Evangelicals on the Ignatian Way

Suscipe and the Contemplation to Attain God's Love

There is a beginning and an end… and hopefully everything in-between is congruent and in harmony with what is said first and last.

In the previous post, I told you what the beginning of the Exercises is all about. That was the First Principle and Foundation which ground the retreatant in the very meaning of creation and the purpose of life.  All things are created for our well being and to aid us in the pursuit of the glory of God.

The final reflection of Ignatius' Exercises is found in Notes 230-237. It is titled:

Contemplation to Attain the Love of God.

(By the way, there are many things that are contained as supplemental resources after this, but they are not the Exercises themselves.)
 

The First Principle and the Contemplation are the Bookends for the Exercises and are deeply intertwined and supportive of each other.

By the time a retreatant has come to this final reflection, Ignatius' assumption is that the retreatant is full of gratitude, having gained awareness of the Presence, Work and Word of Christ (or having Found God in All Things), has consecrated desires to know, love and serve God, and a generosity of spirit that desires to do more for the greater glory of God.

This final reflection invites the retreatant to consider the great love and grace of God for her or him. It is called the contemplation to ATTAIN God's love.  But the word - attain - is not used in the sense of "learn" but rathe rin the sense of "awareness" or "the experience of" God's love.
 

There are four movements in this reflection.  The retreatant reflects on:

God's gift to them (all the retreatant is and has is from God), #234

God's self-giving, #235

God's ongoing labors and works on their behalf, #236

God's unceasing self-giving love, #237

In the center of these reflections is a beautiful and profound prayer. It is sometimes referred to as the "Suscipe" which is simply the first Latin word of the prayer, which begins, "Take, Lord, and receive…"  "Suscipe" is "take."

Here is the prayer:

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,

my memory,

my understanding,

and my entire will,

all that I have and possess.

Thou hast given all to me.

To Thee, O Lord, I return it.

All is Thine,

dispose of it wholly according to Thy will.

Give me Thy love and Thy grace,

for this is sufficient for me.

Ignatius of Loyola

This is a prayer of loving surrender and trust in response to the deep awareness of the enormous love and grace of God for us.

I recommend that you write out this prayer and pray it daily for the week to come. You may also want to reflect several times on these words from the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 3:17-21

I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever. Amen.

Brian K. Rice
Leadership ConneXtions
International www.lci.typepad.com

Anima Christi by Puhl, Fleming and Tetlow

Here is the Anima Christi prayer in three versions. Each one is moving and useful. I encourage you to pray these prayers this coming week.

By the way, I recommend to you, a little book on payer, Hearts on Fire: Praying With the Jesuits, edited by Michael Harter, SJ, published by Loyola Press.

 

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Ignatius

Anima Christi (Soul of Christ)

Source: The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, trans. Louis J. Puhl, S.J.

Soul of Christ, sanctify Me

Body of Christ, save Me

Blood of Christ, inebriate Me

Water from the side of Christ, wash me

Passion of Christ, strengthen me

O Good Jesus, hear me

Within Thy wounds hide me

Permit me not to be separated from Thee

From the wicked foe defend me

At the hour of my death call me

And bid me come to Thee

That with Thy saints I may praise Thee

For ever and ever. 

Amen

David Fleming, S.J.

Soul of Christ Prayer

Source:  Hearts on Fire: Praying With the Jesuits (pp. 3-4)

Jesus, may all that is in you flow into me.

May your body and blood be my food and drink.

May your passion and death be my strength and life.

Jesus, with you by my side enough has been given.

May the shelter I seek be the shadow of your cross.

Let me not run from the love which you offer.

But hold me safe from the forces of evil.

On each of my dyings shed your light and your love.

Keep calling to me until that day comes.

When with our saints, I may praise you forever.

Amen

Joseph Tetlow,S.J. (pictured)

I Choose to Breathe the Breath of Christ

Source:  Hearts on Fire: Praying With the Jesuits (pp. 5-6)

I choose to breathe the breath of Christ that makes all life holy.

I choose to live the flesh of Christ that outlasts sin's corrosion and decry.

I choose the blood of Christ along my veins and in my hearts that dizzies me with joy.

I choose the living waters flowing from his side to wash clean my own self and the world itself.

I choose the awful agony of Chrsit to charge my senseless sorrows with meaning and to make my pain pregnant with power.

I choose you, good Jesus, you know.

I choose you, good Lord;  count me among the victories that you have won in bitter roundedness.

Never number me among those alien to you.

Make me safe from all ha seeks to destroy me.

Summon me to come to you.

Stand me solid among angels and saints chanting yes to all you have done, exulting in all you mean to do forever and ever.

The for this time, Father of all, keep me, from the core of my self, choosing Christ in the world.

Amen
 

Brian K. Rice
Leadership ConneXtions International
www.lci.typepad.com

Anima Christi

In January I will start to blog on key themes that are essential to the Spiritual Exercises. These are the spiritual, theological and biblical perspectives that are woven throughout the Exercises.

For this first post in January, I am introducing you to the Prequel Prayer of Ignatius that is provided before the Exercises begin.   (I know I said I would do the First Principle and Foundation today, I'll do that next week.)

I have provided the Ignatian text as it appears in the Puhl translation. Tomorrow I will have another post providing the Puhl text along with two more contemporary renditions of this prayer. One by David Fleming and the other by Joseph Tetlow, both outstanding Jesuit spiritual directors, authors and interpreters/translators of Ignatius and his Spiritual Exercises

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Anima Christi (Soul of Christ)

Soul of Christ, sanctify Me

Body of Christ, save Me

Blood of Christ, inebriate Me

Water from the side of Christ, wash me

Passion of Christ, strengthen me

O Good Jesus, hear me

Within Thy wounds hide me

Permit me not to be separated from Thee

From the wicked foe defend me

At the hour of my death call me

And bid me come to Thee

That with Thy saints I may praise Thee

For ever and ever. 

Amen

I love to read some of the great and "famous' prayers that have been written and prayed by followers of Christ through the centuries. Some of them are so powerful in their wording, they have sustained their place amid the devotional literature of our heritage.

The Anima Christi by Ignatius is one of them.

I pray this prayer often.

I am moved by how this prayer is so Christ-centered. Ignatius had a strong Trinitarian spirituality AND at the same time, his Spiritual Exercises are Christo-centric. Christ is supreme throughout the Exercises. 

One way to describe the DESIRED OUTCOMES of going through the Exercises is that the retreating will come to know, love and follow Christ with great desire and surrender, wanting only what Christ wants, and therefore, fully devoted to Christ and dedicated to the mission of Christ in the world.

The Anima Christi prayer is the foretaste of what is to come in the Exercises.

I am also struck by how this prayer is so Christ-dependent. Sometimes, evangelicals make a careless and unfortunate mistake in ascribing to Roman Catholicism, a works oriented spirituality.  

Well, yes, there are strong works that are a part of (for our example) Ignatian spirituality. But these works are absolutely grounded in dependence on Christ and His empowering grace that makes all things possible.

Ignatius is utterly dependent on Christ. Ignatius knows he cannot even desire Christ fully and rightly, unless Christ first gives Ignatius this desire. This will be seen all throughout the Exercises. And it is a wonderful corrective to some of our own self-focused, pragmatic, "get'er done" evangelical practices.

Ignatius has captured the spiritual balance of the Apostle Paul:

". . . continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose."  Philippians 2:12-13

"But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No I worked harder than all of them - yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me."  1 Corinthians 15:10

Finally, I notice how devotion to Christ is in this prayer. Ignatius loves Jesus. Ignatius wants to love Jesus more. Ignatius does not merely have good theological notions about Christ. Ignatius wants to experience Christ, and this prayer if for the Person of Jesus in all His splendor, to be with Ignatius in all his need.

As I said above, this prayer is the foretaste of what is to come.

Brian K. Rice 
Leadership ConneXtions International 
www.lci.typepad.com

Dear Lord, Three Things I Pray...

 The musical, Godspell, made the following prayer famous.

O Dear Lord

Three things I pray.

To see thee more clearly.

Love thee more dearly.

Follow thee more nearly.

Day by Day.

Since this is a blogsite devoted to all things Jesuit (for evangelicals) you probably aren't going to be surprised at what I say this next.

This prayer has its origins in Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises. Here it is in Ignatius' words:

 104. Third Prelude. This is to ask for what I desire. Here it will be to ask for an intimate knowledge of our Lord, who has become man for me, that I may love Him more and follow Him more closely. (Ignatius)

The Godspell musical made it a "catchier" chorus/prayer, but nonetheless, its origin is Ignatius' instructions to retreatants on getting ready to contemplate the Incarnation.

  

And at this time of the year, as we celebrate the Word made flesh, God with us, Immanuel - may we all make this our prayer.

Dear Lord, three things I pray…

Brian K. Rice 
Leadership ConneXtions International
www.lci.typepad.com