Discerning a Deeper Call to Action and Experiencing Consolations in Ignatian Spirituality
I have been a business owner and cabinet maker for 45 years. In this role I have trained many apprentices. Some I trained had taken classwork in trade school in order to “be” a cabinet maker. A better term would be to “become” a cabinet maker. Cabinet making is a skill and an art. One cannot become a journeyman cabinet maker only by going to school. One must experience the actual work of cabinet making and do it for many years. One must learn every day. In a lifetime, it is unlikely all aspects of cabinetmaking will be mastered so one can say, “I know everything about cabinetmaking and I can do it all.”
Likewise, it appears that “becoming” a spiritual director must be approached humbly, as an art more than a science, and a call to learn spiritual matters by experience as well as by knowledge. Experience is crucial else one harm another by bumbling around dabbling in matters too great for oneself. I feel the SPT 598 Spiritual Direction Practicum course conducted by Sr. Susan Arcaro and Sr. Barbara Young and in my case, supervision by Bob Fitzgerald, is a transition from head knowledge to experience as a journeyman would train an apprentice. The spiritual maturity and kindness, calmness, and peacefulness of the three are a consolation in itself to acknowledge and emulate. Thank you!
Speaking of the “head knowledge” of this course, our assigned books were Candlelight, by Susan S. Phillips,[1] and The Call to Discernment, by Dean Brackley.[2] Also suggested reading was Silent Compassion, by Richard Rohr,[3] and Spiritual Direction, by Susan K. Ruffing, R.S.M..[4] In addition, Looking into the Well, by Maureen Conroy,[5] was added as optional reference material. I read all the books and benefited by each one, especially by The Call to Discernment.
I want to note the “experiencing” part of Spirituality in this essay. I believe that Spirituality can only be known by experience. Even if we are given a specific spiritual consolation, or a revelation directly by God Himself, it is an experience. It is, by experience, that we have all been called to pass along our own calling by God to the rest of the world:
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, etc.[6]
Going entails passing along our experiences, our Faith story, the Gospel, and for those of us in this class, our experienced based Ignatian Spirituality learned not so much by knowledge, but by love. This love, or affectionate awe, is derived by our desires to know Jesus more clearly, to follow Him more nearly, and to love Him more dearly. In other words, just as a skilled carpenter, such as Jesus was, passes along this experiential knowledge and skill, art, and love, so do we, pass upon the specific graces with which God blesses each of us.
All the books we have read this semester reflect this experiential sharing by spiritual masters. Likewise, the experiential knowledge, the examples of following, and loving Jesus are being passed along to us by our journeymen teachers, Sr. Barbara, Sr. Susan, and Bob Fitzgerald. Thanks to all for this labor of love. It is my desire to share this love with others as I have been so blessed to do with my directees. Also, I want to share as an example of everyday life what a wonderful consolation it was to me to share with one of my physical sisters the Examen Prayer. My sister expressed her burden to me of being somewhat addicted to list passed praying and going over the same list year after year habitually and not letting go. I gave her two versions of the Examen Prayer and suggested she look up videos of the Examen Prayer on the internet and perhaps drop some of the list-based praying she said was burdensome to her. She told me how helpful this was to her. I share this because it is just one example of how our classwork this semester is bleeding off into my daily life and living with others. What a blessing it was to share spiritual matters with one I cradled in my arms when she was a baby.
I feel this Fall’s class is where the rubber meets the road regarding Ignatian Spirituality. Now is the time to discern our specific calling to this skill and art of experiential Ignatian Spirituality. May we discover how much we love others, how much we want to help others, as Ignatius did. May we go into all the world as tools in His hands. Now is the time for action. The course name, Practicum, points to action and experience. Our response to the call is action.
I would like to share some insights I experienced from reading the books for this past semester. Candlelight draws on many years of the Spiritual Direction experiences of its author, Susan S. Phillips. Dr. Phillips using actual cases of her directees (names changed) to illustrate for us how the art of Spiritual Direction is actually done. One of the greatest consolations of her book to me was her 21st chapter, Planted by the Waters. What resonated with me was that I should not try too hard on my own, but trust that God has called me to this work of spiritual direction and will of His desires supply nourishment to bear fruits of His grace, not only in me as I help others, but also provide His direct nourishment to the directees I am trying to help. In this work of God’s grace as both the director and the directee sit in the candlelight of His Presence, this grace acting upon both. I wrote an extra essay about Grace being a “middle voice” of Spirituality,[7] this is, that both Director and Directee are participants in the action that another, (God,) initiates.
