feel that the first kind is an adequate basis for wholehearted following of Christ. And so, he speaks of a second kind of humility or a second way of loving where we want—and here, there is a little bit of a connection the three classes of people where we want whatever is most conducive to the deepening of our relationship in God. Again, it’s a very deep movement.
Now he comes to a third kind. It’s almost as if he’s just pushing the envelope a little bit. It’s hard to put into [00:53:00] words, but it’s when we desire to be “with” Christ as deeply as possible in Christ’s self-giving, self-emptying, and the big Greek word, Christ’s canonic way of life. Philippians 2: 5 to 11, where we want to be with Christ in that pouring out of life, pouring out of love, and there’s something deep here.
I always feel that prepositions have got layers. The preposition “with” has got many different layers. How do I illustrate this? I can be “with” a stranger on a plane. [00:54:00] I’m sitting “with” a stranger. That’s one use of the word with. I can be talking to my neighbor and I’m with my neighbor over the fence. That’s a little bit deeper. It’s another kind of “with-ness.”
Then I can be sitting with Debbie, “with” Debbie around a candle while we have supper. That’s another kind of with “with-ness.” The “with-ness” is deepening all the time. And what Ignatius is doing here, and I hope I’m making this clear, is He is inviting us into the deepest kind of “with-ness,” the deepest kind of mutual indwelling. Christ “with” me, “with” Christ, and we’re not too [00:55:00] sure where one begins and the other starts.
Perhaps I can put this in simple South African English, maybe. It’s like, I love you, Lord. I love you; Lord and I don’t want to do anything that breaks your heart. That’s really a very beautiful kind of loving. It’s a very beautiful kind of humility.
The second one is I love you, Lord, and I want to do whatever’s going to be conducive to your greater glory. I want to do whatever’s conducive to bringing you a better reputation in my life and where I live. That’s a very deep desire.
But the third one is I love you, Lord, and I want to be with you [00:56:00] and I want to share with you in everything. I want to dwell in you and let you dwell in me. This mutual indwelling, this deep “with-ness,” this profound mystery of sharing in the kenotic, self-giving, self-emptying way of life. I don’t know about you, but my life is just full of stuff. It’s really not empty. It’s been drawn into, it’s Paul, hey, all I want is to know Christ, to know the power of his resurrection, and to share in the fellowship of his suffering. There’s something going on there. That is [00:57:00] very deep; very, very deep and long ways still to go.
So, discipleship, you see what’s happening here. Discipleship primarily for Ignatius. Go back to the call of the king. Discipleship is a way of being. It’s a way of being with Christ that precedes our way of doing. It’s a way of being. If I wanted to use Ignatius’s language, it’s the way of radical freedom, of radical freedom.
I thought I would end, not with peanuts, but with my second favorite South African theologian, and his name is Albert Nolan. [00:58:00] He wrote a wonderful book that is very disturbing, called Jesus Before Christianity. He died, I think it was a year and a half ago. He lived very close to us here in Benoni. The book is called Jesus Today, A Spirituality of Radical Freedom, and Ignatius would just be so happy to have that phrase.
Can I just read to you a few words in closing?
When we are radically free, or on the way to radical freedom, divine energy can flow through us unhindered.
I love that word, unhindered.
The divine energy, which is called the Holy Spirit, is infinitely [00:59:00] powerful and creative and healing. We see it at work in the prophets, the mystics, the saints, but above all in Jesus.
The Holy Spirit is Jesus’s spirit, the spirit of radical freedom and we have got two questions.
What struck you tonight in the input?
And any resonances with your experience of these three exercises?
I would be really keen, and then you’re going to groups, and we’ll gather together. Thanks for hanging in there through this particular input.
Adri-Marie: Thanks, Trevor. Have a good break. We’ll see you at quarter past.[01:00:00] [01:01:00]
Trevor: Welcome back. Good to be with you and if my colleagues can spot a hand that that’ll help me too. It’d be lovely just to be in conversation with you around whatever’s emerging as a consequence of your group’s sharing, and if I can encourage you to keep the group sharing as it were at one level confidential, but there might be things coming to the surface that you would [01:02:00] like to explore just a little bit more. You may want to make a comment. You may want to share personally a light that’s gone on for you, or something that maybe is not too clear, but I always look forward with some nervousness to this part of our journey. Doreen.
