Glossary Of Working Definitions
Of Terms Associated With This Website (1)
From A through D 1. Please note the meaning of the following signs associated with many of the terms in this glossary: 2. Also please note how some terms have been capitalized to indicate technical words associated with the Exercises or those particularly significant in this manual.
- (*) Term closely associated with the Exercises text (either actually used in the text of the Exercises or by the translators of the text);
- (+) My own technical designation for a word or concept used in the Exercises or in the spiritual direction of the Exercises journey in our present cultural context;
- (!) Traditional designation still in use by commentators, Jesuits, and spiritual directors as a code language for words and concepts in the Exercises;
- (<) Term presently in use by practitioners of the Exercises and likely to enter into the tradition of Ignatian spirituality.
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Actual Poverty (*)
The actual lack of material goods. It can also mean the vowed poverty of a person belonging to a religious order. In the time of Ignatius, many followers of Jesus continued to take literally Jesus' call to the devout rich young man: "Go and sell what you have, give to the poor. You will have treasure in heaven. Come and follow me..." (Lk 18:22). They often joined mendicant religious orders and begged for the necessities of life -- a sign of their trust and dependence on God. Even in our own time, people commit themselves to God through a vow of poverty. According to the constitutions of different religious orders, this vow is explained and exercised in different ways. For many, it is a commitment to share their resources with the others in the community by contributing all they earn through their work and by dependence on the others according to their real needs. The goal of a life of vowed poverty has always been to grow in Poverty of Spirit. See Poverty, Spiritual Poverty.Additions(!)
Refers to notations [73] of the Exercises. They give directions on how to keep oneself properly disposed for God's initiatives during the Exercises journey. They are written primarily for the Exercises according to notation [20] which, in Ignatius' time, were often given in settings different from our present retreat houses. For example, since a directee would have to walk through the village to attend worship, it was very important to keep one's eyes cast down to avoid filling one's mind with images and thoughts that would interfere with the Grace being sought. Throughout the Exercises, Ignatius gives notes on how to adapt these suggestions for the different phases or Weeks.Affections(!)
In popular culture, affections mean tender feelings. In some philosophies, affections can stand for anything outside the purview of the "faculty" of reason. In the Exercises, affections refer to interior reactions such as feelings, spontaneous thoughts, desires, deep emotions, and any combination of these. They spontaneously and automatically take place within us in response to our "sensing-thinking-remembering-imagining" which is engaged when we reflect with our hearts. Our feelings are always intertwined with thought components. We can say that there is an intentional or meaning quality behind them since they correspond to objective data that can be known. When we notice our affectivity in prayer and/or in day-to-day living, we are noticing the movement of spirits. During the Exercises journey, the director of the Exercises attends primarily to those Affections that occur in response or reaction to the directee's life before God. See Movement of Spirits, Noticing.Affective Prayer (!)
Prayer by which our affections are allowed to surface. This prayer is dialogical -- we respond to God and God to us, personally and intimately [15].Affectivity(!)
Since the mid-sixties, in the oral tradition of Ignatian spirituality, this term has come to mean the area of interior reactions and spontaneities. See Affections.Afterglow(!)
