This Ignatian Life

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What Wasn’t Said

February 22, 2010 By: Lisa Category: Ignatian Spirituality, Lisa's Posts 2 Comments →

As a writer, I find lovely little consolations in grasping just the right words to convey an experience. So when one of the most articulate teachers I’ve ever had told me I needed to listen for what wasn’t said, I was very perplexed. How could I possibly know what wasn’t said?  Any of 10,000 things could have NOT been said.  What’s important to me is what WAS said, the words, the tone, the intention.  But alas, today, I came to understand the ways in which my teacher was exactly in line with Ignatius in the need to listen for and be aware of what wasn’t said.

In contemplation with the senses, Ignatius encourages prayer that puts oneself into the passage from scripture.  You may find yourself an invisible observer in the room of the last supper, hearing the clink of the cups, or you may find yourself one of the characters in the scene, the one being healed, one of the apostles, or even seeing the situation from the perspective of Jesus himself.  But when I utilize that prayer, I am instructed to use all my senses, hearing, sight, smell, touch, even taste, and imagine all that would be evoked within me. I am also instructed to contemplate what wasn’t said, that is, what  wasn’t written in the Gospels. What would I have said?  What side conversations may be going on? What would Jesus have said to me had I been there?  Ignatius asks that I allow the Spirit to speak to me more clearly through what wasn’t said.  Listen for what wasn’t said then, but is being said to you now.  In this is the message you need to hear.

In my relationships with others as well, my Examen is making me painfully aware of what wasn’t said, for good and for bad.  I notice the efforts my teenager makes NOT to argue (I try to reinforce those!)  I notice as well when invitations are not extended my way.  Most importantly, though, I am aware of myself and what I won’t say. What do I really want to say, but just can’t? Where do we hold ourselves back from saying what we truly believe? What could one of us have said, but didn’t?  When I take time to recognize what wasn’t said, I often find the places I most need to grow.

But in both my prayer and my relationships, there is a definite, glorious consolation that comes in recognizing what wasn’t said within those times when nothing can be said, when words defy us, when we are in the space of the ineffable, when the sentiment between the pray-er and the Praised are One and known by each, when we are in total solidarity with another.    To recognize those moments when our verbal capacities fail us, is to recognize that there is One greater than us.

As Jesus stood before Pilate, waiting to be sentenced, Pilate challenged him verbally: “What is truth?” and “Where are you from?”  And the Gospel of John says, “Jesus chose not to answer.”  Perhaps the greatest teacher in history knew, like my teacher knew, like Ignatius knew, that what wasn’t said can be the most powerful message of all.

Photo: "I will whisper hidden secrets in your ear" by HAMED MASOUMI from Flickr (Used under Creative Commons license)

Preparing vs. Planning

December 12, 2009 By: Lisa Category: Ignatian Spirituality, Lisa's Posts Comments Off

Long ago a friend taught me the difference between preparing and planning. Planning is what we tend to do this time of year: travel plans, meal plans, party plans. Planning is not bad and in fact to not plan ahead for known challenges is simply irresponsible (e.g. you can’t take a frozen turkey out the day you want to cook it for the feast!) Planning is being sure we maintain control of the situation, the schedule and the details of the process or event to ensure the outcome we want—ah, the perfect Christmas. (or is it?) In the process of making all the lists and checking them twice, I find myself having planned for the perfect Christmas, but being woefully unprepared for honoring the God-with-us, Emmanuel.

In the first week of the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius emphasizes the importance of preparing oneself to pray each day. In fact, he offers a few directives for preparatory prayer, praying about praying. This is not planning in your mind a Santa Claus wish list of what I will pray for during my prayer time or how the prayer will move along. No, prepatory prayer is praying about that space, that opportunity, that moment that will shortly be upon me to be vulnerable to the Spirit of God. It is the petition for grace, that whatever takes place during my prayer time, whatever movements are churned in my soul, I will be open to faithfully respond. It is the reminder going into prayer that if I’m truly open to the Spirit working in and through me, I don’t know the outcome. I am not using prayer to reach some expected reward, my perfectly planned party as it might be, but rather to put myself at the disposal of God. It is that open, vulnerability to whatever may be, allowing the outcome to be out of my control, that differentiates preparing from planning.

And so too in Advent we have this chance to prepare for the moments of vulnerability before God that are about to be offered to us. These moments are there any other time of year, but are practically handed to us on a silver platter now. I’m not just talking about that time of contemplation at midnight mass when the lights are out and the silence is waiting to be shattered by bellows of “Joy to the World.” I’m talking about the moment when you give that nicely wrapped gift to my grandma, knowing it may be her last Christmas or look across the feast table to my sister, the one you argued with so vehemently growing up and yet secretly always admired. In that moment, the one that is usually glossed over with an “Oh, you shouldn’t have,” or an “I didn’t know what to get you,” you will have a space, a split second perhaps, to be vulnerable to God and those you are called to love. To look them in the eyes and say the words of love that God yearns to speak to them through you. To offer the intentional touch and strong hug that they so desperately need, but rarely get to feel. You can’t plan when it will happen or even exactly what you will say. You can’t know the outcome, or how they will react. But here in Advent is the time for that prepatory prayer; To seek the grace to overcome the awkwardness of those moments, to not shy away from them or gloss over them, to put whatever you do within those seconds of connection with another at the service and praise of the One being born.

