4 Downsizing

To begin, ask yourself these questions:

What do I really need?

What do I most fear?

Many older adults confront questions relating to scaling down their lifestyle: moving to a smaller home, giving up a car, letting go of material things. The aging also face physical and mental losses that involve a different kind of downsizing—or, more accurately, a kind of poverty that has nothing to do with wealth or possessions. Accepting help—let alone asking for it!—may also present special challenges. Fear of the unknown or of loss and diminishment may color any of these issues.

Ignatius’s rules for decision making and his advice about imitating Jesus are certainly helpful in all these situations. But decisions of these kinds, more than most others, require us to look deeply into who we are and what we value. Ignatius’s analytical approach to decision making, discussed in the preceding chapter, may be less useful. We may instead need to discover how God speaks to us through our feelings. We need, in short, a discerning heart.

How Much Is Enough?

Many older adults find that they no longer need, or have the energy to maintain, a large house. Whether to move from a longtime home is often a radically life-changing decision and a wrenching emotional one. How to carry out such a decision may be even more complicated. There are many variations.

Some have the option of moving in with their adult children. Matilda’s story, in chapter 2, is a cautionary tale about the kinds of pitfalls such a decision may involve. Others may wish to establish their own households in the cities or towns where their children live. This, too, has perils. I once worked with a lawyer who decided to move to another state after retirement because his only son was living there with his family. My colleague and his wife returned to New York after a year because they knew no one except their son’s family and missed the active, connected life they had enjoyed in their former community. For many people, there are underlying (and often overlooked) questions relating to the kind of relationship they want to have with their adult children at this stage of life. Preserving independence as long as possible is an objective frequently mentioned when people are surveyed about their goals and concerns. Will that objective be furthered or hampered by living with or near one’s children? Would assisted living be a better or worse option?

Housing is only one area of potential downsizing. Expenses that were necessary during full-time employment may now be luxuries. One car can do the former work of two; reduced income or diminished capacity may mean no car at all.

As the population ages, practical questions such as these have begun to be analyzed in publications addressed to the general reader. The investment firm Merrill Lynch had a section on its Web site not long ago dealing exclusively with the financial advantages of downsizing. But downsizing is not a mere financial transaction. Whether the changes are necessary or merely practical, they inevitably involve an examination of core values. What really matters at this stage of life, at this stage of the spiritual journey?

Not all of us are called to lives of evangelical poverty, even in old age. Many retired people have an IRA or a 401(k) plan that may or may not be sufficient. Some have substantial property, others barely enough to live on. Most of us need to make prudent provision so that we do not outlive our money. Some of us may also ask: How much of our money should outlive us? There is no one-size-fits-all approach. The answers will be different for a single person with no family and a couple with children and grandchildren, but all should ask the question: How much is enough?

Ignatius’s advice on property is a useful starting point. He teaches that we should “desire to keep it or dispose of it solely according to what God our Lord will move [our] will to choose” and should not “desire or feel . . . strongly attached to have wealth rather than poverty, or honor rather than dishonor, or a long life rather than a short one.” With this in mind, Ignatius counsels very specific attention to such matters as how large a household to maintain and how much to spend on one’s lifestyle.24

For many Americans, Ignatius’s admonition not to prefer wealth over poverty can be a stumbling block. Those of us who have worked hard all our lives feel a sense of entitlement to the fruits of our labor. “I’ve earned it” is not a Christian attitude; it is a cultural assumption and one that calls for honest prayer and prudent discernment.

We may not all have the grace to embrace the Ignatian ideal of a genuine preference for poverty, but we may still find greater clarity in distinguishing what we really need for a well-balanced life. For me, it meant the painful decision to give up my car: a necessity when I was working, a luxury in New York City in retirement. For others, it might mean moving from a house to an apartment, cutting down on spending, making gifts to children or grandchildren, or letting go of possessions that are no longer needed. A neighbor of mine, then in her eighties, told me proudly that she and her husband were “de-accessioning” the artworks acquired over a lifetime of collecting, because she knew her children had no interest in inheriting them.

No matter how modest our circumstances, Ignatius reminds us of the need to provide “for the poor and other good works.” Retirees on limited incomes may be able to make only small financial contributions, but for many of us the opportunity to give our time and talents in service can be a special grace. The opportunity to do volunteer work is for many people a new kind of vocation. Downsizing can thus help us focus on social justice, not only in what we give to the poor but also in what we might be called to do.