The experience (of feeling, and/or thinking, and/or interpreting, etc.) that occurs after a Consolation Without Cause is received [336].Agere Contra (!) (*)
This Latin phrase literally means "to act against." It comes from notation [97] where it is expected that the more zealous followers of Jesus desire to act against their Sensuality and from notation [319] where we are instructed to act against the desolating spirit. It has also come to mean an act of discipline or mortification in which one makes a choice that goes against one's personal preference.Analogy
A comparison or an intuitive inference of a similarity of an actual or assumed relationship, in some way, between two things in order to go from the known to the unknown. For example, when we finally arrive at some understanding of a thing, we commonly say, "Oh, ... I see it now." We don't actually "see" but we are using an analogous way of speaking (in this case, a metaphor) based on sense perception. This particular comparison goes all the way back to Aristotle who wrote: "As sight is in the body, so understanding is in the soul, while each is disparate." Analogy is essential to human knowing because knowledge develops from the known to the unknown. In literature, figures of speech such as metaphors, similes, allegories, parables, etc., are specific kinds of analogy.In science, models and paradigms imply analogous ways of knowing; for example, the atomic structure understood as a galaxy within itself is one such model. On July 4, 1997, scientists began to send photographs from Mars from a vehicle that had just landed there. They knew how to do this even though the human race had only studied aspects of Mars through astronomy, physics, etc. By analogy with the physical laws operative on our own planet, they could recognize and extrapolate the similarities and differences of Mars from those of Earth. However, they had to assume the existence of some relationship with aspects of Earth which they already understood. To do this, they had to use an analogous way of thinking. Theology and spirituality, based on the critical reflection on our religious experiences and those of others, such as those recorded in the bible, cannot develop without the use of analogy. It is suitable to speak of the "parenthood" of God because there is something about God's relationship towards us that is reflected in our own experience of parenthood. The bible itself uses such an analogy (Is 49:14; Ps 131).(2)
We understand the text of the Exercises not only by reading it according to its historical and cultural context, but also by analogy with our own spiritual experiences and those of others. In the Exercises text itself, we often understand certain concepts and make applications in an analogous way. Here are some examples:
There are two basic risks in using analogy:We recognize certain experiences as meaning this-or-that simply because we have had experiences like them, and so by analogy, we can recognize and understand, in some way, the experiences of our directees. Though the first or prime meaning of Deception is related to the Second Set of Guidelines for Discerning Spirits, we can apply this concept by analogy to a temptation more properly understood as belonging to the First Set. Angels(*)Risk #1 is the univocal risk. If we presume that an analogy gives us complete understanding, then we might mistakenly understand the comparison as if there existed a univocal relationship to the two objects being compared -- a one-to-one relationship with respect to all aspects of the two things being compared. Thus, with the idea of the parenthood of God, we would be reducing the parenthood of God to our own understanding and experience of parenthood. Risk #2 is the equivocal risk. If we presume that the words used by directees mean the same thing for them as they do for us, we end up misunderstanding and misinterpreting what they are attempting to express. This is not using analogy appropriately at all! This occurs frequently through the phenomenon of projection. In a spiritual direction setting, a directee begins to talk about "struggling over being misunderstood about something." The prayer guide hears the word "struggling" and jumps to the conclusion that his/her own "struggle" with such-and-such has exactly the same meaning as the directee's "struggle." The word used, in fact, may be the same, but the reality signified by the word is totally different. The point the prayer guide infers as the comparison in the two "struggles" is completely different from that intended. The effect of this equivocal risk is that of discounting a directee's experience.
Messengers of God as in Isaiah 6 or Luke 2. In Roman Catholic teaching, they are created beings which are totally 'spiritual'-- that is, without matter or any materiality. They are referred to as pure (i.e., total, complete) spirits. See Good Angel, Lucifer, Bad Angel.Annotations(!)
