 All right. Hi, everyone. Thank you for joining us for the third session of our study group on the autobiography of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Again, my name is Jessica Colligan, and with me, of course, is Father Jerry Bloszek, who will be leading our discussion this evening. We as always ask that you please keep your microphones muted while Father Jerry is speaking, but we do encourage you to use either the chat or the raise hand feature if you want to either answer some of the questions that Father Jerry is posing to the group or if you have questions of your own that you would like to get his thoughts on. We've really enjoyed the interactions that we've had with you over the last two sessions and look forward to hearing from you again tonight. And now I will pass things over to Father Jerry. Thank you very much, Jessica. Again, I see some familiar names and some new names. You're all most welcome. I hope that you and your families and communities enjoyed a rich and beautiful Easter celebration in Paschal Triduum. And I hope that you continue to enjoy Easter, both in the Latin Rite and in the Greek Rite. The week of Easter is a continuation. Easter doesn't last one day. It lasts not even only seven or eight days. It lasts 50 days. So the celebration of Easter goes on and on in our liturgical year. So again, thank you for being here and let me reiterate Jessica's invitation for you to intervene at any time with questions or comments or corrections. This is supposed to be ideally a book study club and so the more participation, the better. We're at the stage in Ignatius' memoirs, autobiography, reminiscences in which Ignatius covers the time between his return from the Holy Land. Let's be honest, kind of an aborted effort to spend his life in the Holy Land. With the courtesy of our Franciscan friends, they wisely anticipated that Ignatius would probably get himself in trouble and they'd have to get him out of it. So they sent him back. And when Ignatius arrives in Barcelona, he decides that he's going to do something that I don't think he would have anticipated. What does Ignatius decide to do when he gets back to Barcelona? When he gets to Barcelona? Okay. Anybody? What's going on here? I can't hear you. Hi, Mary Frances. What does he decide to do? Hello. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Does he decide to go back and spend more time in solitude at Montserrat or to join the monks at Montserrat? I was too... I'm not happy here. So this would be... Let's just go back. Yeah, it's the sixth part of the autobiography from Barcelona. I'm not sure how he draws the conclusion at this stage. It wasn't even terribly clear what he intended to do in the Holy Land. He wanted to stay, but you remember that from the very beginning of the process of his conversion at Casa Loyola, he starts to notice that... His conversations about the things of God seem to move people, right? And even in Manresa, you remember, he noticed he was already giving the spiritual... In some form or another, he was already giving the essentials of the spiritual exercises. And many people were coming to him for what he would call spiritual conversation. I'm not sure how he drew the conclusion, but by the time he gets back to Barcelona, he decides that he has to study, that he has to study. He acknowledges that he doesn't know the first thing about theology, that he had been a rather sketchy Catholic and didn't have a lot of the foundational elements, even of an understanding of our faith, much less of its practice. So what does he begin to do? He goes to school and then Ignatius has an episode where I say Ignatius begins to refine his technique of discernment of spirits. So he decides that for the good of souls, for the good of his helping souls, he's going to study. Now remember, Ignatius is a layperson. Ignatius doesn't have the beginnings of a college degree, much less the theological preparation for ordination. And there's no indication at this point that Ignatius sees himself as founding a religious order or even being a priest. But he knows that somehow greater study, deeper study is going to help him help souls. So he begins and he doesn't know any Latin. He can't get any higher studies at all until he gets his Latin down. So many times in lithographs and pictures of Ignatius or sketches of Ignatius, you have Ignatius in his 30s at this stage sitting on a school bench with kids in there, you know, who were learning the rudiments of Latin. So Ignatius is studying, I don't know whether any of you had to study Latin or Greek, but you remember how tedious learning the conjugations and the clenches are. But Ignatius is doing it. He's learning his conjugation from the clenches. He has a bit of a crisis. Denise, I can't hear you. Is that when he got arrested? No, no, that all comes soon enough. That's a good guess because whenever he's in school, he gets arrested. Tess, what happens when he's studying? He has mystical visions and he's distracted by these spiritual encounters and then discerns later that they were false consolations. What is a false consolation test? Well, he discerns later that they were probably distractions sent by the enemy of human nature. Excellent, excellent. So Ignatius begins to, initially, I mean, wouldn't it seem simply common sense in the best spiritual sense? If I'm receiving profound spiritual experiences of mystical nature, this must be from God, right? It must be from God. But then Tess, what kind of rules of the discernment of spirits does he begin to employ that make him question that? I'm going to venture a guess here that it was the distraction to his studies and it wasn't, these visions weren't allowing him to remember anything that he was reading or studying. So it was taking him away from his goal of helping souls. There you go, there you go. If there's a kind of, you know, Tess, you've probably heard me say that there's a kind of a ruthlessness almost about Ignatian logic. If what he's doing is to help souls, then the means to attain that goal is to be of service to God. It's to be of service to God. And so the primary goal must always be to adhere to align oneself to the service of God, which for Ignatius is going to flow always in the service of souls, the care of souls. And so Ignatius begins to realize that nothing, nothing should get in the way of doing that. And then Ignatius manifests, I think, a very, very courageous and instructive insight. Ignatius goes to the school master and he lays it all out there and says, look, I got to tell you that this is what's going on. And I've been distracted. I haven't been doing my grammar because I've been all caught up in what I thought were religious experiences. And so Ignatius lays out for his school master the truth. This is the kind of experience that convinces Ignatius of the value of transparency. And it sounds kind of commonsensical, but we know how hard that is. We know that people really can get so lost if they don't have a relationship in which they commit themselves to simply telling the truth, simply unguardedly sharing what is happening in their lives. That's what Ignatius does. He'll eventually kind of, he'll eventually put this in good language when Ignatius says in his spiritual exercises among his rules for discerning spirits. Ignatius says the enemy of our human nature turns his wiles and persuasions upon an upright person. He intends and desires them to be received and kept in secret. But when the person reveals them to a confessor or to some other good person, then the person begins to understand the enemy's deceits and malice. He is grievously disappointed, for the enemy sees that he cannot succeed in his malicious project, which he has begun because his manifest deceptions have been detected. And that's a lot of what Ignatian spiritual practice will be about as those of you who have been involved know that when Ignatius will invite people to come, if you come to the Ignatian center for spirituality, what's going to be required is an openness of heart and a transparency, not because the people who are directors or voyeurs or get some sort of an emotional satisfaction out of intruding in your private life. But there has to be a place where in candor and in trust, one tells the truth. And until you find a place where you can unguardedly tell the truth, the opportunities for the enemy to deceive us are legion. And so Ignatius is establishing already by telling the story of Barcelona. He's helping the early Jesuits and people involved with the wider Ignatian community to understand this principle that Ignatius himself had to learn that it was vital simply to reveal the truth of his situation. Ignatius then goes on to say, describing himself, that he made this promise to put aside his spiritual, his enlightenments and his journeys with great earnestness, and he never again had that temptation. Again, there's a kind of a once Ignatius sees what needs to be done, there's an exigency about him. There's a clarity about him. Once he's seen that this temptation can catch him, he reveals it, he tells people about it, and then he decides that he's not going to go ahead with it. Any other comments or questions about Ignatius in Barcelona? So Ignatius, again, no shillie-shallying, once he understands what's at stake, he's going to make a decision and he's going to be explicit about it and share it with people. Okay, Ignatius goes to Alcala. What happens in Alcala? Alcala was the great city of the university, was a great university city. Ignatius leaves Barcelona and the next stage in his journey is to go to Alcala and there emerges a pattern of his life that I want to suggest is almost paradigmatic of what Ignatian people do, at least in the Ignatian tradition. What happens when Ignatius gets to Alcala? He does study, right? But what else does he do? He does study, but what else happens to Ignatius in Alcala, which might be revelatory or illustrative of a paradigm that emerges in Ignatius' earliest years that then are replicated structurally wherever Jesuits and Ignatian folks do anything. Remember what I said that Ignatius tells his story because it represents not just his story, but his life and his primitive experience in his early, his first experience becomes, again, a manifestation of what it seems Jesuits, Ignatian communities keep doing. So what happens? Always studying, always studying. Ignatius keeps studying. He keeps wanting to know better and more. And remember Ignatius is still a lay person. But what does he do in Alcala? Not only does he study, but what else does he do? Anybody remember? I think I remember. Please. We'll see how I do this time. Didn't he start gathering with people and starting to talk to them and do some kind of early form of spiritual exercises with them? Yes, exactly. Exactly. Now, mind you, he's a lay person. He's starting to gather people who have religious hunger, who have religious interests. And he starts giving some form of the spiritual exercises. And he also starts explaining Christian doctrine. Now, mind you, not unlike our own time, people are hungry