A Different Kind of Poverty

In his post-resurrection appearance to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias, Jesus says to Peter:

Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go. (John 21:18)

Although Jesus “said this signifying by what kind of death [Peter] would glorify God” (John 21:19), for many aging people it is a promise of diminished capacity and loss of independence. Those changes may be seen as a kind of poverty unrelated to money or property.

Sooner or later, our bodies begin to fail us. We need bifocals, periodontal surgery, cataract surgery, knee replacements, hearing aids. Starting in middle age, these common medical interventions seem almost like rites of passage. They also remind us that many of our body parts are not well adapted to the long life spans most of us enjoy in the twenty-first century. As we gradually begin to admit that we can no longer call ourselves middle-aged, many of us experience losses in hearing, vision, or mobility that medical science can do little or nothing to arrest.

Then there is fear. The biggest fear for many older adults is the loss of mental faculties: loss of memory, difficulty expressing oneself, and worst of all, dementia. We often hear people say, “I don’t want to be a burden,” when what they mean is, “I am terrified of not knowing who I am or what is happening to me.” The late Thomas Clarke, SJ, has called this “our special brand of poverty.”

Arthritis makes it difficult for me to climb stairs or get up from very low seats; things I can no longer do include riding the New York City subway, sitting in a theater balcony, and using a bathtub rather than a shower. I know people in my age group who have experienced profound hearing loss or debilitating pain that makes social life impossible. These losses are indeed a special kind of poverty—different in kind from the experiences of the materially poor, yet poverty nonetheless. It is also a particularly lonely kind of poverty: Can younger, healthier people even imagine the fear of losing one’s independence, one’s memory, one’s identity?

Grace was a religious sister who, in her seventies, began to have increasing difficulty finding the right word. Before she was diagnosed, she realized that she was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Resisting the fear that inevitably accompanies such knowledge, she embraced her diminishing capacity as a new call to ministry. She saw herself in solidarity with others who were losing their cognitive abilities and sense of self, and she committed to pray for them as long as she was able. The last time I saw her, before she moved to her community’s facility for the elderly and infirm, her ability to express herself verbally had noticeably deteriorated, but she radiated peace and happiness.

Mary was a single woman who, also in her seventies, began experiencing memory loss, which was later followed by significant vocabulary loss. She retired from full-time work and began bit by bit to withdraw from activities she had always enjoyed, including going to the opera and serving as a Eucharistic minister. Her only family consisted of siblings in another state. For a long time she resisted their efforts to persuade her to move from her walk-up apartment to assisted living. She knew that once she gave up her independence, she would never regain it. Always deeply religious, she did not cease praying even as she lacked the words. I had not heard from her in a while, because talking on the phone was a challenge for her. Then, one day she called to tell me of her move to a beautiful one-bedroom apartment in an assisted-living facility. She was not far from two of her sisters and was overjoyed that she was allowed to keep her cat. How her sisters finally overcame her resistance I don’t know. What was clear was that, even as Mary’s ability to describe her feelings diminished, she had found the grace in this unlooked-for stage of life.

Letting go of mobility, of hearing, of independence, may be much more difficult than letting go of material things, especially since we do not choose these physical losses. Here, too, one size does not fit all. Old-fashioned advice like “offer it up” or “live in the present moment” may make the matter worse. But this may be a time in our lives when we can acknowledge our total dependence on God.

On a recent Holy Thursday, I was struck by how the Gospel of Jesus washing the feet of the disciples (John 13:1–15) leads to this insight. I tried to imagine myself as one of the disciples, as Jesus approached to wash my feet. My first reaction was a lot like Peter’s: No, Lord, don’t wash my feet; don’t touch me; I am a sinner; my little heart cannot contain such an enormous act of love. I managed to overcome that feeling, as Peter had. Then my imagination took me to the possibility of a time in the future when I might have to depend on others, not only to wash my feet and “my head and hands as well” but also to help me with many simple everyday tasks. Will I be able to see Christ in the caregivers?

