Discernment of Spirits - Part III

St. Ignatius gave us a great gift in his 14 rules or principles for the discernment of spirits. Typically, they are used for personal spiritual growth, but I think they can also be applied to parish life and the challenges of parish renewal. Today, we are going to look at the third and fourth rules of spiritual discernment and how they can help us when leading change at a parish.

Here’s how Ignatius describes the third rule.

The third rule: Of Spiritual Consolation - I call it consolation when some interior movement in the soul is caused, through which the soul comes to be inflamed with love of its Creator and Lord; and when it can, in consequence, love no created thing on the face of the earth in itself, but in the Creator of them all.

Likewise, when it sheds tears that move to love of its Lord, whether out of sorrow for one’s sins, or for the Passion of Christ our Lord, or because of other things directly connected with His service and praise.

Finally, I call consolation every increase of hope, faith and charity, and all interior joy which calls and attracts to heavenly things and to the salvation of one’s soul, quieting it and giving it peace in its Creator and Lord.

When it comes to parish renewal and changing a consumeristic culture into a discipleship culture, we need affirmation and consolation. We need to know that our efforts are actually working. We get external affirmation when we see the parish grow in some measurable way: giving grows, the pews fill up, people step up to volunteer, we hear a story of life change. While we need the affirmation, the difficulty can be this kind of response or growth takes time. To keep going on the path of renewal, we need some spiritual consolation from God that we are on the right path and doing his will. Consolation is the internal movement stirring of the Spirit in our hearts that we are leading and moving a parish or parish ministry in the right direction.

I remember our final year doing Family Friendly Fridays – a Lenten program that grew in attendance each year, but mostly because we offered free food. The program had become a consumer exchange. Nothing was ever different after than before. We knew it had to change, and so at a certain point, we decided to challenge attendees to serve and get into a small group. We shared a vision of parishioners owning their spiritual growth and getting engaged in the life of the parish. Through the course of that Lent, we “grew” the program from 600 people attending down to 200. And yet, I remember feeling exhilarated at the end of the night. Whereas in previous years, I had felt tired and exhausted because it was just busy work at the end day, now I could feel God’s Spirit moving in our parish. We were on a mission.

Ultimately, renewal will bring fruit and growth, but we can’t rely on that hope alone. As Proverbs 13:12 says, “hope deferred makes the heart sick.” So God gives us spiritual consolations to keep moving, especially at the beginning of change.

Ignatius describes consolations in various ways on a personal level above. In a parish context, we get inflamed with the love of God that he has called us to work in a parish and be on the front lines of ministry. We can be inflamed with a love for the people in our community. Consolation might even mean that our heart breaks for the current situation. It is a godly sorrow that sees the broken systems or structures in a parish, and it hurts our hearts so much we want to change it and be part of the solution. And consolation can also look like any increase of “hope, faith and charity, and all interior joy” which makes us want to work and serve the people in our community so that they will know Jesus Christ and his great love for them. We can have a peace in knowing that God has called us to this mission even though it is incredibly challenging.

The flip side to consolation is desolation. And when it comes to our work in parish renewal, we will experience it as well. St. Ignatius describes desolation in his fourth rule.

The fourth Rule: Of Spiritual Desolation - I call desolation all the contrary of the third rule, such as darkness of soul, disturbance in it, movement to things low and earthly, the unquiet of different agitations and temptations, moving to want of confidence, without hope, without love, when one finds oneself all lazy, tepid, sad, and as if separated from his Creator and Lord. Because, as consolation is contrary to desolation, in the same way, the thoughts which come from consolation are contrary to the thoughts which come from desolation.

I think one of the most important notes about the fourth rule is simply to call it out and acknowledge the reality of desolation. Sometimes people come into work at a parish and think it is going to be all rainbows and roses. They think that parish work will be easy and that there won’t be any spiritual push back. And so they are defenceless against the attack. To be forewarned is to be forearmed.

The Enemy of our souls and of our efforts for parish renewal will push back. He does push back through other people, but he also pushes back internally in us. Evil spirits work to move us to a darkness of souls and disturbance. We will experience agitations. Oftentimes, we might chalk it up to a bad mood, but if we stop and think about it, it goes deeper than our emotions.

Notice Ignatius says “We feel lazy, tepid, sad.” I have to admit I am struggling with this right now. I have had this darkness and sadness over me the last few days. It makes sense because I write this before our Rebuilt conference which we have been working on and praying for months. So, of course, the enemy wants to come and steal my joy. Of course, he wants me to wallow in self-doubt so I don’t bring my best to it. Even just writing that out helps a bit.

In working in parish renewal, we will not always feel a connection to God. We will wonder sometimes if our efforts are worth it. We will have to fight through those feelings. As we work through Ignatius’ rules for the discernment of spirits, he will give us some practical suggestions for how to make the best of those moments of consolation and how to fight back in the moments of desolation.

For now, take a moment to reflect on the last week of your work: Where have you felt consolation? Praise God for the consolation. What has made you feel desolate? Pray for the grace to fight the desolation in the week ahead and not slow you down.

Rooting for you,
Tom