TRANSFORMATION IN RETREATS, TRANSFORMATION IN EVERYDAY LIFE Stefan Kiechle
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PIRITUAL PROCESSES OCCUR both during formal retreats and during
everyday life. In Ignatian spirituality as we now understand and live it, both kinds of process have a place; they differ in kind, but nevertheless they belong together. Both offer rich possibilities; there are, however, some situations in which one kind of setting may be much more conducive to growth than the other. How are we to understand this relationship? How can we steer the two kinds of process so that they do not just carry on alongside each other without any connection, or indeed get in each other’s way, but rather inform and nourish each other? Let me begin by stating my position, oversimplifying in order to make a point. In everyday life, the Spirit’s transforming work takes place primarily through ordinary events; in retreats, the Spirit’s transforming work takes place primarily through prayer. In everyday life, the challenge consists in letting everyday experience become a prayer; in retreats, the challenge consists in getting the prayer to incorporate and inform life that has already been lived or that is to come. In everyday life, the process moves chiefly from without to within; in retreats, the process moves chiefly from within to without. Some kinds of spiritual insight come more easily through retreats; others come more easily through everyday life. Spiritual direction has to deal with the different kinds of challenge in different ways. Some Cases I begin with a few accounts of my own practice, chosen more or less at random, and in no particular order: • I was giving a retreat to some students. One young man was meditating on blind Bartimaus. He became deeply shaken at his own blindspots, and began to see his life and his future in a quite new The Way, 43/2 (April 2004), 18-28