Ignatius prescribes a meditation on St. Matthew’s version of the Beatitudes during the Second Week of the Spiritual Exercises. In the translation commonly used in the United States, the opening verse is “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:3). The Jerusalem Bible, which is popular in countries that use British English, instead begins “How happy are the poor in spirit” and uses “happy” instead of “blessed” throughout the Beatitudes.25 Are we really supposed to be happy about being materially poor, or about the poverty that comes from physical or mental diminishment? How is any of this a blessing? Where is the grace in all this?26

Again, I keep coming back to our dependence on God. That is in fact what “the poor in spirit” is usually understood to mean: those who are aware of their total dependence on God. Thus, the promise of the “kingdom of heaven” is not a mere reference to some future eternal reward. Rather, Jesus is saying that the awareness of our dependence on God is itself a gift. I have no doubt that was how Sister Grace came to embrace what she saw as a new kind of vocation.

Interestingly, Ignatius does not prescribe Luke’s version of the Beatitudes (6:20–26), which begins “Blessed [happy] are you who are poor.” This version may speak more directly to those of us experiencing increasing impoverishment, material or physical. Either way, we should allow ourselves to be led to a more profound understanding that all is gift: every beat of our heart, every breath we take, and every way we are permitted to enjoy life and praise God for as long as God wills. As long as we are alive, there is something to be thankful for.

This may sound like an oversimplification, especially for people who are experiencing severe pain or crippling disability. I cannot speak from personal experience about such extreme situations, but I do take comfort in the well-worn principle that we are given the grace that is appropriate to the situation we are in. When we are healthy, we may not be able to imagine how we would cope with a terminal illness. Nor should we. We don’t need that grace now. When the time comes, so will the grace, provided we are open to receiving it.

God does not force us to accept grace; we can always choose to refuse it. To perceive what our choices are, we need to pay attention. Elijah did not find God in the storm or the earthquake or the fire but in “a tiny whispering sound” (1 Kings 19:11–13). The skills we need to hear what God is whispering to us are what Ignatius called discernment of spirits.

Ignatian Prayer: Discernment of Spirits

Discernment of spirits is not really a form of prayer. Rather, it is a type of awareness that can enrich and deepen our prayer as we learn to distinguish what draws us closer to God and what draws us away.

To do this, we prayerfully examine our feelings, what Ignatius called the “motions” of the heart. I prefer Richard Hauser’s phrase fluctuations of the heart, which better conveys both the subtlety and the fleeting nature of the thoughts, feelings, and impulses that often underlie our actions.27 Those facing downsizing or the poverty that comes with diminishment and loss may find this a particularly appropriate time to ask God for the grace of a discerning heart.

In his autobiography, Ignatius described his first experience of what he later came to call discernment of spirits.28 During his long recovery from a wound sustained in battle and a series of ghastly sixteenth-century surgeries, he had little to read and a great deal of time to let his thoughts run in all directions. He indulged in elaborate fantasies about feats he might accomplish when restored to health and, in particular, how they might favorably impress a certain noble lady. His reading of the lives of Christ and the saints—the only books available to him—also generated fantasies. He imagined himself imitating St. Dominic and St. Francis and was attracted to extreme self-denial. He dwelt at length on both kinds of fantasies and eventually noticed an important difference. The worldly thoughts, while pleasurable, “left him dry and dissatisfied.”29 The thoughts of imitating the saints had a strikingly different effect: “not only was he consoled when he had these thoughts, but even after putting them aside he remained satisfied and joyful.”30 Gradually he began to reflect on the differences and “came to recognize the difference between the spirits that were stirring, one from the devil, the other from God.”31

The modern reader may have more difficulty than Ignatius did in personifying the good and evil impulses as God and the devil, or as good and evil spirits. Scholars of Ignatian spirituality in our own time have understood these terms more broadly. Thus, “evil spirits” can mean any internal or external influence that turns us away from God, such as our tendencies toward egotism or the values of the secular world around us. “Good spirits” are all the opposites. It is in that comprehensive sense that I will use these terms.32

The fluctuations of the heart caused by the different spirits lead to conditions of spiritual consolation and spiritual desolation. Understanding these feelings and learning how to respond to them are the characteristics of a discerning heart.

The crux of spiritual desolation is the feeling of separation from God. In Ignatius’s words, “it is characteristic of the evil spirit to cause gnawing anxiety, to sadden, and to set up obstacles” to spiritual progress.33 In the worst-case scenario, these impulses “move one toward lack of faith and leave one without hope and without love. One is completely listless, tepid, and unhappy, and feels separated from our Creator and Lord.”