Doreen: Trevor, Ignatius is so wise in how he arranges things. So, I was wondering how you see these meditations fitting In Jesus’s life, like why did Ignatius put them after the incarnation and the hidden years and before the public ministry?
Trevor: Doreen, there seems to be a bit of a kind of connection between the two standards and [01:03:00] the experience in the desert; you know, the Jesus and the temptations where I think Jesus is confronted there at the level of riches and honor and pride very powerfully.
I think another image—I’m just making quick connections here, but another, in terms of Jesus teaching on the Sermon on the Mount, when Jesus is on the plane in Luke’s gospel. I’m just trying to think a little bit around the three classes of people. I don’t know about you, Doreen, but I can quite find a few gospel encounters where you have a sense of the three classes of people. I’m thinking particularly, let’s say Jesus and the [01:04:00] rich young ruler and the whole invitation to freedom and attachment around that.
And it really falls at that moment as well in the exercises where there’s a very close link between two standards and the desert experience and the temptation experience. Perhaps struggling a little bit with locating the three classes of people in Jesus’s life, although I often like to find some gospel material that illustrates maybe the dynamic of these three classes in a gospel story.
Liz: The rich young rules would fit number two. [01:05:00]
Trevor: Yes, correct. Yes, you’re right, Liz.
Liz: Peter would really struggle with number three.
Trevor: You’re right. Yeah. Sorry, Brenda, go for it.
Brenda: So, I was just going to say, perhaps some of the you know, birds have their nests, but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head would fit with the three types of humility, three ways of loving, being like Jesus. Some of those texts, even the one we used this evening, you know, “go without any preparations, don’t take an extra bag;” all of those would fit.
Trevor: Yeah.
Doreen: All right. Thank you, Doreen. You’ve certainly got me interested and curious, and I’m going to follow up the [01:06:00] curiosity that you’ve sparked. Thank you.
Adri-Marie: And Trevor, if I can add—one sees in the exercises often also these echoes of Ignatius’s own life. So, kind of the text of life interacting with the text in scripture, and sometimes with these exercises, some of these own experiences and insights, kind of God’s own unique gift for Ignatius life, kind of comes also fully to life.
So, it just made me think of the text of human life and the scripture interacting with one another, and in the group time, I think Trevor, you mentioned something also about some examples of Ignatius’s life that’s so clear. Some of these exercises; I don’t know if you want to add some regarding the text of life.
Trevor: Yeah. [01:07:00] Yes, you know, I think of Ignatius and his own journey to indifference and radical freedom, and when I think in terms of the three classes of people. I think of his own when he kind of admitted that maybe one attachment he had was his attachment to the Jesuit order itself and that he would be quite disturbed if the Pope asked him to close the order. But he says, I only need about five minutes to go into the chapel to release my inordinate attachment to the continuation of the—and in fact, you know, it does happen in real terms as well. He is faced with that and does come to a space of indifference and freedom. So, I think Ignatius’s [01:08:00] own life and journey in terms of those three classes of people reflects very strongly his own growth towards greater freedom.
I hope I made this clear, and certainly in terms of the three kinds of humility, that’s Ignatius’s life in many ways. You know, when you look at the movements in those three kinds of loving. they are reflected in Ignatius’s own journey particularly beyond pride or vainglory.
Thanks, Doreen. Any other thoughts, wonderings, ponderings that we can explore together as a group? I’ll keep my eyes moving around the screen to see if there is,[01:09:00] I guess I do have a little bit of a wondering around whether this was a significant part of your own journey, these exercises, or that if they were not a significant part. And I know that’s putting them quite starkly, but I have come across a number of people who have “done the exercises” and when I may inquire about these structured exercises, there’s sometimes quite a gap here. Shelley, lovely to be with you.
Shelley: Good to see you. I’ll do two issues. One, it was not a profound part of my deepening of the experience. We kind of [01:10:00] wrestled with that in our group.
I struggled to pull out of what the life of Christ that was week two into these what felt disconnected from the life of Christ, and so my particular director and materials did not integrate those well, which is why I loved today’s, “here’s the spirit of this; the spirit is deepening with your life of Christ and union with Christ.” So, there was a profound experience of going through the life of Christ in my week two. This felt like a bit of a disconnect.