Refers to that section in the Exercises text, notations [1]-[22], in which Ignatius gathers together his preliminary observations about the purpose and use of the Exercises as a whole. Some are intended for both director and directee; others, for the one or the other.Application of Senses (*)
The method of prayer described in notations [121]-[126]. Ignatius introduces it as a method by which "it is helpful to pass the five senses of the imagination through the first and second [Gospel Contemplations]." In suggesting how to apply the senses of smell and taste, he writes: "to smell and to taste, with the sense of smell and the sense of taste, the infinite fragrance and sweetness of the Divinity" [124]. This implies that he includes something deeper than the physical imagining of tasting, smelling, seeing, touching, etc., something more intuitive -- called by some 'the spiritual senses.' The Application of Senses is not so much the active application of one's senses but more the passive reception of deep intimacy. In the Exercises journey, this is helped by the use of Repetition which fosters a passive and gradual simplification of the mystery that one is contemplating. (3)Appropriate (verb) (<)
Through spiritual direction, a directee is helped to appropriate his/her own interior consciousness; that is, not only to notice and take in, but to make it a part of his/her own being. See Self-appropriation.Archetype
Archetypes are primordial energies of recurring mythic patterns that channel, in a less-than-conscious manner, human psychic energy. For example, the warrior archetype by which one experiences oneself as battling perceived enemies in one's environment; or the playful child archetype by which one frequently turns the vicissitudes of life into play. In Jungian theory, archetypes are universal primordial images found in the collective unconscious.Asking for a Grace (*)
In each prayer exercise, the directee is instructed to "ask for grace" -- that is, to express his/her desires to God. We know that, ultimately, it is only from God and not from one's own effort that one can receive what one desires in the prayer exercises. The very asking for a Grace or the articulation of one's desires for a deepening of one's relationship with God in some particular way, comes from God. The initial impulse, the consequent shift in one's consciousness, the openness to the gift, the reception of the gift, the presence of God's self in one -- all this is grace. See Grace.Awareness Examen (!) (+)
A prayer method of discernment used to reflect upon one's interior movements and their influences on one's day-to-day choices and consequent activities. Through this exercise, one attempts to discover where and in what ways God has been present or revealed in one's daily experiences. The Examen is to the day what the Review is to the prayer exercise. This Awareness Examen should not be confused with the General Examen [32] even though many people use the same five headings which Ignatius outlines for the General Examen [43]. Other names sometimes used for this prayer method: consciousness examen; examen of consciousness; awareness exercise; awareness process. See General Examen.Bad Angel (*)
Lucifer or one of her/his lesser angels or spirits [50], [331]. In notation [332], the Bad Angel is described as leading the generous person astray with a Temptation Under the Guise of Light (or Good). "Light-bearer" is the translation of the name Lucifer. See Angels, Good Angels.Basic Disorder (!)
Over the years, this term was used by directors to help their directees come to a greater knowledge of the source of what is keeping them from a deeper love for God. It was considered that one of the 'capital sins' or one 'predominant fault' was the root or source of one's sins, faults or disordered activities. This concept does not occur in the Exercises. See Disorder of One's Actions.Blessed History (<)
Often used to denote that specific Consolation which is experienced when one becomes deeply aware of how one's own personal history is a salvation history analogous in meaning to the salvation history of the bible. This phrase is also used to connote the prayer exercises given to a directee "to help get in touch with one's Blessed History." As God had a unique relationship with the Israelites, so God has a unique relationship with each individual. As God encountered the community of Israelites and of the early Christians in unique ways, so God encounters each person in unique ways. In salvation history, the rhythms of God's activity were understood in terms of such thematic patterns as God's covenant, God's spousal love for God's people, Jesus' death and resurrection, etc. In the Consolation experienced through "the appropriation of one's unique personal history in faith," (4) an individual can often discern a unique thematic pattern illuminating God's faithful activity in one's own personal history. The blessed-history approach became accessible to spiritual directors through the work of John English, S.J., and the Guelph Centre of Spirituality at a time when many people in North America were becoming interested in discovering their roots and when psychological studies were making family-of-origin techniques popular. In addition to the use of this blessed-history concept in spiritual direction, this concept is also used effectively in group facilitation. (5)Call Mode (<)
