Week One Exercise

 The Way God Loves

 

A goal of The Spiritual Exercises is to love and see the world the way that God loves and sees the world. We pray this desire at the end of The Exercises at the contemplation to attain divine love. It is what we reach for and hope for and hope to attain so that we can love the way that God loves. We learn to love by watching how God loves us.

 

Ignatius and Teilhard would sum this up as: to find God in all things.” We immediately immerse ourselves into the existing loving relationship with God and creation.

 

Two spiritual truths

 

• Ignatius tells us that love ought to manifest itself more by deeds than by words.
• Love consists of mutual communication between two persons. Each share with the other. The one who loves and gives communicates to the beloved and the beloved in return does the same.

 

God, as lover, loves us. God's loving is an unconditional generous sharing of all that God loves. This is done in deeds not just in words.

 

Contemplation: Learning to Love the Way God Loves

 

God expresses God's self by creating a universe that reflects God's love. This self-expression created a universe that could delight in it as it grew and evolved over billions of years. God delighted in the humid race that emerged from the evolving earth so that they could become conscious of how much God loves them.

 

Imagine yourself surrounded by an omnipresent God holding the human race and loving existence and wanting to be lovingly involved with them, giving countless gifts to people, individually and collectively.

 

Ask for the grace to discover the thousands of ways that God loves you and all of creation. Ask for the grace to experience in your body and soul what it feels like to be so loved uniquely and unconditionally by God. Ask for the grace to feel tangibly connected to God. Ask for the grace to be immersed in God and God's creation and to feel deep gratitude and wonder at the boundless love God shows in every moment.

The first stage of loving: Giving Gifts

 

God gives gifts. Love is shown in action. Giving gifts is an action. All of creation is God's gift to us. Creation is the original blessing.

 

If you find your gratitude and wonder naturally flowing in response to one of the divine gifts, stay with that feeling. Who may spend the entire time with this single movement. Do not feel as if you have to cover all of the seven areas listed below. The graces from this exercise can never be exhausted.

 

1. Consider the gifts that astronomy has revealed to us. Ignatius may not have been aware of the extent of this revelation as he had no sense of the vast number of galaxies for the age of the universe.
2. Observe the gifts God has been giving us that the life sciences had revealed. All of these gifts are active, interactive, and evolving. As life forms kept evolving in complexity over time - From sensation to perception to movement to social life - We observed that consciousness became the primary emergent property of life. Evolution keeps moving forward.
3. Recognize evolution at work in all things. Saint Paul tells us that creation is still incomplete and still in process. Through discoveries in science and technology, we recognize the fundamental law driving creation onward and upward.
4. God's gifts on the microscopic side reveal by science show the incredible complexity and activity of each living being - the human genome, the trillions of cells that live in our body, each cell itself a living being with the highly complex intra active life.
5. Recognize the gifts of the earth itself. All the beauties of mountains, plains, and skies. All the power of tornadoes, hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, deserts.
6. Reflect on God's gift that flow from human consciousness and society, such as civilization, music, art, literature, society, communication, transportation, recreation, science, mathematics, architecture, ecology, entertainment, film, radio, Internet.
7. Consider all the gifts you have personally received - talent, skills, education, opportunities, friends, family. Remember your five sentences as well as memory, intelligent, willpower, imagination, choice, the ability to love and make commitments, the ability to accomplish things, to create things that never existed before, could build teams, to worship.

 

At the conclusion of your prayer you are invited to reply to God, the divine giver, in a personal conversation.

 

You're invited to show God how you have felt and grasp this first level of love. You might want to say something like this:

 

I stand in wonder and gratitude at the number and immensity of the gifts you have given to me and to all creation. I also am one of your gifts. It would have been so easy for me not to have been born, never to be conceived. Here I am, uniquely loved by you. Even before I existed, you know me by my name. Give me the grace to love you and your gifts, and that is enough for me.

Poem: Primary Wonder, Denise Levertov

Days pass when I forget the mystery.
Problems insoluble and problems offering
their own ignored solutions
jostle for my attention, they crowd its antechamber
along with a host of diversions, my courtiers, wearing
their colored clothes; cap and bells.
                                                        And then
once more the quiet mystery
is present to me, the throng's clamor
recedes: the mystery
that there is anything, anything at all,
let alone cosmos, joy, memory, everything,
rather than void: and that, O Lord,
Creator, Hallowed One, You still,
hour by hour sustain it.

 

 

 

 

The First Three Teilhardian Principles

Teilhardian Principle 1: The discoveries of modern science must form an important foundation to any contemporary spirituality if it is to be true, relevant, and inspiring.