Spiritual desolation is not the same as depression, although the two may coincide. Clinical depression involves deep feelings of sadness and hopelessness and increasing lack of interest in people and in formerly pleasurable activities. These feelings are often accompanied by physical symptoms such as loss of energy and changes in sleep patterns or appetite. A person who experiences these feelings over a substantial period should seek therapy. While sadness and negative feelings may also be present in spiritual desolation, the key indicator here is disinclination to prayer.34

One of the most striking examples of spiritual desolation was that experienced by St. Thérèse of Lisieux near the end of her life. In her autobiography, she describes her soul as in “pitch-black darkness” that lasted for many months. Trying to find consolation in thoughts of eternal life, she instead saw only “a still darker night, the night of annihilation!” She had not even “the consolation of faith.” At this point in her narrative, she expresses the fear that to say any more about this lack of faith and hope might amount to “blasphemy.”35 One modern biographer has gone so far as to assert that “by the mid-winter of 1897 [a few months before her death], she had passed beyond all likely or even possible retrieval of faith and hope in a celestial life.”36 Yet she persisted in love, and even in her “night of [the] soul,” she could write: “For me, prayer is an upward leap of the heart, an untroubled glance towards heaven, a cry of gratitude and love which I utter from the depths of sorrow as well as from the heights of joy.”37

There is no evidence that Thérèse had ever read Ignatius. She nevertheless seems a perfect example of how a soul in utter hopelessness can persevere in prayer, knowing at some level of her being that God’s grace is always sufficient, no matter how deep the darkness.

Spiritual consolation, on the other hand, includes “every increase in hope, faith, and charity, and every interior joy which calls and attracts one toward heavenly things and to the salvation of one’s soul, by bringing it tranquility and peace in its Creator and Lord.” It is a gift of God that Ignatius cautions us to receive with humility and use as a means to “store up new strength” against times of desolation.38

Spiritual consolation is not the same thing as feeling good. It can be given during times of sadness. I had such an experience during my Nineteenth Annotation retreat. The Third Week of the Exercises is devoted to meditating on the Passion and death of Jesus. It happened that I reached this point just before Easter. At the beginning of Holy Week, my father entered the hospital for a minor procedure and was found to have lung cancer requiring immediate surgery. On the train from New York to Hartford early on the morning of Good Friday, full of sadness and worry, I was reading the Passion narratives and trying to place myself among the sorrowful women at the foot of the Cross. Suddenly I realized that they didn’t know how the story ended. How total their desolation must have been without knowledge of the Resurrection! It was an extraordinary experience of entering the minds and hearts, and sharing the experience of, the companions of Jesus. At the same time, it was an experience of hope, because we do know how the story ended. This spiritual consolation strengthened and empowered me for the difficult days ahead. It was not a happy time, but it was a time of grace.

Discernment about Downsizing

What, then, has all this to do with making decisions, especially the ones faced by the aging? Decisions about downsizing may involve conflicting emotions, often magnified by family dynamics. Try as we might, we do not experience the tranquility necessary to make a rational decision according to the analytical method discussed in the preceding chapter. Instead of trying to ignore these powerful emotions, we look deeply within them to find “sufficient clarity and knowledge” on which to base a decision.39 To avoid rash decisions or self-deception, we need to distinguish the fluctuations of the heart that come from the evil spirit and those that come from God.

Ignatius uses three metaphors to illustrate the way the evil spirit works to draw the soul away from God.40 The first may be interpreted as that of a “spoiled child.” This evil spirit focuses our attention on every trivial detail in a situation that does not meet our expectations, so that we do not look for the grace in the situation. I once met this devil on a retreat: The bed was uncomfortable; the room was cold; the shower malfunctioned; and breakfast was inadequate. I was so focused on these annoyances that I could not pray—until I recognized what was happening: The evil spirit certainly did not want me to pray! It is not hard to imagine how the same process might play out in the case of, for example, a newly retired person who finds many things to complain about in his or her new situation. The more one focuses on the disappointments and inconveniences, the harder it is to open up to the graces of the new environment.

The second metaphor is that of a “false lover” who draws us away from God through secrecy. If there is a trivial matter that one does not want to mention in confession because it is not seriously sinful, the evil spirit may be beckoning a person down a slippery slope, from the insignificant to the deadly. At a subtler level, when deciding what to discuss with a spiritual director, the uncomfortable topic that one would prefer to leave out is probably the one most deserving of attention. Subtler still is the impulse to avoid certain topics in prayer. It is easy enough to skip over something like anger or resentment, perhaps with an excuse such as lack of time or the rationalization that other topics are more important. A key part of the examen is focusing on what needs improvement in our spiritual journey, and this inevitably requires addressing our most intractable faults and those we have trouble acknowledging.

