Burning Hearts

We reach now Saint Ignatius' Rule 12, and this is another one that I love, and another one that, if we keep it in mind, will save us a great deal of suffering in the spiritual life. In the last three of his rules, we have a slight shift. Thus far, Ignatius has been dealing with spiritual desolation, this tactic of the enemy who brings discouraging lies to weaken our energy in the spiritual life. In the last three rules, Ignatius shifts to the other—I'll call it garden-variety—tactic of the enemy, which is temptation: just deceptive suggestions of the enemy. Heaviness of heart on the spiritual level is spiritual desolation; deceptive suggestions of the enemy, that is temptation.

Now, garden variety doesn't mean that these are not potentially very harmful. Obviously, if we give in to them, they will cause us harm and even potentially great harm. But garden variety in the sense that there's nothing dramatic about this. This is just everyday experience in the spiritual life. There's no shame that we experience it.

As I said, it's simply what happens in living the spiritual life in a fallen, redeemed, and loved world. But what makes all the difference is the discernment to which Ignatius is guiding us: that it's to recognize both of these tactics as of the enemy and to know what steps to take so that not only do we not give in to them and be harmed by them, but we actually grow as we resist them. It's all about setting captives free from the discouraging lies and tactics of the enemy. So, Ignatius' Rule 12: resist the enemy's temptations right in their very beginning. This is when it is easiest.

Here's a high mountain covered with snow. And here at the mountain peak, a snowball is just getting started. You can put out a finger and stop it. Let it get halfway down the mountainside, gaining mass and speed, and it'll run you over.

So let's take our man at 10 PM in that time of desolation, and there's the Bible that he normally prays with for ten minutes before going to bed. And there, just a few inches in front of his hands on the desk, is the Bible, but he has no energy or desire to do that now. And just a few inches in front of the other hand is the phone, and everything in him wants to reach out for that in a way that he knows can become, as Ignatius says, low and earthly. It may start with news sites, maybe sports, and then it will go on from there and go on and on. And one touch of the screen becomes 50, becomes 200.

And we recognize readily how the longer he allows this to go on, the heavier the temptation becomes. When is it easiest for him to resist that temptation? Right at the very beginning, before he even touches the phone. And then, if he stops the snowball at the top of the mountain, he'll never have to deal with the snowball halfway down the mountainside. And that's why I've really come to love Rule 12 and sharing it with others, because if we observe this—if we're willing to stand firm right in the very beginning with God's grace—the rest of the temptation and its burden will never even take place.

Rule 12 is a jewel for the journey. Stop the snowball at the top of the mountain. Resist the temptation in its very beginning. If you're tempted to pick up the phone and speak with that other person and you know it's going to become gossip and negative toward others, don't even pick up the phone at that point. Okay.

Stop it immediately and so much gets easier in the spiritual life. We move in this session to the apparition of Jesus to the disciples on the way to Emmaus in Luke 24, verses 13 through 35. And again, we let our hearts be calmed and just receptive. We see the love in the Lord's gaze as He looks upon us, desirous of sharing with us the richness of His word and its message in our lives. Now that very day, two of them were going to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus.

And they were conversing about all the things that had occurred. And it happened that while they were conversing and debating, Jesus Himself drew near and walked with them. But their eyes were prevented from recognizing Him. He asked them, "What are you discussing as you walk along?" They stopped, looking downcast.

One of them, named Cleopas, said to Him in reply, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?” And He replied to them, “What sort of things?” They said to Him, “The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, how our chief priests and rulers both handed Him over to a sentence of death and crucified Him. But we were hoping that He would be the one to redeem Israel. And besides all this, it is now the third day since this took place.”

Some women from our group, however, have astounded us. They were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find His body. They came back and reported that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who announced that He was alive. Then some of those with us went to the tomb and found things just as the women had described, but Him they did not see. It seems, then, that the fact that they go down to the tomb and find it empty is the final confirmation for them that this is all over.

We had hoped. We hope no more. And reverently, as we're going through this passage, is there any place in your heart that had hoped but finds it difficult to hope anymore? Then let the Divine Stranger, the Divine Pilgrim, join with you on the road. Open your heart to Him.

And now, Jesus, now that they've shared all that's in their heart, Jesus speaks. And He said to them, "Oh, how foolish you are. How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke. Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things?" Then, beginning with Moses and all the prophets, He interpreted to them what referred to Him in all the Scriptures.

They approached the village to which they were going, and as they approached it, He gave the impression that He was going on farther. But they urged Him, "Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over." So He went in to stay with them. And it happened that while He was with them at table, He took bread, said the blessing, and broke it. With that, their eyes were opened and they recognized Him, and He vanished from their sight.

Then they said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us when He spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?” So they set out at once and returned to Jerusalem, where they found gathered together the Eleven and those with them who were saying, “The Lord has truly been raised and has appeared to Simon.” Then the two recounted what had taken place on the way and how He was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

What stirs in our hearts as we walk with these men on the road and the Divine Pilgrim joins us and invites us to share our hearts, share the sadness, the diminishing of hope, the sense of something over, and an unhappy regression to what was before? What stirs in our hearts as He breaks open the Scriptures to us and the slow heart gradually becomes a burning heart and, filled with energy, goes back to the community as witnesses of His Resurrection?

Speak with the Lord now about what stirs in your heart, and allow the Lord to bless that with His courage, with His grace, with His hope. Earlier in this series, I quoted from John Paul II in Crossing the Threshold of Hope, and his answer to the question: Why should we have no fear, we who live in a world in which so many fear-filled things do happen? And I want to read to you now just a few lines in which the Pope answers that question squarely. Why should we have no fear? Because we have been redeemed by God.

In the Redemption, we find the most profound basis for the words, “Do not be afraid.” So this is something fundamental for us who live in a world that is shaken in so many ways and whose future can seem so uncertain in so many ways. If we anchor our lives on the Redemption—that is, the fact that God, the Second Person of the Trinity, came into this world in the Incarnation, lived in this world in Nazareth in His hidden life, and then the years of His public ministry working miracles and teaching—and then, in the culminating moment of His mission of Redemption, died and rose again victorious over death and sin. If we keep that in mind, that this reality has entered into history, we have the key to living without this kind of fear.

In the Redemption, we find the most profound basis for the words, "Do not be afraid." For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son—John 3:16. And let's hear these words now. This Son is always present today as we share this time together every day. This Son is always present in the history of the world as Redeemer.

The Redemption pervades all of human history. It is, quote, the light that shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. Center your hearts and spiritual life on the Redemption that Jesus Christ has wrought, and you will live with hope. May God grant that blessing. Amen.