Any true spirituality must include humanity in its wholeness, that is understood by any civilization in its time. Wholeness must include a coherent picture of the evolution of the universe. It must spell out what we know of God's plan not only for humanity but for all of creation. Knowledge of that divine plan is to be found in scripture, tradition, and also in the discoveries of science. Modern science has been helpful to form a coherent picture of us and our universe. We see an inextricable connectivity to all of creation.

 

Creation is a Book of Revelation that took 14 billion years to write. God has been revealing God's ways to us through creation. We are now beginning to see what Saint Paul wrote: the breadth and length and height and depth of Christ’s love for us in creation that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with the fullness of God. Ephesians 3

 

Any new truth about the universe needs to be integrated into our spirituality since that truth is bound to reveal something more about who God is, who we are, what God's plans are for us and the rest of creation. This information will be awe inspiring and humbling because it will reveal some new aspects of God's creative loving plan. 

 

Faith presupposes reason and enriches it. It is a basic principle of a healthy spirituality. Science uses reason to uncover knowledge of creation. Knowledge of creation acquired through reason and enlightened by faith rises to knowledge of God.

 

Teilhardian Principle 2: Evolution is happening continually on every level of being – and has a direction.

 

This is an innovative principle. It is central to Teilhard’s discernment of God's plan for humanity. From the beginning, God created an evolving universe. The universality of evolution has been revealed by the most ancient Book of Revelation, creation itself. Science informs us. In the evolutionary process on all layers of being, Christ and God are most readily found. These are new insights that were not known before the mid 19th century. Ongoing evolution must shape any spirituality because it continually increases in complexity and consciousness. Everything in life is involved in. Theological truths are involved in about Christ and the people of God. K yard says that all things are going forward and upward with a purpose that follows a central law that was originally implanted by God into every particle of the universe. There is a direction to evolution it is now named as the Law of attraction-connection-complexity-consciousness.

 

Teilhardian Principle 3: The Law of attraction-connection-complexity-consciousness is the law that is giving evolution its direction.

 

From the first moment after The Big Bang, elementary particles that exploded outward seemed driven to attract other particles and to bond with them. This is the law of attraction and connection. As these particles made connections, they became more complex particles over time. It showed their growing complexity. All the original particles were nonorganic and nonliving. It took billions of years for organic chemicals to appear and the laws of organic chemistry to evolve. It took billions of years for living things to appear on earth and the laws of biology to evolve. These are the emergent properties of an evolving creation.

 

This law continued to operate until it eventually produced its first living things, such as single cell bacteria. Following this law, vegetative things capable of growth and reproduction emerged. Then came creatures with movement and sensation. Finally came creatures with neuronal complexity that consciousness and reflective self-awareness burst forth.

 

Saint Paul was fascinated by this law of connection and he explored the unity of the human body and uses it as a metaphor for the complexity and consciousness of the body of Christ.

We humans are at the tip of the arrow that reveals the direction and trajectory of evolution. The arrow tells us that God wants humans to aim toward ever higher levels of complexity and consciousness.

 

Humanity must grow in its ability to create peace in society and promote equality, uphold justice, produce abundance for all, and be more generous and compassionate. It is a challenge to the human spirit working with God's grace to develop a deeper consciousness of who we are and where we ought to be going.

 

What is consciousness?

 

Awareness and Response

 

To be conscious, it is not enough to be aware of what is going on. You need to respond appropriately to what you are experiencing.

 

Becoming conscious changes you. An important element is to develop your consciousness so that you can wake up to and act upon what is real. Saint Paul asks us to see with our inward eyes. When we wake up spiritually, we see things with new eyes thanks to the light of Christ. The purpose of the exercises is to love and see the world the way that God loves and sees the world.

 

As we learn to live consciously in Christ, our perception of reality changes. Everything becomes new. You begin to see yourself and everything else surrounded by God's love and you realize that any moment your spirit can be present in any part of the vast cosmic divine reality that you wish to be. This is Christ consciousness.

 

This same God consciousness embodied in the human Jesus is present in all of us individually and collectively, though we may not have been awakened to it. It is the time we see all things in God and God in all things. Regardless of where we are, we still live in Christ and are united to Christ in the divine milieu. We are invited to grow and evolve into that state of Christ consciousness where we can see reality with new eyes.

 

Ignatius wants the retreatant to attain that special state of consciousness. Therefore, we meditate on the events of Christ’s life. He wants us to get inside the mind the heart and the values of Jesus should that we become immersed in the thoughts, words, emotions, and actions. We are invited to think and live like Jesus. Saint Paul asked us to put on the mind of Christ Jesus.