spiritually and people are saying, even our students will sometimes say to me, Father, we need Catholicism 101. So we don't have the faintest idea what Catholicism is really about. And what they mean by that is I don't really have any idea what the Christian message is all about. And these are many of our students who would have come from traditional families who would still identify as Catholic, but were at a time, Ignatius' time, and differently, but still there's a certain connection. People are looking for some explanation of Christian doctrine. And listen to what Ignatius observes from his giving the spiritual exercises and from explaining Christian doctrine. He said, this brought forth great fruit for the glory of God. He couldn't help but notice that the experience of people entering to the spiritual exercises in one form or another, and to there having Christian doctrine explained to them in a way that was coherent and practical and relevant, brought forth great fruit. And then he uses language that is so core to our tradition. Many came to a deep knowledge and relish of spiritual things, a deep knowledge, not a superficial adherence, not a legalistic abiding with, but many came to a deep knowledge and a relish. And again Ignatius in the Spanish uses that sense of saborear. They tasted and delighted in what they began to experience. Ignatius said also that many who came to him for doctrine or for spiritual exercises were undergoing various trials. And then he said, a great number of people gathered whenever he explained doctrine. Interestingly, it's not a bad description of what happened when the early Jesuits got started. People came because they needed in the preaching, in the teaching, and in the spiritual exercises to have doctrine, fundamental Christian doctrine explained to them and in such a way that the understanding was deep. Now there's another element to what they did. So Ignatius studies, he gives the exercises, he teaches doctrine, though he admits he has almost no foundation himself. What else does he do? What else does he do? He does something that I'm very proud to say I do a great deal of. Yes, I do give the spiritual exercises and I do teach Christian doctrine, but there's one other element that I spent a lot of time doing and I like to imagine myself imitating saying Ignatius in this as well. Fundraising. Ignatius was going around and asking people for money, you know, not only for not just begging for himself, but he was, he would ask people to help him help the poor. So there's a kind of a coherence always in the Ignatian approach. He said Ignatius went out to assist the poor and he didn't have the resources himself. So he would go and ask people who were coming to him for spiritual direction or for doctrine and he would say we have to help. Go ahead Don, please. The thing that impressed me about Ignatius is the fact that he handled situations with great openness and flexibility and he was really highly motivated and for a higher learning too because the challenge was people were saying to look get on below to religious order, you're not a priest, you're not, you know, what authority do you have to be the inquisitors who were saying that to him and evenly got upset when they said well you can go ahead and teach because everything seems alright, you know, I guess it was kosher, everything was okay, but the thing was you're not allowed to talk about the difference between venial and mortal sex, right, until you get some further schooling. And that's amazing, you know, but he was really very flexible and he was discerning where God was and he said his life and he talks about making Jesus the master and then we later learned that the master was reserved that title for people that got their master's degrees or advanced degrees, but to me that's the other thing was what he did back. He was such a generous dude. Like he was, he gave the money away. Absolutely. And that was really almost Christlike too. So I would say the fundamental paradigm of the kind of approach that our spirituality brings is if you notice Ignatius, of course he was going to the liturgy, but he's a lay person and so Ignatian spirituality is from its foundation a lay spirituality. That it's about a personal experience of God. Of course you're affiliated with the church, but it doesn't require ordination, doesn't require religious vows. This will be the form that Ignatius and his companions will eventually take, but already the primary forms of Ignatian ministry explaining doctrine in a way that makes sense to people and transforms their lives. The spiritual exercises. Organizing people. Ignatius wasn't doing this all himself. He was organizing people to care for the poor. Yeah, but he was just one thing I do. God comes through for me and I'll be quiet because I'm just here for my sisters and brothers. The idea was he was developing the exercises by living it. Precisely. That's why it's so powerful. Because he comes across these folks and wrote all the time and he's discerning what should I do. What are these thoughts I have? They seem good initially, but what's the exercise saying? What is the outcome? What is the fruit of? It seems like a great idea to stay with these mystical inspirations in this beautiful prayer, but he's saying at the end of the day, I'm supposed to be studying because that's what's going to help souls. There's a kind of an Ignatian cosmological pragmatism. Ignatius goes to the university, he's doing all this stuff, and then Ignatius in the autobiography introduces a topic which we