And then a totally separate issue, I would say. I wrestled with as I started with the two standards exercise. And I have had conversations with other folks around Ignatian spirituality, the sense of dualism, good and evil. And so, I think there’s been so much growth in our dialogue around good and evil isn’t necessarily applied to [01:11:00] moral actions and people as much as it is your heart. Right. So, there’s been a lot of dialogue in spirituality about non dualism. So, there’s a wrestling and our church just did a workshop on Ignatian discernment and some of the folks struggled with defining things as evil, so I have wrestled with that, and it really comes up in that two standards.
Trevor: Right. Thank you. Thank you, Shelley. If I can just hold the two parts of what you’ve shared. I’m really happy that there’s been a kind of a felt connection between these exercises and the deepening of our friendship, [01:12:00] relationship with Christ.
That whole idea of the “with-ness” deepening all the time and so just want to celebrate that. I also think your sharing it is an invitation to us to ensure, and this will be picked up next week I’m sure, that in the giving of these exercises, it’s not a sense that we are moving away from the gospel life of Jesus. I think that is the danger, that we’re going to put the gospel life of Jesus on hold now, and now we’re going to do these three unrelated exercises, and part of my purpose tonight was to try to heal a little bit that split.
In terms of the second question around the dualistic [01:13:00] kind of tendencies around Ignatian spirituality and the growth towards non dualism today, and not seeing things in kind of a “this or that” or, you know, either or. That’s a big one, Shelley. I’m gonna just offer a few thoughts if I may. I think that’s why I found Veltri’s understanding of the two groups of knights coming together in battle—that when they are in battle. It’s very hard to distinguish. You know, where they are in hand-to-hand combat. I found that helpful because like you, I’ve become a little bit more resistant to a harsh dualism. [01:14:00] That it’s either good or it’s bad. So, I really want to soften that a bit. I don’t think I can escape the dualistic feel to the exercises. I can only soften it, I think. You know, there is the good spirit and the bad spirit. There’s something quite stark there.
So, I just find it helpful to bring my own journey and my own wonderings around non-dualism and dualism into my giving of the exercises, just to be careful that I don’t get into a what I would call a harsh dualism.
I love the parable [01:15:00] of the weeds and the wheat growing together; let them grow. There’s an encouragement there, I think, to a softer dualism. or a softer dualistic understanding. But I think that the critique of Ignatian spirituality as having a dualistic tendency, I think is in place, but I would want to say a little bit in defense, going back to the Principle and Foundation that everything comes from God—the sense of God giving everything, some of which is helpful and some which hinders. So, I like to keep that faith vision of the Principle and Foundation. I like to keep that in my mind because it’s a very non dualistic one, and then when you [01:16:00] come to the contemplation on the love of God, where you encounter God in all things, again, it’s a very strong, counter movement towards a harsh dualism.
So, for me, those brackets of the spiritual exercises, the PNF and the contemplation on the love of God, which give us Ignatius’s faith vision of reality, I think we need to put the two standards against that very strong optimistic vision of reality as being permeated throughout by God. I think that’s where I’m coming out, Shelley, as I respond to you, but I’m just so glad you’ve raised it. And Adri-Marie and Brenda may like to come to my help.
Brenda: Trevor, what springs to mind as you’re talking is the awareness that we’re not talking about little groups of [01:17:00] some things in a very dualistic way. Really Ignatius is talking about movements, and so even in a non-dualistic sense, we’re okay with, there are movements within me that will lead me to deeper friendship with Jesus and the movements in me that will lead me away. And so, that is the reality that we all know and experience.
So, we’re not saying this is good and that is bad, but rather, how do I distinguish between those inner movements and flows? So, Rob Marsh’s language of movements and counter movement is for me very helpful because we’re not saying there’s a little something making stuff happen in me, but I can identify those movements like the wind that lead me deeper to cry into the witness with Christ that Trevor’s talking about and those movements that take me away. So that may be just another way of phrasing it that is helpful.[01:18:00]
Trevor: Shelley, how is this landing? I’d just be interested and then not to put you on the spot, but just how is it landing? The responses you’re receiving.
Shelley: Very helpful. I think there’s an invitation for an honest wrestling. And much as Brenda said, I perceive this as the inner movements, but the language sometimes is distracting to folks, and so it’s working with the language.
Trevor: Thank you. Yeah. And perhaps we can pick that up a little bit without putting Adri-Marie on it, but I’m sure that it’s going to come up in the adaptation of the exercises within a 21st century context. Thank you so much, Shelley. Appreciate that. Viv. Good to [01:19:00] see you.
