Ignatius, Prayer and the Spiritual Exercises (theway.org.uk)
Ignatius, Prayer and the Spiritual Exercises
Ignatius’ life, however, was profoundly
affected by four foundational mystical events: his conversion experience
while recovering at Loyola from the Pamplona battlefield injury; an
experience of the Virgin Mary during that same recuperation which
confirmed his desire to live a chaste life henceforth; the subsequent
enlightenment at the River Cardoner; and his vision at La Storta leading
him to a mysticism of service.2
In addition, God blessed him with
numerous extraordinary secondary mystical phenomena
Ignatius valued mystical graces only in so far as they helped
him to seek, find and carry out God’s will. Thus, Ignatius has been
rightly designated as an apostolic mystic.
3
His mystical and apostolic gifts
are really two sides of the same coin. He was apostolic because he was
one of the profoundest mystics the Church has ever seen. His apostolic
successes are the expressions, the sacramental embodiment, of his
radical mysticism. Thus, to miss Ignatius as an apostolic mystic is to
miss his heart and sou
That Ignatius, the apostolic mystic, spent long hours in prayer but
forbade his men to do so highlights another Ignatian paradox. In fact,
the demand by some Jesuits for lengthy periods of prayer sparked the
first major crisis in the Society of Jesus. When one Jesuit insisted that
eight hours of prayer daily was insufficient and that prayer of less than
two hours was ‘no prayer’ at all, Ignatius called that bad spirituality
and wrote: ‘A truly mortified man unites with God more
easily in fifteen minutes than an unmortified man does in
two hours’.
For him mortification was
not simply a matter of penance, any more than prayer was of duration.
Because his own excessive physical penances had injured Ignatius’
health, however, he later emphasized interior penances, such as
divesting oneself of self-love, self-will and self-interest (Exx 189). He
expected prompt obedience of Jesuits, not physical penances.
In a letter to Francis Borgia, Ignatius suggested that he cut his prayer
time in half and that he learn to rejoice in our Lord in a variety of
duties and places, instead of only one
It is striking that Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises concluded with the
Contemplation to Attain Love (Exx 230–237), rather than with an
attempt to attain the heavenly life, as meditation books in his day often
did. In this exercise one asks for the grace to be a contemplative in
action, to be able to find God in all things, as Ignatius was and did.
Ignatius would have exercitants ask for an intimate knowledge of the
many blessings they have received from creation and redemption, to
perceive how God dwells in all things, how God works for them in all
things, how God dwells in them—so that filled with gratitude for all, they
might in all things love and serve the Divine Majesty.
The Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola have enjoyed a privileged
position in the spirituality of the Roman Catholic Church for over four
hundred years. But one should not forget that Ignatius began his career
as teacher and spiritual guide without any authorisation, with neither
priesthood nor university degree. Furthermore, the access to God that
his book and teaching promise seemed to be open to the accusations
made against the so called ‘enlightened ones’, the alumbrados—heretics
11 Cited in Bernard McGinn, The Persistence of Mysticism in Catholic Europe: France, Italy, and Germany
(1500–1675), volume 6, part 3 of The Presence of God, 277.
Ignatius, Prayer and the Spiritual Exercises 51
who claimed special access to the Holy Spirit and divine illumination.
Was not Ignatius accused at Alcalá, at Salamanca, as well as later in
Paris, of being a heretic? After imprisonment and investigation, he was
acquitted both times in Spain, and was not even arrested in Paris
His emphases fostered
many excellent dispositions for receiving this gift of God, if God should
offer it: freedom from every inordinate affection, humble abnegation of
self, habits of recollection and of docility to divine inspiration—in
short, practices aimed at seeking, finding and carrying out God’s will
the unofficial and official
Jesuit Directories, which were
written instructions on how
to give the Spiritual Exercises
composed in the late sixteenth
century. They indicate a shift
away from a more affective
form of contemplation and
12 This letter is translated by Philip Endean in ‘Spirit, Contemplation and Ministry’, The Way, 42/4
(October 2003), 89–104, at 94–98.
Ignatius, Prayer and the Spiritual Exercises 53
emphasis on the discernment of the various spirits moving a person
found in the Spiritual Exercises to a more discursive form of prayer.13 In
addition, no scholar has yet given a satisfactory answer as to why Ignatius’
Autobiography and Spiritual Diary dropped out of sight during this period.
If what is called Jesuit prayer can be identified in some way with
Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises, then it obviously cannot be reduced to
any one method of prayer. Ignatius insisted on every method, which, in
my opinion, even includes those not mentioned in the Spiritual Exercises.
Contrary to some received opinion, the Spiritual Exercises guide persons
in the progressive simplification of their prayer through a sacramental
deepening of meditation upon and contemplation of Christ’s life, death
and resurrection. Ignatius sought an increasing transparency in the
images, symbols and mysteries of salvation history to reveal the mystery
both of the human person and of God’s self-communicating love. This
is a highly sacramental mystagogy.