see throughout the rest of the autobiography. Who starts sniffing around? Immediately Ignatius is doing all this stuff, and immediately even in local law, he finds out that there are rumors and differences of opinion about him and suspicion and hostility and guess who's coming after him? Inquisition. Inquisition, yeah. What's going on here? Two things. Why is the Inquisition after Ignatius? And secondly, why 20, 30 years later is Ignatius still telling this story? Why is Ignatius still telling the story of how he was dogged by the Inquisition in Alcalá, in Salamanca, in Paris, and by the way when he gets to Rome it's no better. Why does he keep remembering this and what is it about the way he dealt with it that you think is in some way a legacy for his community then and maybe even for his community now? I don't know if it happened in the beginning but I know there were at least a few times that when he knew he was that there were rumors about him and that he knew he was going to be questioned that he took matters into his own hand and approached them and said why do you want to talk to me? This is what I'm about. And we give them all the information. There you go. So in a certain way Ignatius is doing two things right off the bat. He's not saying to hell with the Inquisition you have no right to be this should not exist. The church has no right to interfere with me. On the other hand he will say that he will follow the injunctions that are given to him or the sentences that are laid out for him he will follow them according to the when he's in the territory where those rules apply when it doesn't he won't but he wants protocol to be followed right? He's saying if you have a problem with me spell it out you want more information I'll give it to you. Now you know who knows how he seems like he was I mean he was respectful but he certainly wasn't fawning on authority was he? I mean he doesn't present himself as fawning with authority. He's saying you have a problem tell me what it is you tell me that you have no problems with me all right? So then I want an official statement of my innocence. So I mean he accepts that the church has structures to which he chooses out of a sense of communion and loyalty to be respectful and accountable to but he's not servile he's not he's not saying oh whatever you say no he's saying let's get this let's do this right and let's do this according to to write jurisdiction and to rules and I will abide by it but that's it. So there's an interesting model because the society over the course of history this was not the last time we'd have difficulty with church authority. I kind of loved that he brought his own notary with him. Let's just be sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you Don. Or Kevin. Kevin is that Yeah, I was just going to say it seems that he kind of he believes that he's doing right and he trusts that the good is going to set him free in these conversations right? He goes into it fully explaining himself and accepting the consequences but if you really believe in the end in mind that's that's kind of the right approach I would guess. You know to the point exactly to the point where you know it later on in Al-Qulaf you know he's been in and out of jail and you know he's in jail they put him in jail again and people are saying well Ignatius has a lot of connections right and so why doesn't he use his connections to get out of jail? And you remember it was that in Salamanca there's that fact of jailbreak and the doors are open and Ignatius refuses to leave and at one stage he says he for whose love I have come here will set me free if his will is served thereby. I find that you know extremely a revelatory of who Ignatius is he for whose love I have come here will set me free if his will is served thereby which is to say there's nothing more important in Ignatius's life than the love which is motivated him to do what he's doing and that he be that everything that he do serve the will of God and that that's finally if the will of God is that Ignatius is going to stay in jail and suffer Ignatius is going to say all right I may fight it legally I may insist on following protocol but at the end of the day if it emerges that the will of God is that I suffer the humiliation and even physical suffering of imprisonment nothing is more important to Ignatius than that his life be totally aligned as best he can discern to the will of God day by day that is what Ignatius is about you remember in the principle and foundation of the exercises Ignatius says the human person is created to love and to reverence and to serve God but remember that service of God for Ignatius is not something which is almost like penal or demeaning for Ignatius how is it that people come to want to serve God I'm flipping to the very end of the spiritual exercises where Ignatius asks people to pray for an internal knowledge of all the good that I have received from God the end of the spiritual exercises this whole process this whole Ignatian pedagogy is to lead people to the point where they pray and pray God receive from God an internal knowledge not a theoretical knowledge that's there but a profound internal knowledge of all the good that I have received being moved by gratitude I turned myself over entirely in love and in service of the Divine Majesty in all things so for Ignatius service is gratitude put into action that's important so service is not something you know a servile it's not something that you know you have to do to please God and God's good graces we serve God