Ah, now that would be the perfect Christmas.

Time is short. Those moments are coming. I’ve done a lot of planning, but am I prepared?


Photo: "Last Candle of Advent" by Bob Travis from Flickr (Used under Creative Commons license)

Rummaging for God.

October 12, 2009 By: lizivkovich Category: Liz's Posts 2 Comments →

Last night Fr. Dennis Hamm spoke to us about “rummaging for God” in our days. I like the word rummaging. I like rummage sales, I like looking for special deals, and I really like this new (to me) idea of the Ignatian style examen of conscience. He explained that the word for conscience in English doesn’t fully grasp the meaning of what conscience is- conscience being also consciousness, awareness, thoughts, events, and ideas, not just sins or feelings of guilt. I actually don’t really like doing examinations of conscience because I feel like I’m already living with the inner critic inside my head “That was stupid Elizabeth.” “REALLY?” “You just totally embarrassed yourself.” “What would JESUS do?” He (yes, the man in my head) says to me. I felt a little drop in my stomach when my Spiritual Director said “You should do an examen each night for twenty minutes.” That’ll be, uh, fun. But she went to explain what she meant, and this is what it looked like:

1) Ask for light : “Jesus, help me to see through the events of this day and know where you were with me, where I was with myself, and what I felt, experienced and saw that should stick with me.”

2) Look with gratitude at all the events of your day from beginning to end: Hmmm… woke up this morning, rode to the airport in Michigan. Got to spend time with my best friend Lara, ate the BEST QUIZNOS sandwich ever, finished Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, was in Minneapolis airport – I love that place! Home smelled like cookies and was so beautiful to me after three weeks on and off the road. I love snow on the streets and cold weather, riding my bike around. Home, thanks God for all the good and such a great home.

3) Find feelings that effected you throughout your day. Tired, hungry, back hurt, happy, sad to leave, happy to be home, safe. Very safe at the end of the day in my own bed.

4) Pray from one feeling. Thanks God for places of safety and rest. I want to find more safety throughout my work days, my vacations, my time with friends and family… I rest in that good feeling of being home and at peace and long for it more.

5) Pray for the events of the next day. Back to work after a hectic three weeks means e-mail. I hate e-mail Jesus, order my day, help me to pace myself, help me to retain a sense of being home and being safe throughout the day tomorrow.


Photo: “DSCF0262” by “pdgibson” from Flickr (Used under Creative Commons license)

 

Panic Prayers

September 13, 2009 By: mbensley Category: Megan's Posts Comments Off

Recently, as I was teaching a group of ninth graders, the noise level in the room rose to an uncomfortable level. It was last period of the day on a Friday and the room was saturated with excitement for the weekend. Being that I am relatively new on the scene of high school teaching, my heart still begins to race when cracks appear in my classroom management. My heart accelerating with the noise level, I not only threw the class off-guard, but myself as well, with the words: “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.”Twelve words spoken without even raising my voice caused all thirty students who were at various levels of attentiveness to snap to attention; snap their mouths shut and snap their eyes to the front of the room. I wish I had given more careful thought to what I was going to say next after such an effective command. There we all were, thirty-one of us, waiting for someone to break the now oppressive silence. One of the “talkers” in the back of the room had the honors of greeting the newfound stillness with “Wow.”

“Wow” was right. While I don’t want to make a habit of spouting tidbits of internalized prayer, I was amazed at the effect it had. But perhaps even more noteworthy was my quick turn to God in a moment of stress and panic.

A friend of mine calls these automatic, almost reflex-like reaching out to God moments “panic prayers.” When you are running late to work and your mind is racing with the “What ifs” of your delayed arrival, you might interrupt your reeling thoughts with, “Please, God, let the number 7 train be waiting at the platform when I get there.” When driving through treacherous weather— thunderstorms with sheets of rain, tornados on the horizon, bits of blasting hail hitting your car—gripping the steering wheel and focusing eyes more intently on the road, I imagine I’m not the only one who will burst out an “Our Father” or ask more informally, “Jesus! Help!”

So what’s the deal with panic prayers? Are they legit? Should we be using them, relying on them in the freakishly distressing moments of life? Or, are they simply expressions of not carefully thought-out, almost irreverent demands, shouted in life moments when self-control has dwindled? Answer? Legit. At least, I think so. Each of the above examples: teaching in the classroom, commuting to work, and driving in the car lend itself more often to sincere, intentional prayer than it does this quickened, fright-filled kind. As long as I am remembering to pray with and for my students at the beginning of class when the environment is calm and relaxed, I don’t think God so much minds the occasional panic prayer in moments of management crisis. Likewise, the subway can be the perfect place to insert daily prayer time that includes praying for the sleepy people around you who are hiding behind newspapers, plugged into ipods and anxiously checking their watches with a tapping foot. Similarly, if sitting behind the steering wheel is a recurring location of yours why not make it the moment for scheduled time with God? If we can say that we are honestly making an effort in these various settings throughout our day to actively include God, talk to God and practice routine prayer, then the moments of “panic prayer” seem a little more grounded, legitimate and justifiable. I once had a teacher tell me, “If you’re going to panic, panic constructively.” Bring on the panic prayers, albeit sparingly and grounded in the relaxed routine of self-control.


Photo: “by Jami” by “Sara!” from Flickr (Used under Creative Commons license)