In my own prayer, I have often returned to a person I trusted who hurt me deeply and whom I had great difficulty forgiving. In the immediate wake of the event, I brought to prayer my resentment and anger, which dominated my daily examen to the point of giving very short shrift to everything else that mattered during the day. I reacted by trying to suppress all thoughts of the episode, to put them completely out of my mind. But, of course, the feelings were still there, festering beneath the surface. For a long time, I prayed for the grace to forgive the person who hurt me instead of trying to forget what happened. Eventually, I was able to move away from reexperiencing the resentment and the hurt, but I learned from this experience that recognizing the obligation to forgive is not the same as forgiveness from the heart.

For the aging, there are often painful situations calling for forgiveness, sometimes arising out of long-standing family conflicts and enduring hurts. It is all too easy to avoid thinking of these things. Allowing repressed feelings to surface brings to light what the evil spirit would prefer to keep in darkness. Some people have difficulty with the idea of bringing anger to prayer; it goes against a lot of what we were taught as children about how we “should” pray. But recognizing a bad feeling is not the same as accepting it, much less acting on it. The more we understand our negative impulses, the more we can ask for, and accept, the grace to act against them.

Another way the evil spirit may use the temptation to secrecy is to turn us away from help we may need. Refusing offers of help from family members or neighbors may be rationalized as a desire for privacy, but it could mean that a person is in denial. My mother began to lose her hearing when she was in her sixties, but when she died at age ninety-one, she was still insisting that she “wasn’t ready” for a hearing aid. Something as simple as repeatedly postponing visits to the doctor or as dangerous as concealing the lack of food on hand may proceed from this kind of negative thinking.

The third metaphor Ignatius uses is that of a military commander who attacks us at our weakest point. In the face of impoverishment, material or otherwise, people are often beset by fear. Without minimizing the very real basis for some of these fears, they can certainly provide the kind of vulnerability suggested by Ignatius. In short, the evil spirit magnifies every what-if in an effort to make the fear controlling. Recognizing this dynamic can open us to respond with trust.

Ignatius also cautions that the evil angel sometimes “takes on the appearance of an angel of light.”41 One of the forms this took in his own life was the experience of vivid spiritual insights while he was studying. Aware of the importance of study in the life to which he felt called, he gradually came to realize that the spiritual insights drawing him away from study were in fact temptations. On a much more mundane level, while writing this book, I have often had my best ideas during prayer time.

Spiritual desolation can occur at any age or in any circumstances, but we should not be surprised if it occurs when life-changing decisions are in prospect. Ignatius cautions strongly against making significant changes during a time of spiritual desolation. As the “counterattack” to this condition, he instead urges increased prayer and meditation, patience, and, above all, confidence that the desolation will pass and God’s grace will be sufficient. The guidance of a spiritual director, discussed below, can be especially helpful in times of spiritual desolation.42

The appropriate response to spiritual consolation, on the other hand, is first and foremost to give thanks to God for this gift of grace. For many people, aging brings greater interest in an inner journey. That does not mean merely more prayer or less fear of death but a deeper appreciation that all is gift, and a growing ability to find God in all things.

Discernment in Times of Involuntary Poverty

Discernment of spirits, then, is a means to wise and God-centered decision making. But the impoverishment experienced by many of the aging is involuntary. We do not decide to lose our hearing or to suffer a debilitating disease. What do good and evil spirits have to do with how we live now?

No matter how restricted our circumstances, we still make choices. We did not choose the pain, but we can choose how we respond to it. Easier said than done? Yes, of course. But that is precisely why it matters to understand how God is speaking to us through our feelings. As we advance in discernment, recognizing the fluctuations of the heart as they occur, we can come to a deeper understanding that our relationship with God is the purpose of our lives.

As we ask for the grace of a discerning heart, there is great practical help in both keeping a spiritual journal and meeting regularly with a spiritual director.

Keeping a Spiritual Journal

A spiritual journal is a regular record of spiritual experiences, insights, consolations, and desolations. They are best written down as soon as they occur, before memory has faded and their significance is lost. The end of the examen can be an excellent time. Some people write long, detailed accounts; others prefer key words or phrases, or even diagrams or drawings. A quotation from a verse of Scripture that stands out on a particular day may be all that is needed to bring the experience to mind. At other times, a detailed description of the experience may help you understand it more fully.

