I am so glad you have decided to explore The Jesus Way: Practicing the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises. This is an opportunity to have your imagination shaped by the story of “God with us.” The world offers many narratives, but not all lead to life. What fills your imagination is what you become. In the Spiritual Exercises you allow Jesus to saturate your reality and invite you into true life.

Ignatius of Loyola hoped that by the end of the retreat you would know God’s love deeply and return God’s love in such a way as to be love to others. The Exercises are not only for personal enrichment; they are especially about shaping the way you move in the world. They are about imbibing and imitating Jesus so as to use your gifts to help others. This is why discernment and decision-making are so integral to the Exercises: active love involves making concrete choices on a daily basis.

The retreat presented here follows Ignatius’s intent closely while still being readily accessible.[1] I am indebted to those who have flavored my interpretation of the Exercises. Most significantly, Michael Ivens’s commentary Understanding the Spiritual Exercises, trainings from Howard Gray, SJ, and a ten-months apprenticeship in the Exercises with former mentor and supervisor Michael Dante, Director of the Faber Center for Ignatian Spirituality at Marquette University. However, the retreat is my own adaptation and any inadequacies should not be attributed to them.

The retreat offers six options for prayer, Scripture reading, and reflection per week, as well as a review day at the end of the week. Even though the retreat provides structure, there is also flexibility within that. Consider one of the following approaches and which might work best for you.

  • Taste it all. If the Spirit has given you a hunger to experience all that is offered, you can complete each of the meditations and activities. The options have been intentionally sequenced to present a train of thought or progression.
  • Take it calm and slow. If the Spirit has given you a desire for gentle contemplation that savors small bites, you can focus on just a couple suggested options and stretch them out for the whole week.
  • Take it as it comes. Perhaps you are not sure where or how to start. Maybe some weeks you have a voracious appetite and other weeks you feel the need to slow down and savor. You can let the Spirit guide as you go.

Regardless of which approach you take, keep in mind that the goal is conversation and relationship with God. Let prayer be a primary activity during your daily retreat. Talk to God about what you are feeling and thinking and listen for how God responds.

And finally, remember this retreat is not about “arriving” but about the continual process of becoming. We are always in process and will be until the end of our lives. As Paul the Apostle wrote, he pressed on toward the goal even though he had not attained it in full (Philippians 3:12-14). The enemy might throw “shoulds” at you and accuse you of not measuring up, but hold fast to the truth that you are cherished by God. Our spiritual growth is fueled by love not fear.

May your heart be filled with a deep affection for God. May you know how deep and wide is God’s kindness for you. May you experience the presence of Christ and radiate that presence to those around you.

With sincere warmth,

Karen R. Keen, Th.M.
Spiritual Director
The Redwood Center for Spiritual Care and Education
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[1] All quotations of Ignatius’s Spiritual Exercises are taken from Father Elder Mullan, The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola: Translated from the Autograph (New York: P. J. Kenedy and Sons, 1914). Public domain. In some cases, wording has been lightly adapted for readability.