Saint Ignatius – 500 years since his conversion: Jesuits in the Holy Land

On July 31, 2021, the Jesuit community of the Holy Land celebrated the feast of Saint Ignatius of Loyola and marked the five hundred years since his conversion. Five members of the community presented five steps in his spiritual journey. Here are the texts read at the celebration.

Father David – Pamplona

BOOM! Five-hundred years ago, on May 20, 1521, Ignatius of Loyola, a 30-year-old soldier, was badly wounded in a battle between Spanish and French supported Navarrese troops in the city of Pamplona. A canon ball shattered not only his right leg but also his dreams of a life of worldly success and romantic chivalry.

Our Ignatian Year is the celebration of a defeat, a failure, a painful wound? Our story begins with this confusion. Where does this injury lead? Ignatius had to be willing to see all things anew. He allowed a Light to enter through that wound that blinded him to what he thought he already knew in order to receive an understanding of God, of the world and of himself that he did not know yet. That wound became fruitful in him as it dismantled him. During his long convalescence, reading the lives of the saints, he prepared himself to be set in a new direction, not the one he had chosen but one that showed itself when, listening, he came to discern the Voice of God.

Pope Francis has said about Ignatius: “All through his life he converted, […] he put Christ in the center. And he did so through discernment. Discernment is not about always getting it right from the start, but it’s rather about navigating, about having a compass to be able to set out on the road which has many twists and turns, but always letting oneself be guided by the Holy Spirit who leads us to an encounter with the Lord.”

Father Doan – Manresa

Iñigo left Loyola with an ardent desire to change his life from the worldly ambition of being a knight at the service of some noble lady, to the holy ambition of becoming a knight in the service of God, following the example of the great Saints he had read about. Going from Loyola to Monserrat, there he exchanged the attire of a knight for the garments of a pilgrim, ardently confessing his sins. Then he made a stop in Manresa.

He would later enunciate the graces received at Manresa: a great devotion to the Holy Trinity, an understanding of the manner in which God had created the world, an inner understanding how Jesus Christ our Lord was there in the Most Holy Sacrament and a look at the humanity of Christ. These strengthened him and prepared him for a fifth grace known as “The Cardoner Illumination”, received on the bank of the Cardoner River. He described it later: “While he was seated there, the eyes of his understanding began to be opened; not that he saw any vision, but he understood and learnt many things, both spiritual matters and matters of faith and of scholarship, and this with so great an enlightenment that everything seemed new to him … This left his understanding so very enlightened that he felt as if he were another man with another mind”.

At Manresa, Iñigo received a clear apostolic orientation for him and his companions later: to help souls.

Father Josef – Jerusalem

Iñigo arrived in Jerusalem in September 1523 — we will celebrate the fifth centenary of his visit in two years’ time. The Holy Land for Ignatius was meant to be a destination. Here he could walk the same land where the Word of God took flesh, here he could walk the same roads that Jesus walked, here he could relive the mystery of the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Jesus. As he invites us to pray in the Spiritual Exercises, here he could see Jesus more clearly, to love him more dearly and follow him more nearly … this Jesus that he had discovered in his conversion, and dedicated his whole life too. Secretly, he also was keen on helping souls, on leading others to this Jesus.

But the Divine Providence had other plans for him: the situation in Jerusalem was getting harder with the Ottomans now in charge, and the Franciscans themselves would soon be expelled from their convent on Mount Sion, and even spend time in prison. The group of pilgrims with Ignatius was the last to celebrate the Eucharist in the Cenacle.

Ignatius’ dreams met with the harsh reality of Jerusalem, and his personal discernment met with obedience to the Church, in this case through the Franciscan superior. Ignatius went one last time on Mount of Olives, to catch a glimpse of Jesus’ feet at Ascension. Perhaps he too was asking himself, now where? Which direction should he take?

Even years later, the Holy Land remained on his horizon, but it was not to be. He hoped to return and even celebrate his first mass in Bethlehem, but God had other plans.

Father Luc – Paris

Paris. 1528. Ignatius of Loyola is 40 years old. The dream of Jerusalem is going to be realized, differently. Seven decisive years. Ignatius comes to Paris to seek intellectual reference points.

The spiritual experience of Manresa must be written. He needs a grammar to propose a method, spiritual exercises, which combines freedom and exigency to be totally available to the will of God. Reason and faith must dialogue, debate.  This is the philosophical and theological adventure that is decisive in the formation of Jesuits in order to stand up straight in the storms of culture without being judges of society. To listen, to understand, to risk. Paris was a laboratory for intellectual debate. Ignatius was not alone in Paris.

He shares his student room with some of those who will become the first Jesuits: Francis-Xavier, Pierre Favre. They were “friends in the Lord” as we still define ourselves today. Together they experienced one of the essential pillars of Jesuit life: community. Community for mission, open to the outside world, where they learn from each other to invent and risk the proclamation of the Good News.

On August 15, 1534, seven people gathered in a chapel on the hill of Montmartre.  They committed themselves to a common action that would lead to the pontifical approval of a new religious institute, the Society of Jesus, in 1540. An unlikely team: six lay people and one priest, three Castilians, one Navarran, one Basque, one Portuguese and one Savoyard… They were between the ages of nineteen and forty years old. In Paris, Ignatius became a passionate about conversation. Spiritual conversation, intellectual conversation on the background of intimate conversation with his Lord.

Conversation is something other than dialogue. Each one at the point where he is. Each one infinitely respectful of the other’s point of view. Untiring listening. The right word at the right moment, the sobriety of words… the art of conversation. A Jesuit trademark that must always be cultivated, corrected, adjusted.

Father JP – Rome

St. Ignatius and the founding Fathers went to Rome in 1539.  Their original intent was to come to the Holy Land and when travel was restricted, they decided that a “Plan B” was needed.  This would be putting themselves at the disposal of the Pope.  At a small chapel on the outskirts of Rome, in the village of La Storta, Ignatius had a vision that God would be “propitious” to them. Not knowing exactly what they meant, once they met the Pope, Ignatius realized that the Holy Father was very much impressed by this group of men and the unique charism by which they had chosen to live. He gave his approval for this group to become a religious “order” with a unique “special vow of obedience to the Pope regarding the acceptance of “special missions.”   Knowing that this could mean being “dispersed” throughout the known world, the Companions discerned and elected Ignatius to serve as Superior General of this new order.  After several attempts to decline this election and their refusals to let him, he accepted.

For the next 16 years, Ignatius never left Rome.  He spent mornings sitting in his small office praying over and writing out the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. Being a man who disliked being stuck in an “office”, he spent the latter part of the day addressing the needs of Rome:  working in providing housing and suitable employment for prostitutes, creating sodalities of lay men and women to care for the poor, hungry, and the needy, and giving the Spiritual Exercises to various leaders of the Roman population.  He also used the time to write over 1000 letters to various Jesuits and lay colleagues.  It was through these letters and the Constitutions that the depth of Ignatius’ “mysticism” was revealed.

In these 16 years Ignatius saw this small band of 9 Jesuits grow to over 1000.  And even though he did not want to have this newly founded Society be “attached” to institutions, he soon realized the importance of “forming youth to care for the needs of others” through education.  Thus, by the time he died in 1556, the Jesuits were known for providing quality education in over 75 schools on three different continents, including the Gregorian University in Rome.

Ignatius died in Rome in 1556.  In 1622 he was canonized along with his close friend and fellow Jesuit Founding Father, St. Francis Xavier.  It was said that Xavier carried copies of letters from Ignatius in a bundle around his neck so he could feel the “close proximity” to Ignatius.

Original article: https://bit.ly/3sNRaIE