Directees are considered to be in a Call Mode when they make the Exercises journey more intentionally and explicitly to discover God's call and are ready to make particular decisions concerning God's desires for them in the development of God's reign. Such directees focus predominantly on how God is calling them to work in God's household in spite of their own need for healing. Healing issues may still be present, but these issues are not in the foreground at the time of making the Exercises journey. See Healing Mode.Capital Sins (*)
The seven deadly sins: gluttony, pride, greed, lust, sloth, anger, envy. This listing is a traditional summary (going back further than the 13th century) used to categorize the general ways by which we sin. They are not sins in the proper sense, but they can be understood as tendencies within us that lead to sin. See Basic Disorder.Carnal and Worldly Love (*)
The adjective 'carnal' by itself means the same as Sensuality. However, the phrase, 'carnal and worldly love,' also includes the need for a good name, status, pleasure-seeking, self-centredness, ambition, living up to the expectations of others, competitiveness, manipulativeness, over-responsibility, undue preoccupation with the need for affirmation, etc. See Sensuality, World.Cartesian Mind or Attitude
Follows a fundamental belief associated with the philosophy of René Descartes (1596-1650). According to Descartes, that which is to be taken as true and trustworthy must be mediated by clear and distinct ideas known directly by the conscious mind. In the history of ideas, Cartesian philosophy led to rationalism and to the emphasis on quantification and measurement in the scientific method. The classicist worldview borrowed Descartes' belief in the use of reason but did not embrace the later scientific development which emerged from this belief.Catechisms
Manuals of doctrine in a question-and-answer format; one of the first was Martin Luther's. The Roman Catechism of the Council of Trent (1566) was the basis for other catechisms such as the Baltimore Catechism, first printed in 1885, and used widely until the late 1950s.Centering Prayer (<)
A contemplative prayer form or method in which a person empties oneself before God and attempts to create an inner stillness, sometimes by using a mantra.Christian Perfection
See Evangelical Perfection, Life of the Counsels.Classicist Worldview
In theological circles, this is a term that often connotes an amalgam of a late medieval worldview and an early modern worldview. In embracing rational logic that was present in the early modern worldview, it undermines the more intuitive logic intrinsic to the medieval worldview. It stresses that all true knowledge is objective to the exclusion of so-called subjective contributions. Universal theory and principles mediated through rational logic are stressed. This has been questioned by the modern worldview (Muldoon). See Cartesian Mind, Modern Worldview.Collective Unconscious
The deeper-lying portion of the unconscious postulated by Jung to be the repository of universal dispositions toward certain forms of experience represented by the archetypes (Wulff).Colloquy (*)
The conversation in which a directee engages at any time during a prayer exercise and which Ignatius places at the end of his models for the prayer exercises [53], [54], [199]. This dialogue can be with Jesus, with God the Father, with the Holy Spirit, with God by some other name or image, or with some saint or Saint. See Communion of Saints.Communal-Societal Spirituality (+)
Exists when mature Christians understand and accept themselves humbly, as a small part of the larger universe, while using discerning processes for making decisions and implementing actions with others in cooperation with God's desires for humanity and for this planet. (6)Communion of Saints (*)
All those who have died and are with God; they are all saints. In the Roman, Orthodox and Anglican traditions, Saints (with a capital "S") are those who have died and have been recognized officially as having lived a life of outstanding discipleship and goodness.Compassion (!)
Comes from two Latin words which, together, mean "suffer with." We have come to use this word to describe the Grace for which Ignatius instructs us to ask during the Third Week [193]: "sorrow, grief, deep feeling with Jesus in suffering." It is an ability to be truly present to another person in his/her suffering, not just physically present but with the focus of one's heart and spirit.Composition of Place (*) (!)
Literally, "composition, seeing the place" (Mullan). In each prayer exercise, the Composition is the 'prelude' which instructs a directee to settle into the prayer exercise by composing (gathering together) oneself to become interiorly stilled and as present as possible to God through the material of the prayer exercise. Ignatius suggests that this be done by making use of one's imaginative powers; that is, by recalling and making oneself present to certain aspects of the mystery upon which one is contemplating or meditating. This helps a directee at prayer to disregard what is going on around oneself and to give oneself to the exercise with a relaxed but focused attention. (7)Confirmation (*) (!)
The last phase in the decision-making process which brings it to closure. God confirms the person making the decision, not the decision. Confirmation is not the seal of approval that the decision will have successful consequences. It is a Consolation, accompanied by the sense of closure, that one has made as good a decision as one can make at this time [183]. In addition to this subjective and experiential Confirmation, a married directee may need to seek the 'objective Confirmation' from one's spouse; a directee living as part of a community, from the community.Conscious
The content of one's own mind or mental functioning of which one is aware.Consciousness Examen (!)
