Into Deep Waters

As we begin our session this time, I'd like to introduce a second part of the teaching of Saint Ignatius, which is very closely linked with his teaching on prayer. Because when we pray, we already know this by experience: day in and day out, there are ups and downs. There are days when God feels close and there's energy in our prayer—what Ignatius calls spiritual consolation. And there are days, for reasons we often don't understand, when the bottom seems to drop out of that energy.

And then, if we're honest, on such days, it's hard to even want to pray. And if I may say it reverently, maybe we don't pray, or pray less than we really wish we would have prayed, or are not happy with the quality of our prayer. And all that energy for new steps in the spiritual life and growth, and entering more deeply into our vocations—everything that the process of the Spiritual Exercises is shaped to foster and facilitate within us—the attraction toward that just wanes, and we feel discouraged and without energy for such things. Now, there's absolutely no shame in experiencing these ups and downs. It's simply what it means to live the spiritual life in a fallen but redeemed and loved world.

But what Ignatius has done is to craft a set of 14 practical guidelines—he calls them rules—which help us make sense of this up-and-down daily experience and, above all, give us tools to respond well to it so that we're not harmed by the discouraging times. And if I may say this, there is a lot of this discouragement out there now—what Ignatius calls spiritual desolation—and there are reasons for it. If we look at what's happening in the culture and in the world, in the political situation, the sufferings of our Church. And I'm finding as the years go by that these 14 rules or practical guidelines of Saint Ignatius become increasingly valuable, so that once we start praying and start on the journey, we'll be equipped to stay on the journey and to see our time safely through what might otherwise be discouraging enough to cause us to pull back. And I'm simply going to mention the first of these rules this time, and I'm going to give this in my own contemporary language or rendering of Ignatius' sixteenth-century Spanish.

So Ignatius starts with a person, starting in the situation most far from God, and then he's going to work closer to our own situation. This will not be the situation of anyone listening and following this series, but it's helpful to get clarity on these basic things. From the second rule on, Ignatius will speak directly to our own experience. So when a person lives a life of serious sin—so you have a person like Augustine before his conversion, those twenty years, Ignatius during those thirty years when he's so far from God, or anyone living a life of serious sin—Ignatius explains how the enemy and the good spirit will act.

By enemy, he means obviously Satan and his associated fallen angels. He also means the wound of concupiscence, or the flesh, and then the third part of the classic triad, which is the world in the negative sense—those influences that will pull us away from God unless we resist them. And by good spirit, Ignatius means above all God Himself, the Holy Spirit, who works in the hearts of His children whom He loves. He means the good angels. He means the whole richness of grace implanted in us through Baptism, and then good influences around us, which abound in the world today and always.

So these are two actors in the spiritual life: the enemy and the good spirit. When a person is living far from God, how will these two actors work? The enemy, Ignatius says, will fill the imagination with images of sensual pleasures. Obviously, as long as the imagination is filled this way, the person will continue to live in this way, and it's enough to say this to realize how real this is today. The good spirit, on the contrary, stings and bites in the person's conscience—God's loving action calling the person back reverently, if any of us ever was in this situation.

We remember that sense of trouble, that lack of peace, that emptiness that almost compelled us to take the steps that brought us back to God. That's God's loving action in the hearts of those who are far from Him. God never stops pursuing His children. The most lovely literary description of this, to my mind, is the entirety of Francis Thompson's poem, "The Hound of Heaven," which is precisely about this action of the Good Spirit. Okay.

We'll be saying more about this as we go forward. Now, for this particular session, the text that I'm choosing with Ignatius is Luke 5:1–11, Peter and the catch of fish and the invitation to put out into the deep. So again, we allow the Lord's gaze of love to be upon us. And we look into His eyes and see the love, the welcome that is there, the warmth. And we open our hearts now to hear His word, to allow Him to speak to our heart.

While the crowd was pressing in on Jesus and listening to the word of God, He saw two boats there alongside the lake. The fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, He asked him to put out a short distance from the shore, and He sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. After He had finished speaking—and we can see this again, the crowds pressing against the shore into the water—Jesus from the boat speaking the words that are so life-changing for them. And when He has finished and the crowds begin to leave, He turns now to Simon and says, "Put out into the deep, into deep water, and lower your nets for a catch."

