I went to a Jesuit college, where I met my husband. There is a lot of Jesuit experience in our family: my dad went to Jesuit college, my husband's grandfather taught at a Jesuit university, three of our kids went to Jesuit schools. But sometimes I learned the most about the Jesuits when others would say to me, "Well, you know what the Jesuits say..." and they would share something I never heard before. This even happened at the doctor's office, where my doctor had gone to a Jesuit school. It's an interesting dynamic that bonds us to each other, knowing we experienced Jesuit training. Anyway, one of those concepts is the Spiritual Exercises written by Saint Ignatius. I wanted to share this exercise of Consolation and Desolation today because it's ringing true for me.
Consolation is a time when we feel full of love toward ourselves, toward others, toward the world itself. Desolation is the absence of those feelings, and the absence of love.
'Desolation’ is the name I give to everything contrary to what is described [as consolation]; for example, darkness and disturbance in the soul, attraction to what is low and of the earth, disquiet arising from various agitations and temptations. All this leads to a lack of confidence in which one feels oneself to be without hope and without love. One finds oneself thoroughly lazy, lukewarm, sad and as though cut off from one’s Creator and Lord. For just as consolation is contrary to desolation, in the same way, the thoughts that spring from consolation are contrary to the thoughts that spring from desolation. [317] -Quotes from ‘The Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola’ translated by Michael Ivens SJ (Gracewing, 2004)
What to do? When I went for spiritual direction with a Jesuit priest, he taught me to bask in the consolation periods of my life. Hold onto those moments of love and goodness to get us through the rough patches. We seek to console ourselves gently, to remind ourselves that we are loved, to remind ourselves that God loves us, just as we are - despite the flaws and failures and flailing in the wind.
Not too long ago, a friend invited me to North Carolina to go to the beach. I needed some consolation. It was so peaceful to walk along the water's edge and just bask in the warmth, what little warmth there was still felt like consolation. Sun, exercise, prayer, long walks and long talks do a body good and do the soul even better. I came home feeling healed. Here are some pictures that I took down there. They look like such opposites. One feels like it might be consolation and one feels like it might be desolation. But I'm not sure that's true. Even the darkness holds some light. Which one speaks to you today?
I wish you Consolation today, even if just for a few moments.
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