Another name for the Awareness Examen.Consider/Consideration (*)
When Ignatius uses the word "consider," he does not mean what we mean by "analyze." For Ignatius and those in a medieval culture, the powers of imagination, memory and intellect were interwoven and not separated as they are for us with our more analytical, scientific methods [94].Consolation (*)
See notation [316]Consolation With Cause (*)
This Consolation is received because of some outside cause and can be explained by it. This outside influence can be any interior event such as one's own personal insight and understanding, or exterior event such as a beautiful piece of music to which one is listening, or a gift received from someone, or a compliment, or a job well done, etc. In other words, there is some outside influence that can explain the Consolation. Much of our work with directees involves this kind of Consolation and, therefore, requires discernment.Consolation Without Cause (*)
This Consolation is sometimes referred to as taking place without proportionate cause because no accompanying interior or exterior event can explain completely how the Consolation has come about. The Consolation is beyond its cause. For some Christians, their "calling" was experienced this way. Notation [175], the First Time during which a sound Election can take place, is one example of this. Notation [15] suggests that this experience of Consolation Without Cause is not necessarily out of the ordinary during the notation-[20] Exercises journey since the director of the Exercises is to allow the Creator to communicate immediately with the creature. (8) English writes that this Consolation Without Cause suggests "an experience of the presence of God that takes over our whole person. I describe this experience as the confluence of two things: a passive experience of the unconditional love of God and an active experience of unconditional response to this love. Such a Consolation is self-authenticating and cannot be doubted." (9)Contemplation (*)
Working descriptions for this term are given in the first few pages of Chapter 23, "Concerning Gospel Contemplation." See Gospel Contemplation.Contemplative Attitude (<) (+)
The ability to allow God into one's heart. When one is able to allow one's real reactions to surface and allow oneself to be vulnerable with God in more than a momentary way, then that person has the Contemplative Attitude.Correct and Good Choice (*) (<)
This is Puhl's translation of part of the title in notation [175] translated by Mullan as "a sound and good election." Such a choice requires, among other things, that one is experiencing Consolation and Spiritual Freedom.Counterfeit Consolation (+)
The term I use for a Consolation With Cause [331] during which, in Ignatian language, the Bad Angel is influencing one's heart. Spiritual directors sometimes refer to this as "false consolation."Countertransference
The helper's partly unconscious or conscious emotional reactions to the person, client, or directee being helped (adapted from Psychiatric).Criteria(+)(<)
A criterion is a standard of judging -- a rule or test by which anything is tried in forming a correct judgement respecting it. In every decision-making process, many variables are pondered in order to arrive at the final decision. With respect to all these variables, Criteria, whether implicit or explicit, determine what things to consider and the priority of each of them; what to reject; and finally what to accept as the final resolution of the whole process. When the Criteria are not made explicit (as often happens in discerning a decision), they are imbedded in a decision-maker's assumptions, values, beliefs, etc.Critical Reflection
Reflection itself is a natural human process by which one thinks about and judges some object or event. Critical reflection is the same natural human process but with a disciplined focus which involves analysis of the different
aspects of its subject and evaluation of their significance in the light of other relevant frameworks of understanding. See Social Analysis, Theological Reflection.Dark Night
One of the stages of spiritual growth in the overall spiritual journey, elucidated by John of the Cross. He uses images of darkness with its different intensities as metaphors for the experience of the soul moving with greater surrender toward union with God. There are different forms of darkness such as the Dark Night of the Senses and the Dark Night of the Spirit, etc.Deception (*)(<)
Strictly speaking, Deception is a Temptation Under the Guise of Light. It comes to the generous and spiritually mature person during the time of authentic Consolation and Spiritual Freedom when the Bad Angel tempts one towards what seems to be wholesome but, in actuality, contains some "trickery" (misinformation, misjudgment resulting from ambiguity, etc.) to lead that person astray [332]. See Temptation Under the Guise of Light.Defense Mechanism
Unconscious, intra-psychic process(es) serving to provide relief from emotional conflict and anxiety. Conscious efforts are frequently made for the same reasons, but true defense mechanisms are unconscious. Among the common defense mechanisms are these: denial, displacement, projection, reaction formation, rationalization, etc. (adapted from Psychiatric).Desire (*)
See Grace I Desire.Desolation (*)