Vivianne: Hello. Just something I didn’t share in the group, but that I did, I recall sharing in the time when I did the course was for myself, just recalling and always appreciating the grace. I know you spent a fair amount of time at the beginning, really emphasizing the grace and the two components of it this time round, but I know for myself when I got into the space of the humilities recognizing that it really wasn’t anything I could do at all to make this happen. I appreciated your talking about the prepositions and to say like, you could know, or you could know, or you could know, or you could know.
So sometimes, like you talked about “with,” but it could go for, many simple words. I appreciated that emphasis because I think we have this checking things off list [01:20:00] and we sort of say I understand the concept of this and I understand the concept of that, but in my own experience, I just experienced hitting a total wall between the second and the third humility.
There was just no way under it, no way around it, no way through it. There was just a total impasse, and it left me very humble, which I think kind of lines up with the theme, and I realized I just was there with open hands. I had nothing and it was just an act of grace that the season opened up again and there was movement. Just for myself, just wanting to reemphasize as we go through all these technical things and this type of consideration, that meditation to go and to really get it, to know it is really just totally a move of God and it’s nothing I can make happen. I can show up and I can invite it and then I just, sort of sit on the [01:21:00] egg, hope that it hatches.
Trevor: Viv, I think as I listened to you, I think that what you helped me to understand and I’m sure the group as well, and you haven’t used this word, but I find it helpful is that part of the movement through the exercises is an honest awareness and recognition of where I am at the moment, without self-evaluation, without self-judgment without self-condemnation. This is where I am.
Like you were saying, I feel I’m moving between these two humilities. That’s an acknowledgement and I bring to that acknowledgement, my desire for greater freedom. So, it’s not me gritting my teeth to make myself humble kind of thing. It’s just this honest awareness, [01:22:00] this recognition, and then the expression of desire and longing and then as you say, then it’s really over to God. Thank you so much for that. I appreciate that. Hi, Mel. Good to see you.
Melanie: Good to see you too, Trevor. The stirring in me as I’m listening to this really wonderful discussion is my director will say, “You know, Melanie, you’re mostly light, but there’s some shadow. And so, for me, this is sort of what we’re talking about is that sense of, as I have more light, I can consent to more.
And again, that’s a grace of the Holy Spirit in me as the shadows are lit up, so it’s not so much an either/or as much as a kind of going with “candle of the Holy Spirit”— to borrow a [01:23:00] phrase from one of the Celtic daily prayers—the candle of the spirit that goes deeper into my soul, lighting things up that I can then consent to and that is my desire.
Trevor: I hope I can do this faithfully to your sharing that I think, in some sense, you are relating to some of our conversation around dualism and non-dualism a little bit, and you’re giving us another framework. And the framework is like, and I’m going to use my language of the Holy Spirit being like the heart searcher and or the candle of light and that as that movement happens, there is a kind of organic movement into darkness and into my shadow or the ignored parts of my life in which I can then kind of bring, as it [01:24:00] were, put my arms around and bring into perhaps the light and to allow them to be touched by, by Christ. That’s what I’m getting from your sharing.
Melanie: Yeah. And I think for me, it’s nothing , like Vivianne said, it’s a desire I have. I can’t make it happen.
Trevor: Sure, and I think it might be helpful at this point to share that I think Ignatius has this emphasis, which is quite interesting, that there’s a sense in which we are blind to certain dimensions of our own life and particularly to our own sinfulness, and it’s not me digging it up. It’s much more the movement [01:25:00] of asking for light to be shed and almost at God’s pace with me, that coming to the surface and saying, “Trevor, let’s deal with this now in your life.” That’s the sense I get from what you’re saying, Melanie. Thank you. Appreciate that.
Any other wondering thoughts? I’ve found the conversations quite stretching and helpful and curiosity sparking. Angela, good to be with you. Angela.
Angela: As both Vivianne and Melanie have been sharing, I wonder, as I’m reflecting on what I’ve gained from going through the exercises as a whole. is maybe the posture that says throughout [01:26:00] life. when I notice and I’m aware of my own brokenness and my own desire to be whole that I see it as a grace to be received. I would say that that has become a part of my daily life.