The main reason for keeping a regular spiritual journal is to observe the patterns in one’s spiritual life over time. That may be particularly true of the pros and cons of a proposed decision as they unfold. As suggested earlier, it is also important to record experiences of spiritual consolation, to return to them in times of desolation or dryness. Combining journaling with spiritual direction can be especially enriching.

Spiritual Direction

A spiritual director is a person trained to help another develop a closer relationship to God. This ministry includes priests, religious, and laypeople. Spiritual direction is something of a misnomer, because the relationship rarely involves giving directions or instructions. It might be more accurately described as spiritual companionship. The director may also be considered a facilitator or a mentor who helps the directee to both a deeper appreciation of God’s presence and a more loving response, always in the context of the presence of the Holy Spirit. The task of a spiritual director has been variously described as listening attentively, sympathetically, or empathetically. I prefer to call it “listening with the heart.”43

Spiritual direction thus differs significantly from counseling. The counselor is expected to give practical advice, to help “fix” problems. The spiritual director’s role, in contrast, is to evoke the directee’s spiritual experience. The goal is not to tell the directee what to do but to help the directee to greater awareness of God and his or her own responses to that awareness. For me as a new director, this has been a challenge: When one of my directees is in a dark place, my first inclination is to talk about how God loves her unconditionally and about all the graces that surround her. But she must discover this for herself, in God’s good time. My role is to be with her, always aware that the Holy Spirit is the real spiritual director.

Prior to the Second Vatican Council, spiritual direction was available primarily to priests and religious. Indeed, it was part of their religious formation. As spiritual direction has become available to people outside religious vocations, more and more laypeople have discovered this valuable spiritual resource, and there has been a greater understanding that the spiritual journey is that of the directee and that he or she is the person ultimately responsible for growing closer to God. For the aging, spiritual direction may be particularly helpful in discerning how God is calling us to live at this stage of our lives and in looking forward to a horizon that is coming ever nearer.

Director and directee usually meet once a month, for a period of forty-five minutes to an hour, although neither the frequency nor the length of the meetings must fit any particular pattern. All that is required of the directee is a sincere desire to develop a closer relationship with God, and a commitment to regular prayer.

What is discussed in each spiritual direction session will vary according to the directee’s situation. The conversation should be limited to spiritual matters; friendly chitchat can sometimes be a defense mechanism for avoiding a difficult subject. The director will usually expect to hear the most important experiences in the directee’s spiritual life since they last met. Sometimes there will be one overriding experience; at other times, there may be a pattern of recurring themes or no pattern at all. Keeping a spiritual journal and reviewing it before meeting the director can be useful in prayerfully preparing for the meeting, but doing so is not mandatory. The director may be helpful in discerning consolations and desolations and may sometimes suggest a specific form of prayer or a Scripture passage for meditation. Whether to follow the suggestion is entirely up to the directee, and a good director will never inquire whether the directee did so.

Above all, both director and directee should strive for greater awareness of the presence of the Holy Spirit, in their spiritual conversations and in their lives.

The first question people often ask is how to find a spiritual director. There are several answers, depending on various factors, such as region of the country. There are no uniform standards for spiritual directors; anyone can hang out a shingle. Unlike psychiatrists, lawyers, and hairdressers, they are not required to be licensed. The training they have received may be as different as a master’s degree in theology or ministry from a Jesuit university; a university-level program leading to a certificate in spiritual direction; or a more informal course of training offered by a diocese, retreat house, or other institution.

For one seeking a director trained in Ignatian spirituality, a good place to start is a Jesuit university that offers training in spiritual direction and can refer people to its alumni. Among the institutions with well-established programs are Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska; Fordham University in New York City; and Boston College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. Their graduates may be anywhere in the world. The increasing numbers of laypeople trained in these programs have created a wide pool of talent, facilitating the search for the right match. A grandfather may be comfortable with a married deacon, while many women find a laywoman or a religious sister a better match than a priest.

The faculty of Jesuit high schools or the staff of Jesuit parishes may also be good sources of referrals. While not all Jesuits give spiritual direction, many of them are well acquainted with those who do.

Retreat houses can also be helpful. Some augment their full-time staffs in the summer, when the demand for retreats is heaviest, and may be able to refer an inquirer to one of these directors. In approaching a retreat house, however, it’s important to know something of the background of the permanent staff. Some retreat houses offer opportunities for personal prayer and solitude, but their personnel are not necessarily trained or equipped to offer spiritual direction. It’s best to choose an establishment where you have already made a retreat.