Desolation, with a capital "D" in this manual, refers to what Ignatius calls "spiritual desolation" in notation [317]. The adjective "spiritual" together with the term Desolation is found only this one time in the Exercises even though Desolation by itself always means this spiritual condition. Notation [317] gives Ignatius' own working definition. Desolation is often a form of resistance to our loving God. Sometimes our psyche is less consciously aware of something it does not want to surface into consciousness and Desolation is the conscious symptom of that resistance before God's love. In popular language, desolate feelings, desolate, and desolation may or may not have anything to do with one's relationship with God. See Resistance, Dryness.Detachment (*)
One of the aspects included in the concept of Spiritual Freedom. A person has to be 'free from' in order to be 'free for.' Detachment denotes the 'free-from' part of Spiritual Freedom and implies more of a voluntaristic and static quality than the loving, dynamic quality implied in the 'free for.' Consult the first sentence of notation [316]. See Indifference, Spiritual Freedom.Developmental Worldview (+)
The present worldview that acknowledges how all life on planet earth is developing through stages of growth, and is interactive with other life-forms with consequences for good or ill. This worldview has left behind the classicist and early modern worldviews which believed in a fixed, objectively knowable universe. It embraces the historical consciousness of a later modern worldview. With the discovery of the unconscious and its influences on our perceptions and conscious choices, it acknowledges how we understand ourselves by paying close attention to our historically conditioned, subjective experiences. See Ecological Worldview, Modern Worldview, Postmodern.Directee (+)(<)
Denotes the one who is receiving spiritual direction in a closed, directed retreat setting or in the setting of ongoing daily life. I use this term whether the directee is making the Exercises or not.Director of the Exercises (*)
Identifies the one who is giving the Exercises and suggests a kind of competency and skill in discernment that is associated with this ministry. Such a person should have such deep understanding of the Exercises text that this understanding has become second nature, and he/she is skilled enough to give the Exercises in a team setting with peer-peer supervision.Discernment (*)
In the Exercises, discernment specifically denotes the discrimination and judgement concerning the kind of spiritual movements that take place in a directee's heart as he/she is preparing for, and engaged in, discovering God's desires for him/herself in the process of moving towards greater Spiritual Freedom and conscious decision-making. Spiritual directors often use this term less specifically for all the ways they help another spiritually, such as helping a directee interpret the meaning of a Gospel Contemplation. Consult Chapter Twelve for the differences between monitoring the correct use of, interpreting, and discerning Gospel Contemplations. See Interpretation.Discursive Prayer (!)
A form of mental prayer in which the use of one's analytical powers of reasoning predominate. In the classicist worldview, this form of mental prayer was called 'meditation'; unfortunately this term came to be equated with Ignatius' use of the term "Meditation Using the Three Powers of the Soul." When Ignatius used the word meditation, he did not mean discursive prayer; rather he meant a pondering of the heart, not an analytical exercise separated from the use of imagination and the reflections of the heart. Discursivity or analysis, as our educational systems have very adequately communicated to us, was unknown to persons like Ignatius who were steeped in the medieval worldview. (10)Disorder of One's Actions (*)
This phrase occurs in the Third Exercise of the First Week [63]. I refer to this as Hidden Disordered Tendencies. Ignatius would consider an action disordered if one does the right thing but is motivated by affections and attachments that are not oriented to the praise and service of God. The love which moves and influences one to choose anything "should descend from above" [184]; that is, the affection that ultimately motivates one's choice is for one's Creator [166].Disordered Attachment
One has a disordered attachment if one is attached or inclined to a thing inordinately; that is, if one is inclined to any person, place, thing, attitude, or stance, etc. that is not primarily for the purpose of cooperating with God's desires. Behind all attachments are affections. In the language of the Exercises, the terms "inordinate" and "disordered" are very close in meaning as are the terms Disordered Attachment and Inordinate Affection. See Disorder of One's Actions.Disposition Days (<)
This term has been employed at the Guelph Centre of Spirituality to denote the preparatory phase before the Exercises proper begin. (11) Though there is daily personal spiritual direction in this phase, there are also presentations on themes that fit the general spiritual/cultural needs of the directees. Traditionally, over the years, in the closed, directed retreat setting, there were always two to three days of preparation on themes implied in the Principle and Foundation. Since the early 1970s, the Disposition Days usually take five to seven days. See the opening six chapters of the Running Commentaries of this manual for one paradigm of the Disposition Days for the notation-[19] setting. Chapter 31 is an application of this concept in the early stages of ongoing spiritual direction.Dryness (!)