It’s not that in the exercises I accomplished humility or any of these other things, but by going through these exercises, Ii opened me up to a new way of not striving but putting myself in a place to receive grace. And so, as we’re sharing that, I think I’m just naming that as something that I’ve carried with me—not even that the exercises have somehow made me a more humble person, but made me more aware that in my need, I present myself and ask for the grace.
Trevor: Yeah. Thanks Angela. I think you are helping us keep focused so let me just get what you’re saying. You are saying that the effect of [01:27:00] going through the exercises in your own life was two things—the one being this deepening desire that got evoked as you went—maybe desires for freedom or desires for greater whole heartedness and that there was a release at a new level of desire and longing and yearning in your own relationship with Christ; and that being linked to the place, with Ignatius as our guide here, to grace.
We ask for the grace of that which we are desiring, that which we are longing for and somehow in your own exercise journey, the deep gift of desire and grace coming [01:28:00] together, rather than going on an achievement model of kind of achieving a freedom or achieving a humility.
I would want to say this quite strongly, and I maybe didn’t say it strongly enough, that these exercises are primarily designed for the heightening of awareness and the deepening of desire. They’re not self-evaluation tools and I think if that settles, we place these exercises, I think in a much better context.
As exercise givers. I think we need to be quite helpful in terms of how we offer them, because I think it can be quite easy to say, “Which class of people am I in? Which humility[01:29:00] am I?” I think it’s just to hold it as an awareness and as a desire. It’s after awareness and after desire. Thanks, Angela.
Adri-Marie: Yeah. And Trevor, if I can add, I love that you mentioned that awareness and the desire. If we zoom out even just a little bit more, and actually just remember what is the purpose of the exercises; to just hold it always near and whether we say that the purpose is to fall in love but also to hold near what Ignatius particularly mentions. It’s kind of this discerning of God’s will, the dealing of our inordinate attachments. Just an encouragement again to go and hold that purpose near to your heart because it helps us also kind of see the dynamic because if we zoom a little bit out, [01:30:00] you might pick up some flavors of week one in some of these meditations, but Ignatius is so passionate about our freedom that he just says, well, how about thinking about it through this lens? And how about thinking about it through that lens? It’s like the exercises don’t leave any stone unturned.
It almost moves into those dimensions of almost “the sin of omission,” you know; it’s just the layers of potential freedom and this awakening of desire to be even more free. It’s like it just cycles them through the whole time; in the examen, a mini cosmos within and to remember that these three key exercises is within a long grace that’s being prayed in week two of following Jesus more closely, knowing him more intimately, loving [01:31:00] more deeply.
So, within that asking of that relationship, how can I be freer to love closer? So just a mention of that; it’s that we zoom out and then we zoom in; it’s like mini cosmoses, all these meditations keep true to the purpose.
Trevor: Thanks Adri-Marie, appreciate it. Hi Heather, good to see you.
Heather: Hi Trevor, hi everybody. You know, I don’t know if this will make any sense but one of the things that really struck me was when you said when we recognize; and it was when we were talking about, “get off your throne and come onto the plane.”
All of a sudden, I had this feeling of “get off your high horse,” and I don’t know whether that’s because of going into battle and then you can’t tell the difference of who’s good and bad, but it was [01:32:00] quite amazing because, once I thought about, “I’m getting off my high horse,” it became clearer that I cannot live in freedom and live in God’s will and have my purpose, because my purpose is to love life and be free and do God’s will. And I can’t do that while I’m on my high horse, if that makes any sense. It just feels amazing. If I can recognize. for myself when I’m starting to even just climb onto the high horse, it might be quite valuable.
So, it was actually quite a revelation; this whole thing about it’s when I’m on my high horse and I get on it so often.
Trevor: Yeah.
Heather: Interesting. Thank you.
Trevor: Thank you, Heather. As I witness your experience, Heather, I think you’ve [01:33:00] allowed these very powerful images of throne and plane. You’ve just allowed them to play on your own imagination, and you’ve come up with your own language, which really speaks to yourself of getting onto your high horse. It doesn’t become a thing of self-judgment, but it becomes a thing of awareness; that maybe I just become a little bit more aware when I’m beginning to put my feet in the stirrups and get onto the saddle and also just in one’s examen of reflecting on the day; has it played out today? It’s just that tool again of deepening awareness or enlightenment, if you want to use that word or illumination of the truth of my [01:34:00] life, which I can bring to Christ. Well, thank you.