Parish priests may or may not be helpful. They often have extensive experience in counseling, helping people with serious problems that need immediate remedies. They rarely have time to give spiritual direction themselves and may not have many qualified spiritual directors in their Rolodexes. If you know your pastor well, it could be worth a try.

As a last resort, an online search can serve as a starting point. The Office of Ignatian Spirituality, a ministry of the Maryland and USA Northeast Provinces of the Society of Jesus, has recently started an online database.44 Spiritual Directors International is an organization that maintains a roster of available spiritual directors—but be aware that the list is ecumenical, and the organization’s definition of spiritual director is broad. Careful scrutiny of a director’s biography and training is called for.45

The right fit between director and directee is essential. Talking about such intimate matters as the deepest desires of one’s heart requires a degree of mutual trust. Despite the best intentions of both parties, it sometimes happens that a director may seem too detached or that a directee wants to focus exclusively on matters that require counseling rather than spiritual direction. It may be too difficult to set up regular appointments because the parties have incompatible schedules. In a small community, the director may be personally acquainted with many of the directee’s friends or relatives, putting stress on the confidentiality of the process. Both parties need to trust their instincts on these and other signals.

As a first step, then, there should be a get-acquainted meeting, with no presuppositions. Common icebreaking questions like “What do you do?” and “Where are you from?” are as appropriate here as in other contexts, but the conversation should then proceed to a frank discussion of the director’s qualifications and what the directee is seeking in spiritual direction. Some questions a prospective directee should ask may include the following:

Where have you trained as a spiritual director?
Someone trained in Benedictine or Franciscan spirituality may be a gifted spiritual director but not the right match for someone attracted to Ignatian spirituality. Conversely, as one of my teachers pointed out, not everyone who has SJ after his name is a qualified spiritual director. A director should be willing to summarize his or her background and experience. Reluctance or evasion is usually a red flag for the prospective directee to look elsewhere.
Have you any experience with directees in my age group?
Someone who spends most of his time with Jesuit novices may not be the best match for a layperson with children, grandchildren, and financial problems. But a prospective director shouldn’t be ruled out based on age alone. I am approximately the same age as my director’s mother, but he has been a channel of grace for me for a number of years.
Where do you meet your directees?
A quiet, contemplative environment free of distractions is essential. Parishes and retreat houses often have suitable conference rooms or parlors; a lay director may have an office. Public places and either party’s residence should normally be avoided.
When are you usually available?
Some directors have specific days set aside for direction; those with full-time jobs may be available only in the evening; still others will be extremely flexible.
Do you charge for your services?
It sometimes surprises people that priests and religious expect payment for spiritual services, but many religious orders need income generated by their members in order to survive. Some lay directors function much as any others in the helping professions, such as therapists or counselors, with a regular fee schedule. However, many directors, both religious and lay, accept no payment. In these circumstances, the directee might consider making a generous gift, perhaps at Christmas, to a religious director’s congregation or to a charity favored by a lay director. Finally, and most important:
What can I expect from you? What do you expect of me?

The director, in turn, will have questions. The prospective directee should be prepared to describe his or her spiritual background with some particularity. Typical questions might be the following:

Have you ever had spiritual direction before?
What moved you to seek spiritual direction at this time?
How do you pray?
Who is God for you?
What can I expect from you? What do you expect of me?

Sometimes the get-acquainted meeting ends with exchanging contact information and fixing the first appointment. More often, the director will leave it to the directee to call or e-mail. This approach avoids embarrassment if either party decides not to go forward. It also places the primary responsibility where it belongs: on the directee.

Prayer Exercise: Discernment

Choose a period of time—the past week or month, or the period since an important event, and reflect on the following questions:

Where have you met the evil spirit?

Are there trivial things that annoy you? Do you complain about them? How do they affect your relationships? Your prayer?

Are there subjects you don’t want to discuss with anyone? Can you talk to God about them? Is there a closed door in your emotional environment? Can you ask Jesus to open it?

Is there something you need help with? Can you admit it? Can you ask for help? If not, can you ask Jesus for help?

Can you name your fears? Can you talk to Jesus about them?

Where have you met the Holy Spirit?

Can you quiet yourself to listen for the “tiny whispering sound”?

When you are aware of the presence of the Holy Spirit, how do you respond?

What, if anything, keeps you from being fully open to God’s Spirit?

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