Also, in Candlelight, Susan Phillips indicates respect for taking a Sabbath each week. “There’s a feel of Sabbath to spiritual direction. We enter into the rest that God blessed and called “holy,” a time of reflecting on the wholeness of creation and union with God.”[8] For many years after leaving the Catholic Church at about 20 years of age, for matters of conscious, I observed the seventh day Sabbath (Saturday) of the Ten Commandments. A little over 20 years ago I came to a better understanding of the New Covenant, and that our rest is actually in Jesus, who started His work in us, and I no longer observe the letter of the law, evening Friday to Saturday evening Sabbath rest strictly, but I respect those who attend to their spirituality in this manner. It was a consolation to me to see how Dr. Phillips valued the Sabbath in relationship to spirituality and a reminder to me to respect all people’s beliefs.
The Call to Discernment was in my view the deepest and most profound of the books we were assigned this semester.[9] Brackley takes a journey through the Exercises[10] as if one were experiencing the actual Exercises week by week. I have taken the 19th Annotation of the Exercises and reading The Call to Discernment brought back my actual experiences of the Exercises to life once again. When doing the Call of Christ, the King part of the Exercises, I received my first desires to promote Ignatian Spirituality, and specifically to write a book about my journey and to share the Exercises with others. This book, Let God In: One Ignatian Journey is soon to be published and I am also in discernment regarding the promotion of this book which is a fruit of this calling. The 19th Annotation was an additional conversion experience for me. It is just one of the factors which led me back to the Catholic Church of my youth. The Call to Discernment speaks to the heart of my personal theology of non-violence and social justice and deepens my commitment and call to promote Ignatian Spirituality, not just for Catholics, but for others who may be Protestant, or of another Faith Tradition, or no tradition at all.
Next, I will mention Silent Compassion[11] and Spiritual Direction[12] in relationship to how these two books also led to responding to the call of God and my own personal discernment. I already follow Richard Rohr’s daily meditations. I use apophatic (wordless, thoughtless) contemplation in conjunction with kataphatic (with words and thought) meditation in my personal spiritual practices. Ignatian Spirituality is largely kataphatic. Silent Compassion was reinforcement for what I already do. Spiritual Direction was valuable to me with its heavy emphasis on actual experience in spiritual direction and mutuality with God. Experience is mentioned throughout the book. Experience is what we are gaining this semester in the Practicum. We are spiritual directors in training, gaining experience. Ruffing is a master of her trade, passing along her knowledge and experience to others who include myself as an apprentice.
Looking Into the Well[13] was very helpful in understanding how to provide Verbatim’s and Process Notes. The book is helpful not only to supervisors of Spiritual Directors, but to Spiritual Directors themselves as a continuing reference Source. In process notes for my first directee session I wrote:
I thought I was going to have a real problem with the Verbatim, but now that I have done two pages requested, I could go on and on. I was feeling apprehensive because I am so hard of hearing and have trouble listening. I tried to “bone up” for a few days in advance, reading Looking Into the Well and making notes [from Candlelight] and typing them up, then a couple of days before the first session it came to me that I was trying too hard and I needed to let the Holy Spirit lead. He/She did. I am crying as I write this… There was so much more in this session I could have put in the Verbatim.
In closing, I want to speak of my class experiences of consolation this semester. Our commonality of spirit in periods of prayer was very important to me. Several of us shared different prayer presentations and Sr. Barbara and Sr. Susan offered succinct and helpful handouts relating to prayer. Our prayer time was experiential in nature with each of us learning from each other’s efforts as if we were a team of prayer warriors. Experience in prayer is crucial to all spirituality. Bob Fitzgerald was very effective in advising exactly the right things and pointing out principles directly from the Exercises to clarify my concerns. Thanks to all, including my classmates! Finally, as a journeyman passes along his trade to future generations of apprentices, let it be so with Sr. Barbara and Sr. Susan, and Bob Fitzgerald, as those of us in our Fall 2018 class offer ourselves as tools in God’s hands and continue to discern just how, when, and where we will work to help all God’s people!
John Cooper
Tuscaloosa, AL
[1] Candlelight: illuminating spiritual direction, by Susan S. Phillips, Morehouse Publishing, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-8I92-2297-8 (pbk.)
[2] The call to discernment in troubled times : new perspectives on the transformative wisdom of Ignatius, of Loyola, by Dean Brackley, The Crossroads Publishing Company, 2004, ISBN: 0-8245-2268-0 (alk. Paper)
[3] Silent Compassion : finding God in contemplation, by Richard Rohr, Franciscan Media, 2014, ISBN: 978-61636-757-2 (alk. Paper)
[4] Spiritual Direction: beyond the beginnings, by Janet K. Ruffing, Paulist Press, 2000, ISBN: 0-8091-3958-8 (alk. Paper)
[5] Looking into the Well: Supervision of Spiritual Directors, by Maureen Conroy, Loyola University Press, 1995, ISBN:0-8294-0827-4
[6] The Go-Anywhere Thinline Bible Catholic Edition, NRSV, by HarperCollins Publishers, 2010, p. 945, Mat. 28:19
[7] https://jcooperforpeace.org/?s=middle+voice
[8] Ibid, p. 189.
[9] Ibid.
[10] The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, Ignatius of Loyola
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Ibid.
jcooperFORpeace 