An Introduction to The Spiritual Exercises according to Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. (Louis Savary)

I am sending you some materials of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. and his thought that I'll be incorporating into The 19th Annotation. 

We meet on Tuesdays. 

                 Eastern time: 4:00 to 5:00 p.m. 

                 Central time: 3:00 to 4:00 p.m. 

                 Mountain time: 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. 

                 Pacific time: 1:00 to 2:00 p.m.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's theology integrates evolution with Christian faith, proposing that humanity is evolving towards a final spiritual unity he termed the Omega Point, which he identifies with God. This perspective emphasizes the convergence of science and spirituality, suggesting that evolution is a divine process leading to greater consciousness and unity among all beings.

Overview of Teilhard de Chardin's Theology

 

Teilhard's theological framework is unique and multifaceted.

 

Evolutionary Perspective — Teilhard viewed evolution as a divine process, suggesting that all life is evolving towards a higher state of consciousness.

Omega Point — He introduced the concept of the Omega Point, a future state of ultimate unity and consciousness that aligns with the Christian understanding of God.

Cosmic Christ — Teilhard identified the Omega Point with the Cosmic Christ, emphasizing that Christ is central to the evolution of the universe.

Integration of Science and Faith — His work sought to reconcile scientific understanding of evolution with Christian theology, arguing that both can coexist harmoniously.

Spiritual Unity — He believed that humanity's evolution is not just physical but also spiritual, leading towards a collective unity in God.

 

 

 

The Exercises are designed in four distinct movements called "Weeks." The first week is focused upon receiving God's mercy. The second week builds and examines the relationship between you and Jesus Christ. The third week enters into the Passion when we act as chaplains to Jesus of Nazareth as he goes to his death. The fourth week allows us in the live in the Spirit of the Resurrection and the promises offered to the world in God's reign.
 
A very important concept to understand is the discernment of spirits. We have to discern what is happening spiritual within us as we progress in the spiritual life. Some of the movements will be of God; the Spirit of opposition will also be at work and we have to discern who is leading us. I may lose stamina. There will be times when you become confused or even feeling down and you will question yourself. That is part of the process. It is often the grace that you seek. We will navigate through those interior movements, and it is important to stay with the process.

 

 

The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola is a methodology of prayer that is based upon the life experiences of the Pilgrim saint. The Exercises are broken into four movements called weeks in which a person is praying for a particular grace. Some of the prayer styles are the following: Ignatian contemplation, meditation, colloquy, use of the imagination, composition of place, application of the senses, consideration, and devotions. A hallmark of the Exercises is that one must experience freedom. A person making the Exercises must first exhibit a generosity of heart.

 

The First Week

 

The First Week of the exercises is to fully experience the mercy of God. One begins this prayer by contemplating the nature of God and assessing one's image of God. A person looks at the great scriptural passages from the Psalms and wisdom literature in order to behold the mystery of God’s grandeur. When one gets a sense of awe and wonder, then one reads the First Principle and Foundation, which talks about one's dependence upon God at the beginning of life and at the close. God is then able to reveal the beauty of creation in God's plan and promise for the world. As we begin to marvel at what God has done for our enjoyment and benefit, we see that sin takes away from the beauty of this created world. We contemplate God's dream and our misuse of our gifts that take us away from God's dream.

 

We look at the creation of the first sin, that of lucifer, the bearer of light, and then we look at the sin of the first humans. We then begin to notice how sin permeates the world and its grip and intensity grows upon the world. We pick up the newspaper and read about murders and deaths, sorrow and wars, suffering and hatred, and we begin to realize that we are contributors to the sinful structures of the world. We see God's magnificence and our sinful response to it, and we are filled with healthy shame and confusion asking why we do those things that we do. We then realized that we convict ourselves. We are the one who sins, and surprisingly, God does not wipe us off the face of the earth. We get a sense that God's mercy sustains us. It is at this time, Ignatius brings us to the prayer of the Trinity in the heavens. The father, the second person of the trinity, and the holy spirit, look upon the world and sees the beauty and the suffering, and the triune God’s heart is moved with compassion. 

 

The Second Week

 

God sees the need for a savior to help people deal with all their chaos. God the father says, “I want to send someone to let them know that I care for them. Whom shall I send?” The second person of the Trinity responds, “I will go.” The retreatant begins to rely upon God’s undeserved mercy. Ignatius then ask the persons of prayer to use imaginative prayer as we insert ourselves into the biblical or scriptural scene. We begin at the Annunciation followed by the birth of Jesus. We become one of the characters in scripture so that the scenes are real. It may be that we hold the infant Jesus in our arms and give him the love that any infant needs to survive.