now not out of obligation but out of the gift of acknowledging and experiencing deep inside of us the extraordinary graciousness and love of God that's come to us in ways that are infinite and for Ignatius that knowledge that internal knowledge is what transforms everything the internal knowledge of all that God has given to me in creation in Jesus in my own particular history in the beauty of the world in my daily life this experience of gratitude is what explodes this inner knowledge develops into gratitude which must incarnate itself in loving service in loving service so for Ignatius to serve God is not an obligation if it's an obligation of love it's what love generates so alright so Ignatius is saying look if being in prison is what God wants it's fine by me it's fine by me because I want nothing more than to serve the divine majesty and to be utterly aligned with Jesus in serving the will of the Father through the service of God's people and so for Ignatius you know with Jesus in mind as model here we are just after the paschal triduum we follow Jesus through his passion and his death so Ignatius will say nothing would delight me more than the opportunity to be so conformed with Christ even in his sufferings and in his rejection that I will follow but let's go back just for a second to because as I say it's certainly Don and Don you were reminding this throughout whether Ignatius is in Salamanca or even in Paris or Rome opposition, hostility rumors negativity keep coming even in our own time and in your own historical memory what are the things that people find about the Ignatian tradition or the Jesuit tradition which makes them think that what causes people to hate or oppose or challenge things Jesuit or Ignatian and I don't mean this is really not political it's like what is there really there's something about the way we be that antagonizes or challenges or raises possible misunderstandings so what is it about Ignatius in his time and in the Jesuit or Ignatian Charism that is always going to rankle people or raise questions Barbara? By the way I want to preface this by saying not that Jesuits haven't given plenty of reasons to dislike us we can be arrogant, we can be unpleasant I can give you the long list but apart from that Barbara I was thinking the inner freedom go ahead the inner freedom should not be bound by every single rule I think is a real threat to people and it's Christ had it and I think a lot of Jesuits do too and I think that creates a lot of misunderstanding and a lot of people can get their hackles up self-righteously because they follow the rules and you don't necessarily so I think that's part of it I think you're right I think I hear what you're saying Barbara could you say more about how this inner freedom is so central to Ignatius and his tradition just that your Ignatius to my mind was respectful of the rules of the day but it didn't allow himself to be pushed into categories that were not necessarily of God and so I think that for instance I don't know the Jesuits in general I don't know I think I'm out of my league so I'll let you take it from there anybody else I don't think you are Barbara but thank you I will look into pressure anybody else want to add to that we do have a couple of hands raised Vincenza and then Michael okay I would agree with Barbara welcome go ahead I'm sorry I'm going to say I was also going to say the constant truth and the constant willingness to serve and not care about what people thought about you which corrupts a lot of people the long way and then bringing his example into modern time that you know going back to maybe Vatican II Aaron all of that the Jesuits were known as the rabble rousers at that point you know and pushed people in various directions and also pushed the social norms as well and kind of kept the church moving forward sometimes I always didn't agree but that's what I saw right right anybody else want to comment on that Michael if you want to chime in I think you alluded to this a little bit farther but I I think that sometimes they are perceived as being a lot more liberal than maybe other orders and so that sometimes like I'm a Fairfield graduate and a Fairfield professor proud of both and I think it's great what they do but I think that sometimes they're perceived as that and so a little bit to the ladies earlier part rabble rousers like there's a quote in the chapel as you walk down the stairs there's something I think it's a rupee or something to wonder why I'm if I wonder why the people are poor they think I'm a saint and if I try to help them they think I'm a communist so I think if I help people I'm a saint if I ask why they're poor then I'm a communist that's okay but and I think it's unfair I think the Jesuits get a bad rap about that but I think that's why maybe in modern times I can't say for Ignatius where they more liberal thinking faith and reason I think that sometimes that comes across but I don't know what you think you know I'm just raising the question I think even though she pulled back Barbara I think you're right Barbara it's there is something about the gift of Ignatian spirituality which is about internal freedom which doesn't mean I'm not that I don't love and am loyal to the church but that God is bigger than the church how about that but that God of course the Lord chooses the church the church is we would say that the church is an instrument of God's salvation and redemption to us but not uniquely and not solely so that God is still perfectly capable of dealing with individuals and