Simon said in reply, “Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing. But at Your command, I will lower the nets.” When they had done this, they caught a great number of fish and their nets were tearing. They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come to help them. They came and filled both boats so that they were in danger of sinking.

When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said, “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.” For astonishment at the catch of fish they had made seized him and all those with him, and likewise James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners of Simon. Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.” When they brought their boats to the shore, they left everything and followed Him. So let's now be there by the lakeside.

It's the early morning hour. The fishermen have been fishing all night. The boats are pulled up on the shore. They're washing the nets, and the great crowd gathers and presses increasingly along the shore to hear Jesus. Maybe I'm there among them, and I hear His words, and I allow them to speak to my heart.

And now Jesus gets into Simon's boat, asks him to put out a short distance, and perhaps I'm there with Jesus in the boat, hearing His word close to Him. Maybe now I even take Peter's place if I feel so moved. And I hear the Lord say to me as He said to Peter, put out into the deep. Put out into the deep. Don't simply continue as you've been doing until now, but put out into the deep in your spiritual life, in your daily Christian life, in living your vocation.

It's time for something new. It's time for something deeper. As I said, the first request was not hard—to put out a little from the shore—but the second asks for more: put out into the deep. And maybe I ask the Lord now as I pray, are You calling me to put out into the deep in living my vocation, in my spiritual life, in my service? And where and how and what step are You inviting me to take?

I may share Peter's own sense of helplessness. We toiled all night and took nothing. I've tried and I've tried and I've tried, and still nothing. The same struggles, the same weakness. But now the moment of grace arrives—the moment of faith, of trusting the Lord's word with courage.

But at Your word, I will let down the nets. I will take the step. And like Peter and the fishermen, I experienced the astounding fruitfulness of simply trusting in the Lord's word, of putting out into the deep—the useless toil in a moment just changed into an overflowing abundance. My life can change. And I hear Jesus say to me as to Peter, Do not be afraid.

Maybe over and over again to my heart. And I hear Him give to me, as to Peter, a sharing in His mission. And Peter and the others, they leave everything, and they follow Him. Is there a word in this Scripture, a moment in this Scripture that speaks to your heart? What is the Lord saying?

Where is He inviting you to take the next step? I'll conclude by quoting—this will just be two sentences—from the chapter in his book, Crossing the Threshold of Hope, in which Saint John Paul II answers the journalist's question: You have been saying to the world for so long, "Do not be afraid." The question is essentially this, and it's a good journalist's question: How can you say that to the people of this world when there are so many wars and disasters and natural earthquakes, and all the broken nations, broken hearts, broken families, cultures struggling? How can you say to the people who live in this world, "Do not be afraid"?

And I won't go through the entirety of the Pope's answer. I will say that this chapter of this book is the text of John Paul II that I go back to more than anything else. But at one point he says this in reply: Have no fear of that which you yourselves have created. This was in 1995, and we can think of what's happened since. Have no fear of all that man has produced and that every day is becoming more dangerous for him.

Finally, and this is Peter and this is us, have no fear of yourselves. Have no fear of yourselves. That's Peter's fear. And if I may say this reverently, I believe that in the deepest place of our hearts, all of us share something of that fear. I'm not all that You want me to be, Lord.

I'm too weak. I don't respond fully. I indulge myself too much. I miss opportunities to help others. My spiritual life should be richer than it is, and we can go on with the various ways of expressing this.

But somewhere deep in our hearts is a sense of fear that I'm not what I should be. And then we need to hear John Paul II's words here: "Finally, have no fear of yourselves." And above all, Jesus' words to Peter, when he says, "Depart; I'm a sinful man." Do not be afraid. And the invitation through these spiritual exercises, and always in our prayer, is to share that place with the Lord.

That was the great lesson that Thérèse of the Child Jesus learned. And then our weakness, the place we are most afraid of, becomes the place that most brings us close to the Lord and helps us grow in holiness. May God grant us that blessing as we continue on this journey. Amen.