Means that prayer or the spiritual journey has become difficult and one's experiences with God are not as pleasant as one may have experienced before. The road has become cumbersome. Spiritual directors often refer to some directees as experiencing dryness in their prayer or in their day-to-day lives. Such terms as "dryness," "aridity," "going through the desert," and "desert experience" are commonly used in spiritual writings. None of these words or phrases appear in the Exercises text. During the Exercises journey, dryness can be a sign of either Consolation, Desolation, Incipient Desolation, Tranquility [177], fatigue, resistance, some biological reaction, etc. Of itself, dryness is ambiguous. Even if it were merely a biological symptom, it is the way a directee relates to the experience of dryness that determines the nature of the spiritual movement. See Dark Night, Desolation, Consolation, Resistance, Tranquility.Dynamic Model
An illustrative structure to help one understand a complex reality; for example, a plastic model illustrating the molecular structure of a unit of matter. A model can be static or dynamic. When a model illustrates a process of human development, we can call it a 'dynamic model.' Erik Erikson's (1902-1994) eight stages of human development comprise such a dynamic model. The notation-20 Exercises also give us a dynamic model; the Conversion Cycle explained in Chapter 32 is another dynamic model. Such dynamic models are used to explain the meaning of human processes and/or to make further discoveries about them. Because they have the capacity to stimulate further discoveries, they are also called 'heuristic structures.' See Heuristic Structure.
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Endnotes 1. This glossary is made up of my "working definitions" of words and concepts actually used or implied in the manual. I have used the following as a help:David Wulff, Psychology of Religion: Classic and Contemporary Views (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1991); referred to as (Wulff).
American Psychiatric Association, A Psychiatric Glossary, 5th ed. (Boston: Little Brown and Co., 1980); referred to as (Psychiatric).
David G. Creamer, Guides For The Journey (Lanham: University Press of America, Inc., 1996); referred to as (Creamer).
Mark Muldoon and John Veltri, "From Symbolic Rapport to Public Rhetoric in the Roman Catholic Church," Grail: An Ecumenical Journal, vol. 11, no. 4 (1996), pp.25-43; referred to as (Muldoon).
Alan Richardson, ed., A Dictionary of Christian Theology (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1972); referred to as (Dictionary).
Also from conversations with Elaine Frigo, CSSF (Frigo), Mark S. Muldoon, Ph.D. (Muldoon), Frank H. Whelan, S.J. (Whelan).
2. Consult Ian G. Barbour, Myths, Models and Paradigms: A Comparative Study in Science and Religion (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1976).
3. Commentators with a more classicist worldview explain the rationale for this method by suggesting how it is an easy method to use after the directee is tired out at the end of a full day of prayer. Their comments refer to the Exercises according to notation [20] in which four one-hour prayer exercises come before the daily Application of Senses suggested for the latter part of the day. Since, in a classicist worldview, these four prayer exercises were considered to be primarily 'discursive,' this would make sense. Why would their conclusion be a valid one for them?
However, in the light of a developmental worldview and with a more profound understanding of the medieval worldview, we have rediscovered and appreciated the importance of the imagination in its intimate connection with memory, intuition and reason. Consult the closing pages of Chapter 23 of this manual.