inspiring them and that God is perfectly capable of speaking through you know people of other religious traditions even and that salvation of God is not limited to what happens inside of a church but that God is to be served and found and interacted with at the end of the exercises in all places and in all things so there's a breath which makes some people suspicious and they're right Jesuits can get lost because we're stretched Ignatian people can get lost because we really do believe that God is everywhere in the world and that God is speaking through all people and through all traditions always given priority and centrality to Christ but there is therefore for us a healthy tension and that makes some people very uncomfortable very very uncomfortable all right Kevin if you want to go ahead I think the one thing that always impressed me about the Jesuits is that it's not just a cerebral thing or a conviction thing it's an action oriented approach there are results to be driven and the Jesuits tried to do that once you start to rubble the feathers in reality it becomes a little bit more obvious that there's something to react to and some will react positive some will react negatively but it's important that you take it all the way through to the action you know somehow right Kevin and I think that is reflected in that Ignatian paradigm of Ignatian style ministry we study the doctrine, we teach the doctrine we have an interior discipline and we make the spiritual exercises and we organize people to respond to the poor that's always the paradigm that last one is not optional whatever Ignatius' most crucial experience was it resonates with the experience of the early Christians where God is loved and how do you show your love but how do you take care of the least of your brethren and so I'm not saying other religious traditions don't do this certainly not but there's an insistence that it be done also with learning and with discretion you know what you are quoting Kevin not only do you ask how do we take care of the poor but eventually with solid learning that's something that Ignatius is going to come back to again and again knowing that we don't have all the time in the world and that I waste all my time in the beginning I just go under my time in the beginning when Ignatius gets to Paris he goes back to you remember when he gets back to Paris he says damn everything that I did in Barcelona in Alcalá in Salamanca it was never really organized it was never really progressive and so he learned that in Paris they had a method that was organized much more coherent and what was called the modus paridensiensis and Ignatius took that into all early Jesuit schools and into our tradition now so if Fairfield or Fordham or Holy Cross or Boston College had a core curriculum it goes all the way back to Ignatius saying look there's something progressive something that has to be coherent learning has to go from step to step to be accountable has to be has to be proactive has to be active learning and so really what Ignatius discovered in Paris is why we have a core curriculum and why we keep fighting and saying liberal arts are still important and until we learn to read and write and analyze texts and put the numbers together you can't go any further it's crazy there's nothing that they'd praise more after they're out a few years and saying thank God we had the core curriculum thank God we had logic thank God we had enough I would say we've lost too much philosophy but that's either here or there but that a core curriculum fundamental core education and the liberal arts is essential Ignatius saw that there was a pedagogy a process of pedagogical expression that was vital and he learned that and so solid learning and it would be typical of Jesuit universities but I would say it's typical of Ignatian ministries that goodwill enthusiasm zeal are not enough that there must always be solid learning and the discipline and the rigor that is involved with a willingness to do solid learning and to do hard studies I was novice master and I didn't have to make up what was supposed to happen in the division thank God back in the 16th century Ignatius already outlined it there were things that I had to do I had to make sure that all the candidates were willing to commit themselves to the rigors of solid learning but in fact they might have a vocation to some religious order but not ours and this is not Ignatian arrogance but it's if you want to help souls as somebody from the Ignatian tradition you do it with solid learning and you subject yourself to the rigors and demands of solid learning so I think that's also something that not everybody's comfortable with in an Ignatian way of proceeding so we would say that's why the Murphy Center for Ignatian Spirituality has a very and from the time of Father Jim Bowler we were determined that if people are going to be spiritual directors they're going to have a very solid there's going to be very solid learning and supervision and constant renovation of the person so a typical Ignatian approach is of course you trust God but boy you work like hell you talk to yourself to the rigors of constant analysis and supervision and acknowledgement that it's time to go back and learn again and that's part of what our way of proceeding demands and I think that's also scary scary for some people let me make sure I want to make sure we don't lose anything else now here Ignatius on trial in Salamanca what do you think about the way the way he's lured into his trial in Salamanca I love my Dominican