 

We then follow Jesus as he goes through childhood and encounters villagers. We begin to befriend Jesus and to know that he relates to us in a very personal way. When we have built up enough fondness for Jesus, Ignatius brings us to a meditation called the Call of Christ, our King. It is in this passage that we begin to hear from Jesus himself God's desire for the world. He calls us into his company, and we get to know the friends that he assembles around him. We then watch Jesus as he goes through his public ministry. We pay attention to how he ministers, the gestures he makes, the tone of voice he uses, and his style of ministering. He invites us into his company that will minister alongside him. It is at this time that we begin the meditation on the Two standards - The standard of Christ and the standard of the enemy of human nature. We look at the style of Jesus with his gentleness and humility, and we examine the devious ways of the enemy of human nature who often deceives us and makes us feel as if we are doing something good. We then choose if we want to continue this relationship with Jesus.

 

If we do choose to continue, then we look at our degree and intensity of loving Jesus, knowing that we are to present our real selves and not merely the person we want to be as we stand before Jesus. We look at the three degrees of humility, and the three classes of persons, all the while watching Jesus as he performs his public ministry of healing, teaching, and proclaiming the reign of God. We examine what exactly this reign of God is and we see both the human and divine nature of Jesus. We are then called to an election with the question: do I want to follow Jesus wherever he goes no matter our personal cost?

 

The Third Week

 

If we say yes, then our job is to walk with Jesus as he goes to his Passion. Our job is to be a chaplain to him. We ask him about his feelings, his experience of saying yes to God, his fears about his impending death, and we let him say whatever is on his mind. At the same time, We are sharing with Jesus the chaos that is within us, the troubling confusion we carry as we know that Jesus is going to the cross personally for us. The third week slows down as we watch the arrest of Jesus and then his suffering and death, and we watch him go to the cross, knowing that we are at the limits of our love and power. We recognize that Jesus needs to die for us. We must experience that Jesus dies for us. Personally. Intimately. It is often difficult to let him die, but we must watch him be taken off the cross and placed in a tomb. We are encouraged to say any last words before that tomb is sealed.

 

The Fourth Week

 

This week begins with the resurrection of Jesus. We contemplate the risen life, the visit of Jesus to his friends and family, and we learned that his nature of ministry has changed to one of consoler and peacemaker. No one has seen the resurrection, and we don't really know what it's about, but as we have personally walked with Jesus on his way to death and shared our lives together, the resurrection of Jesus takes on a new meaning. We contemplate the love of God, and we commit ourselves to loving and seeing the world the way that God loves and sees the world. We watch with new eyes about the way that God is active and present in the world, and we look how Jesus is with us closely, and that the Holy Spirit is there to guide us. Jesus left us with a community of faith gathered around him so that we can continue to transform the world in his love, justice, and mercy.

 

 

 

Retreat in Daily Life:

Type: Retreat in Daily Life (sometimes referred to as the 19th Annotation)

Format: Online via Zoom.

Dates: September 8, 2026 – April 30, 2027 (Tuesdays via Zoom, 4:00pm – 5:00pm, Eastern)

About: This retreat will serve those familiar with Ignatian prayer and would like to deepen their faith relationship in a group setting.

• Alternatively, we will accommodate those people who are seekers and do not yet have a firm faith background.
• This retreat targets as well people who need to express themselves better in creativity than by words. For instance, painters, sketchers, colorists, photographers, artists, craftspeople, poets who need to express themselves differently from the regular use of words.
• Retreat Direction will be provided on an individualized basis, often by Zoom.
• I create a recording version of the discussion for weekly reflection.
• Each week’s handouts will include:
• A poem
• A song
• A visual art contemplation
• A reflection on Teilhard de Chardin’s Creation Theology.

Creativity Option: People are free to express their graces and experiences by drawing, sketching, painting, or through any creative technique that deepens their prayer movements.

Creation (Evolution) Theology as proposed by Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. and advanced by thinkers like Delio, Haight, Haught, and Savary teach us about the compatibility of science and theology. We look at God’s project for the cosmos and humanity’s place in the universe that is still in its infancy and is subject to the laws of evolution.

Fr. Predmore, S.J. teaches prayer classes (Foundations and Practice of Christian Prayer, Giving the 19^thAnnotation, and Ignatian Discernment and Synodality) at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska. The Christian Spiritual Program forms future spiritual and retreat directors and awards Master's Degrees in Spirituality.