4. This phrase was created by John English, S.J., in Choosing Life: Significance of Personal History in Decision-Making (New York: Paulist Press, 1978).
5. Consult endnote1 page 1 of this manual. The ISECP group (Ignatian Spiritual Exercises for the Corporate Person) contributed a great deal to the development of this concept. The ISECP group called this concept "Graced History." Its manual, Focusing Group Energies, Volume 1: Structured Resources for Group Development (Scranton: University of Scranton, 1992). In it participants are asked to pray over their own "Personal Graced History" and, then, by making use of the group's "History Line," to pray over its "Communal Graced History."
6. For me, this term means the same thing as the term or phrase, "communal spirituality," which is being introduced into the working vocabularies of spiritual directors by John English, S.J., Spiritual Freedom (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1995), p.275ff. The difficulty with using "communal" by itself as an adjective describing spirituality is that communal connotes any interpersonal faith-sharing group or a religious group that lives together as in a monastery or a village such as an Amish settlement. For me, the adjective "societal" in association with the adjective "communal" draws our attention to a spirituality that also includes the social justice, political, and systemic aspects. The use of the adjective "communal," without another adjective, can lead to much confusion in our psychologically literate culture.
7. Consult endnote 34 in George E. Ganss, S.J., The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius: A Translation and Commentary (St. Louis: Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1992). Ganss translates Ignatius' Spanish as: "A composition, by imagining the place...." This is quite close to Mullan's translation used in this glossary.
Other translations, such as Puhl's, which render the Composition as "a mental representation of the place," may contribute to the continuation of a classicist interpretation. In the classicist worldview, the context for many commentators prior to 1960s, the Composition was presented as a separate step in which a directee had first to imagine the place like a stage on which the play was to be enacted. This led to the teaching that a directee was to imagine first the place and then, while still imagining the place, continue with the rest of the prayer exercise -- and all this was to keep the mind from being distracted. I have never met anyone who was capable of doing such a mental gymnastic. Have you? Why would such a teaching be consistent with the classicist worldview?
8. "Immediately" here means "without mediation" -- "without any previous sense or knowledge of any object through which such Consolation would come, through one's acts of understanding and will" [330] or through some outside influence that could explain the experience.
9. John J. English, S.J., "Mysterious Joy of the Poor and the Complex Causes of Consolation," Review of Ignatian Spirituality [CIS], no. 85 (Rome: 1997), pp.74-75.
10. So when you read traditional works on meditation that go back to the 16th century, do not interpret them with a Cartesian Mind.
11. The Spiritual Exercises, according the notation-20 closed retreat setting proper, begin with the First Exercise of the First Week.
12. Note the kind of temptations which Ignatius considers "gross and open." They are not the same as those associated with notation [314].
13. In the mid-1980s, some directors of the Exercises began to speak of directees going through part of the Exercises in an 'identity mode' and receiving the graces of the Exercises in an 'identity mode.'
14. Adolphe Tanquerey, The Spiritual Life: a Treatise on Ascetical and Mystical Theology (Paris: Desclee & Co., 1930), p.454.
15. I am grateful to Mark Muldoon, Ph.D., for many conversations around how our powers of imagination are enmeshed with our powers of intellect.
16. Intuition is the function by which we perceive things as a whole rather than in parts. Intuition is the sense or hunch we have about a situation or some partial data even before we have the complete data for the judgment. Jesus used intuitive logic when he gave the parable of the sower and when he explained it.
17. Some myths are quite conscious. We name them ideologies. When a personal ideology no longer has positive power over us, it is time to renew our personal myths.
18. William A. Barry, S.J., and William J. Connolly, S.J., The Practice of Spiritual Direction (New York: The Seabury Press, 1982).
19. The analogy that Ignatius employs for the Election process is that of choosing a major state of life or "calling" which involves a permanent commitment -- an unchangeable state of life.
20. Why would it be inconceivable for Ignatius to write the Exercises text from the viewpoint of the First Time [175] or the Third Time?