friends before this is a sad story he's invited for dinner for God's sake and what happens what happens when he's in Salamanca oh come for dinner Ignatius the trap is set very important the superior says so is it true that you go about preaching like apostles the trap is set don so how does Ignatius respond he's astute oh you know I don't have exact words do you remember how it runs anybody remember how it runs if you're preaching then logically enough how did you how much of your study so what are you preaching where's your license what's your background and so Ignatius says look I'll tell you I'm the most educated of this whole bunch and I have no solid formation so all of these all of these incidents confirm in Ignatius his determination that he's going to get a solid education boy is he going to be sure anybody who works with him is going to have a solid formation right has to be solid not aristocratic not elitist but solid solid solid solid so but what does he say when the Dominican say oh so you're preaching are you Ignatius says who said I was preaching who said I was preaching the people who you know whom we give certificates from the Murphy Center do you preach no Ignatius says by the way we do not preach we speak to a few in a friendly manner about the things of God just as one does after dinner don't you love it don't you love it so the core the core Ignatius and Jesuit spiritual mission is spiritual conversation dinner talk after a few glasses of wine and you talk about the things of God you let people open their hearts people are able to express their questions their challenges their sufferings their anxieties their desires their aspirations and Ignatius says little by little you sometimes talk about virtues and you always praise them and sometimes you talk about vices and you condemn them but always always in the context of a conversation that's not the way a lot of religious figures do their jobs is it I'm not being petty or critical but for Ignatius the way that you work your way into and serve people is in the give and take of a conversation that's extraordinary imagine a spirit that a conversation is the place where God meets us not by somebody who because of a license or a caller lays down the law and believes that he or she has some sort of a privileged access to the truth but that in the conversation God is present and God will reach out go ahead they challenged him in a way because they said how can you talk about vice or virtue where's your background you should have some more you should have some degree or some authority some type of course work and I think to his credit Ignatius listened to that just like you were talking before about the core of liberal arts as a novice master you have to get this body of knowledge that gives you not necessary to put it over on somebody but it kind of says I try to acquire some information some knowledge to apply it and that was kind of interesting in that conversation to me it was a setup but the point is he learned from that absolutely his performance changed he said okay I'm going to get those degree or take the courses whatever it is and I'm going to come back and still do God's work that's important you remember they didn't fuss about vice and virtue they said alright I'm going to say again as far as we can tell there's nothing that you're saying that impedes you're being able to have these spiritual conversations but Ignatius is saying what they said was you cannot help people with any distinction between mortal and venial sin now there are enough people of an age here where we understood why that was so crucial oh my God was that a moral or a venial sin I don't think any of our students give a damn about whether something is a mortal or if they know what a sin is but for the people of Ignatius his time the scruples we saw how he suffered with scruples am I on the brink of hell because of the fineness it's vital for people to be free to have the understanding and freedom and he was helping them do that and so once they said you can't do that Ignatius said the door has been closed you're not allowing me to help people at the level they need to be help so I'll do the damn studies he was already aware that he needed solid learning and now he's going to do what the church is saying is your license to be able to address these sorts of problems why why because he wants honor and privilege to know you know that because he knows how prone he is to be suckered in by the promise of honor remember that's the very first line of the autobiography I was seduced by my great vain desire for honor so he knows that he doesn't want to chase this for honor but he's learned from experience that people need his presence they need what he can bring them through learning and from the exercises and you know what he's not going to jump ship Ignatius is not going to break communion with the church many do and many have but Ignatius remained wanting to live in the communion of the church and so he's dealing with the authority and what they're laying on him but why not because he wants power not because he's drawn to clerical privilege he despises all of that he hates all that because he knows how dangerous it is for him for everybody he sees how dangerous it's become but for him he knows how the attraction to privilege and honor and prestige he knows how killing that is for himself but nonetheless he's willing to do it why because nothing is more important than to quote some quotes help souls to help souls to help souls to help souls and when he's helping