This Ignatian Life

What am I looking for? Is it love? Acceptance? Understanding? Purpose? What words do I put on the thing or experience that I think will help me feel like I am doing my part in this world? Is there a word? I am not sure that I have any answers that have not been covered at least 10,000 times by minds more nimble than mine. Words…words…words…

I have felt inarticulate as of late. I have been traveling for the last six weeks, never staying in one place for more than ten days, occasionally waking up and forgetting where I am. To be sure, I have had beautiful experiences with family and friends. I have seen the sun set over mountains, on plains (in planes), and rise over pine trees and frozen hills. I am grateful for the experience. I have experienced conversations in cultures (both in the US and outside) that have opened my eyes in new ways. The thing is, I cannot really say much about them. I do not know what to say. They have not had time to settle. I have not had time to process. I do not have the words available. Further, looking at the news of the world and seeing murder, mayhem and madness floating alongside stories of beauty and grace, I do not know how to feel.

Culture shock, mixing with the mental and emotional saturation of the holidays, the glut of food, family, friends and foreigners, leaves me just feeling worn. I feel like hibernating. I feel like sinking into the sluggishness of the season. I know I think things and that I feel something. I am just not sure it matters if I say what. I mean really, is it necessary to say anything? Is it necessary to try to muddle through the mental slog and describe the sediment of some sentiment? Is there any articulation that will actually help matters?

I am not so sure. In fact, maybe articulation is what I want to avoid.

My real desire, see, is to let myself drift into a quiet place away from the noise and hullabaloo of the next big entertainment event (Grammy’s Superbowl, Olympics, Oscars) and listen.

Thank God Lent is coming.

These are the desert days for me. These are the days when I want to go out into the barren land and learn to listen again to the voices of my soul. I do not want to avoid the World so much as I want to remember how to listen to it. I want to remember how to hold the events of my day along side the events of the world and let them coexist. I need to remember how to let go of the desire to do and give into the awareness of “I AM.” I want to remember the voice of the one crying out in the desert. I want to remember how to let myself be moved again and respond once more as a child of God.

For better or for worse, media cultivates our imaginations. Our minds feed on a symbolic language of images mixed with emotion and intellectual content. Things like news programs, sitcoms, and newspaper articles work to impart information in a particular context, shaping our perception of how that symbolic language is used. Language needs a context and perception is always about perspective (ours, theirs, neutral, biased, whatever). Whenever we perceive anything, our imaginations are actively engaged in the act of association, working within a context and perspective to make sense of the world. In regular conversation there is the opportunity for give and take where two people can come to understand each others’ perspectives. The thing about media, though, is that there is no dialogue. We are told something without the opportunity to respond in a way that has much effect. We are taken along for the ride without any effort on our part. After a while, we begin to absorb the perspective of the “text” we are engaging, but the form of the text itself remains unchanged. Whether we choose to internalize it and make the perspective of that form of media our own is an entirely different matter. We can ask the Holy Spirit into our experience of media in hopes of understanding how we might grow through our consumption of it.

I have no idea how many virtues I have been introduced to by various forms of media. Books, movies, art and television shape my own wants and desires (for material goods, to seek a loving partner or not, to find a fulfilling job, to seek strong friendships, etc) in ways I have only just started to comprehend. Likewise, it has informed my understanding of things like courage, love, hope and honor. This is both good and bad. It is good in so far as ideas and images have allowed me to see in new ways. At the same time, there are other things I have witnessed that I might now wish I never had seen at all.

I want to live a good life. I understand this to mean that I want to be loving and kind. Oftentimes these virtues require other virtues like patience, hope, and trust. The problem is that these virtues cannot simply be downloaded and internalized without a constant process of reflection and action and a willingness to respond to grace. No matter how many times I see examples of love on a screen, I still need to learn how to live love in my own relationships. Since my relationships with people are dynamic and always changing, there is rarely a set way for me to act. I need to keep looking at my friendships in new ways, taking into account my own desires, perceptions, and needs as well as trying to understand the other person’s. This is especially difficult when I either do not like that other person’s desires and perception or when I misunderstand it. This is where prayer comes in.

The Holy Spirit works with what it has to work with. The images I put into my head, the things I fill my mind with, this is some of the language the Holy Spirit speaks to me through. Rather than simply accepting the thoughts and ideas placed in my mind by various sources of media, I need to reflect on how they affect my perception. In prayer I can consider all of the images presented to me by various forms of media and notice how they affect my own desires. I can learn to understand thoughts that appear to be good, and others that stand in opposition to the good. Asking the Spirit of love and compassion into my understanding of media seems somehow just as important as asking the Spirit to be present in my relationships because my perception of wants and desires affects my relationships. The life of a Christian is one of thought, word and deed. These things are interconnected. The media I consume plays a major part in informing my perspective, and if I am not asking the Spirit into my understanding of what I see, I am cutting myself off from the potential for transformation. Prayer allows me to consider my entire life, relationships and perception of the world (real or imagined), as a place where the Holy Spirit is working to transform creation at all times.

And into this world, a child was born.

I think of this, at this time of year, and I allow myself to be renewed. I remember now. I remember that there was a person who lived, whose words were love, who gave himself to kindness, even to death. I remember, there was a person who spoke about the troubles of the world, and rather than feel powerless, he felt all power – but it was not the power the world seeks. It was the power of care for others, concern for the least among us, and concern for the cares of the people I love. He talked about forgiveness – that I am forgiven, and that I can seek to forgive. He talked about loving, not just the people who love me, but the people who hate me as well. He talked about letting go of my desire for material treasure, and seeking, instead, treasure that would not corrupt.

I ask myself…

It is Christmas time…

Do you know where your savior is? Is he in the manger? Is he in the temple? Is he around the table? Is he on the cross?

(don’t look in the tomb, you won’t find him there)

Do you see the person sitting next to you? Do you see the people whose messages are in you “inbox?” Do you see the people sitting at the light next to you? No. None of them are your Savior. They can reveal Him, though. Christ is being born at all times, in them, in you, in the world.

Do you hear the good news?

Do you hear that voice underneath the radio, below the hum of your computer, beneath the sound of the rain, just under the ringing in your ears, in the ebb of your breath? There is a space within us all where we can know the Messiah. Is it her, the voice of proverbial Wisdom? Perhaps once your house has been all stilled (thank you John of the Cross), the voice of the One you seek will call you to meet Him. Or as Theresa of Avila describes, the voice of the kind King is calling you always to come a little further into the castle, to a place near the center, where you can sit in one another’s presence. There is a place where you can “behold God, beholding you, and smiling” and it is not far.

I rest.

Know he is being born in you. His love helps you forgive. His love helps you understand the hurt, and learn to love again. His love helps you continue on, through heartbreak and loss. His love gives you the freedom to celebrate with joy. His love gives you strength to effect change, to spread peace, to carry the message he professed in his sermon on the mount, as he reclined at table, from the top of Golgotha, and on the road to Emmaus. The change in the world that you long to see, his love will help you be that change. He is in you, being born in you. Let yourself listen for the words you long to hear.