Just as every practice of piety contained in the Prayer Book is imbued with a Pauline spirit, in keeping with our devotion to Jesus Master, so too are the Spiritual Exercises. This great annual practice, undertaken in a suitable house, in favorable surroundings, extends over several days.
Significance of the Spiritual Exercises
The spiritual exercises are a designated period of time (three days, five days, eight days, thirty days) dedicated to exercising oneself in acts of faith, love, and prayer. The purpose of the spiritual exercises is to prepare oneself and be united with God in order to live a holier life and attain the joy of heaven.
There are spiritual exercises for conversion, others for perfection, others for knowing one’s vocation, others for living the religious and priestly life. But the general function is always to bring about a complete renewal of the practice of religion, both interiorly and exteriorly, in private and in public. In fact, its aim is to sanctify the whole person: mind, will, and heart, according to one’s state, vocation, or situation in life. Therefore, one should meditate on dogma, morals, and worship.
The spiritual exercises can be divided into three parts:
- In the first part, there is a renewal of and deeper reflection on the basic principles of the faith contained in the Creed, in order to think like Jesus Christ (doctrine).
- In the second part, meditation centers on the fundamental principles of an upright human, Christian, religious, or priestly life, on the Commandments and the evangelical counsels, so as to live like Jesus (morals).
- In the third part, the soul is grafted onto Christ through prayer in the broadest sense: “You, a wild olive shoot, were grafted to share the richness of the olive tree” (Rom 11:17) as the good olive is grafted into the olive tree bringing life
and new fruitfulness, which is charity (worship).
The outcome will be the twofold fruit of purification and complete orientation of our life in Christ: “For me to live is Christ” (Phil 1:21).
p. 200Misunderstandings to avoid
It would be a grave mistake to reduce the spiritual exercises to reading or listening to sermons or saying a few prayers. What is needed above all is prayerful reflection. Meditate, examine yourself, work, and stir yourself interiorly to deep reflection, applying those reflections to your life. Exercise yourself in acts of hope, repentance, desire, reparation, offering, submission to God, petition, resolution, prayer, etc.
The exercises are not a time for intellectual study, of cultural or relaxing reading, or of a condescending or lazy silence.
It is not a question of simply abandoning yourself to the work of grace, but of stirring yourself up so as to prepare the ground for God’s seed; to cooperate in its birth and growth; to bring it to full maturity, mindful always that we are cooperators: “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our sufficiency is from God” (2 Cor 3:5). “For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil 2:13). Thus, there has to be a holy blend of prayer and action. We must activate all our powers: mind, heart, imagination, memory, speech, hearing, sight, etc.—our entire being.
The spiritual exercises can be made without sermons, and even without readings; but they are never made without intense personal work. The fruit of the exercises is proportionate to our recollection and the directing of all our spiritual and physical strength toward achieving the goal of the exercises. That is something we must determine from the very outset.
St. Ignatius of Loyola, the great patron of the spiritual exercises, says, “The more the retreatant withdraws from friends and acquaintances and from every earthly preoccupation, retiring to a place where he remains as hidden as possible, the more he will advance.” These words correspond to those of the Master of the exercises, Jesus Christ: “Come apart to a desert place and rest awhile” (Mk 6:31).
Alone with God! No visits, no letters, no distraction of the senses, no conversations with friends; just interior and exterior solitude. Silence is, as it were, the soul of recollection: “juge silentium cogit coelestia meditari.” “Habitual silence draws one to meditate on the things of heaven.” Silence enables us to speak with God, to hear God, and to receive from God. In holy silence the soul will reflect on itself, will know itself better, and will achieve greater union with God. It will experience the fascination of God, enter into intimate conversations with him, and pray like St. Augustine: “that I may know myself, that I may know you.”
There are three advantages: the mind concentrates more easily on the truth; the soul prepares itself better for the inundation of grace; and the will directs itself more easily to achieve the goal of the spiritual exercises.
A year of spirituality
There is the scholastic year, the fiscal year, the liturgical year, etc., and there is also the spiritual year. This extends from one course of exercises to those of the following year.
Every scholastic year a teacher prepares a program to be developed day by day, month by month, until its completion. Likewise, during the exercises, the retreatant prepares the year’s spiritual work, set invariably within the program of life: salvation in Christ and in the Church: “It is now no longer I who live; it is Christ who is living in me” (Gal 2:20). In this lies Christian, religious, and priestly perfection.
The goal is to root ourselves totally in Jesus Master Way (will), Truth (mind), and Life (heart); indeed, it is to reach the supreme stature of our personality: I who think in Jesus Christ; I who love in Jesus Christ; I who will in Jesus Christ; or Jesus Christ who thinks in me, who loves in me, who wills in me.
Practical element
St. Augustine describes the structure and fruit of the exercises with these words: “Man is a pilgrim. The starting point is sin; the goal is God; the way that leads to God is Jesus Christ.” Now, the human person is gifted with intelligence, will, and feelings. To think in Christ, we need to meditate on the truths he preached; to will in Christ, we need to contemplate his life from his Incarnation to his glorification; to love in Christ, we must make his heart ours, banishing every other love and focusing on the twofold love of Jesus Christ for the Father and for every human person.
Meditations
The exercises consist of three parts, all in view of renewing and uplifting the person. The first aims at removing error or ignorance through meditation on revealed truths. The second seeks to remove bad habits through meditation on divine examples and teachings.
The third is directed at removing sin and human attachments through prayer, in the broader sense, and meditation on the means of grace. This way, we keep before us the description of religion in its basic components—doctrine, morals, and worship—and we follow the path God chose for us to reach him, that path that is the Divine Master, Truth, Way, and Life.
Normally, for professed religious more advanced in religious life, the emphasis should be placed on the exercise of union. Thus, rather than being presented in the form of instructions or meditations that exercise the will on the topics proposed, the third part should take the form of ardent contemplation of the mysteries referred to, so as to participate with the mind, heart, and will, together with the external and internal senses (UPS, I, 183–191).