souls he's in total alignment with Christ whom he believes calls to him remember Ignatius sees his life always and every human life as a call in the exercises this is where Ignatius talks about the call of Christ the king directed to each person individually and to all to share the life giving message of what an authentic life looks like so Ignatius says all of us are sent on mission life is a mission one thing I really admired about this story one little snippet it says how a poor person or some Spaniard cheats him out of money then later on he gets a note from that same Spanish person that said I'm sick and I'm ill in Ruan will you come and give me some money where's Christ like he goes there he goes there I forgive you I'll do all I can to help you not only that Ignatius looks at this guy and thinks there might be potential for him to be won over for Christ he doesn't write him off doesn't write him off when Ignatius wait I was going to tell you here or ask you what you thought about I love that when Ignatius is in prison and his friends keep coming to take care of him they keep coming to see him so there he is he's being he's put in prison threatened by the inquisition and quote the pilgrim kept on his practice of speaking about the things of God there's a stubbornness about Ignatius which comes from this conviction that his life is a mission and that there's nothing more important than sharing with people the things of God but he does it from what we can tell well we know the way Ignatius gave the exercises how he told us to be giving the exercises and he tells us I wasn't preaching at people I wasn't wagging my finger at them I was having conversations isn't that the way typically the best of our tradition does its work with these conversations now as we were saying earlier and Barbara you're the one who picked this up there's something very dangerous about introducing people to the living spirit of Jesus it gives them freedom and it makes them unpredictable some of you there's a story you know Tess I may have told this or Don when you guys were in formation but one of our students who's no longer here he did the 10 week program where our students spend an hour every day praying reflecting and then see a spiritual director once a week this young gentleman came to see me and his father had pretty well decided his father worked on the street his father had pretty well decided that his son was going to move into the family's finance business and that he was going to be a volunteer and the young man when he was praying discovered more and more that his heart was not in that and that what made him happiest he was an athlete and what made him happiest was to help the younger athletes and as much as he enjoyed you know having goals and being applauded what made him much happier what made him himself was helping to foster young people he had never thought of himself in those terms but as he was quiet, as he listened as he listened to the Jesus story he said that's what I want to be about and it was just before Easter one year and he said to me well father don't mind if I use this language because I'm trying to be accurate he said father don't mind I'm going to be pissed at you I said why is that he said my old man's going to say that the Jesuits got me soft in the head because the young man was going to have the courage to say to his father I think I want to do something different I think maybe I want to be a high school teacher that's not what you had in mind for me you know I think I like to be a high school teacher and a coach and then he said my father's going to be my father's going to be so pissed at you and I said friend and tell him to complain to God I never told you you should be a high school teacher or a coach but see it's the freedom so Barbara you're right Ignatius and this Ignatian tradition once we bring people to a place where they start listening and believing that God really is alive and speaks to them through their own experience and draws them to a place of authenticity and in service then we're very unpredictable and certain kinds of people who don't want that and would regard our sort of spirituality of empowering people to receive the freedom of the sons and daughters of God that's pretty damn dangerous alright we're almost finished my goodness how did the time pass so quickly this week alright last opportunity for questions comments protests corrections nobody not seeing any hands or anything alright thank you all very much so we will go we will go I will pick up where we left we didn't talk about what happened with Ignatius and the Indians at the very end in Paris where at the chapel there's a little chapel on the base of Montmartre and and it's the chapel of Saint Denis and Ignatius and his college roommates and companions made a promise that they didn't know where God was taking them but that they were going to stick this out together that God was that they were all pilgrims and that they were going to go to Jerusalem and serve people there maybe try to convert the Muslims but in any case they would get to the Holy Land that then they would go to the Holy Father and say we're at your disposal whatever you want us to do we'll do and that launches us into the beginnings of the foundation of the society of Jesus thank you everybody thank you thank you everyone we'll see you for our final session two weeks from tonight it will be in May already Tuesday May 3rd and we'll cover the remainder of the book chapters 9 through 11 thank you very much everybody thank you all so much