Heather: It is quite amazing because I feel that I am a plain person. I love to be on the plains, you know, in the grid’s kind of thing, in that dusty kind of place, literally. And so, it’s really brought it so alive for me. So, thank you.
Trevor: Thank you. Thanks Heather. Appreciate that very much. I think we’ve got time maybe for one more interaction—anything else that has really just been helpful or anything that you’d like just to open up a little bit more for conversation.
Tracy: Hey Trevor; It’s Tracy.
Trevor: Hi, Tracy. Good to see you.
Tracy: Yeah, good to see you. You know, I feel myself kind of [01:35:00] looking at the three degrees of humility and I like how you had rephrased it, “I love you, Lord, and I want to do whatever is conducive; and I love you Lord, and I want to be with you and share with you.” You know, I always find myself in that push pull between what am I going to do for the Lord and this being with the Lord and like that unity with God, and you know, it’s in unity with God when do I do? And what am I doing that’s leading me away from unity with God, even though it’s with a desire for God? And I don’t know if I’m making any sense at all as I put those words together, but I find myself just squeezing back and forth between those two and just almost feeling uncertain.
Trevor: May I just ask for myself a clarifying question? Are you saying that within your own experience, especially when we came to the [01:36:00] three kinds of humility, you get drawn to a tension, a push pull in your own experience of being—the being dimension with God or the being dimension with Christ and the doing or the active dimension.
Tracy: That’s right.
Trevor: Okay.
Tracy: Yeah, and it seems like the being dimension leads to doing, if that makes sense and this is gonna sound simplistic, but it’s not like we just sit and soak in God’s presence 24 hours a day with our life and, you know, I was kind of even struck about like thinking about unfreedom versus freedom and when am I operating from freedom and what I’m doing and when am I operating out of unfreedom, but out of a desire to do for Christ? And maybe it was [01:37:00] just a noticing of that or a struggle for me, but It struck me different today.
Trevor: Okay, and may I just think aloud with you and wonder aloud with you. I’m also wondering whether they’re not like separate, like the I’m either being with Christ or I’m either doing for Christ, that rather than either/or, there’s maybe much more of an integration that the person I bring to each moment in my life of doing each encounter, each task is hopefully some sense of my mutual indwelling with Christ.
So, it’s not that go and be and then I go and do, but it’s much more a sense [01:38:00] of I’m Tracy, you’re coming into this moment with Christ who is with you and in you If that makes sense,
Tracy: I think we learned this in spiritual direction to like, we’re sitting in the room with Christ doing with Christ, and it’s kind of like, can every part of my life be with the indwelling of Christ in every moment that I’m living. I think that might be what you’re saying.
Trevor: Yeah, and that’s why I love the word “with,” Tracy. I really do love that word, and it comes up a lot, you know, right from the Call of the King; the first call of Christ in the Call of the King is to come and be with Him.
So, “with” is a very strong theme through the exercises, almost growing and growing into the other preposition of “in,” [01:39:00] and it’s almost growing from with morphing into “in,” and when you come to the contemplation on the love of God, the preposition there Is now “in,” and it’s very powerful.
Tracy: I don’t know if we have time for this, but it brings up another curiosity because I was thinking about this idea of God in all things, including like suffering and hard things happening in the world. Something I was kind of pondering was this word “with” of like, God is “with” us in these horrible things. God doesn’t cause the horrible things that happen, but how is God “in” or “with” us through that and just kind of thinking about what you just said with the word “in;” it has me curious.
Trevor: I’m going to hold my own response to that Tracy if I may if I can just live with you in that [01:40:00] curiosity of the wondering of how God is present in immense suffering. I just want to hold it. If I may. I think I will hand over to Adri-Marie.
Adri-Marie: So, we are gently landing and celebrating being together again. So, I just want to invite you. I’m going to pray the grace of the second week, just gently, and I wonder if you can let those words just soak into, pray with, and enjoy however that lands with you.
Jesus, we desire to follow [01:41:00] you more closely. We desire to love you more deeply. To know you more intimately. Jesus, I desire, and we desire to follow you more closely. I and we desire to grow in deep love with you. I and we desire an intimacy, a deeper knowing.[01:42:00] Thank you for being with us as we share the desire to be with you too. Amen.
Lovely to be with you all. See you next week. Bye.