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IntroductionThe Creighton University Online Retreat, from which this book originates, began with requests from our faculty and staff, which went something like this: “We understand that thoseSpiritual Exercisesare really central to the mission of this university. How can I get a copy to read?” We would explain to them that St. Ignatius’s Exercises are a 450-year-old collection of guidelines and prayer experiences, which Ignatius wrote based on his own religious renewal for people who would guide other people in opening themselves to an experience of conversion. The book is full of directions and exercises, which he continually suggests should be adapted to the person making the retreat. Ignatius tells the director of the retreat—the one reading the book—that the person making the retreat should give thirty days, away from family and friends, to make the experience. He adds that some people can’t give that kind of time to the Exercises, so they should be adapted for a longer time and should be made in the midst of their everyday, busy lives. Often faculty and staff would look sad and regret that there wasn’t something more accessible for them, so they could experience what these Exercises were all about.Since our Daily Reflections on our Online Ministries Web site had become so popular, we asked ourselves, “How would Ignatius want us to adapt his Exercises for today? Wouldn’t he urge us to adapt them for busy people today, so that people could make them online, over thirty-four weeks, 24/7, from anywhere in the world?” We spent eight months adapting the movements of Ignatius’s Exercises into the Online Retreat. The central goal of the retreat is to grow in spiritual freedom, specifically to be able to make choices more freely. Another goal of the retreat is to help a person become “a contemplative in action,” finding “intimacy with God in the midst of action,” so we decided to design the retreat so that a person making it this way would learn how to practice this very contemporary spirituality. The retreat would not require much time in formal prayer. What would be more central would be learning how to place the material of the retreat into the “background” of one’s consciousness throughout each day and to let the material interact with the real events of ordinary life. That’s where the fruit of this retreat would be found and how the grace would be given.The retreat that evolved became thirty-four weekly guides, accompanied by a series of resources. The first resource was thirty-four photos by our dear friend and colleague, the gifted Jesuit photographer Don Doll, SJ. From among his thousands of powerful photographs we chose thirty-four to provide a visual experience of the grace being prayed for each week. We asked Fr. Larry Gillick, SJ, a mentor, colleague, and the director of our Center for Ignatian Spirituality, to write a reflective piece, called “For the Journey,” to accompany each week.We encourage people making the retreat to make the retreat with a spiritual guide, to do it with a group of friends, or to make it alone. In whatever way a person makes the retreat, we encourage people to use this book in conjuction with the online version. It can be found at the Creighton University Online Ministries Web site at http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/cmo-retreat.html. Since this book does not include the Readings and Prayers of the online version, these resources may be found there. We especially encourage people to take part in the opportunity to share the graces of the retreat and to give feedback online at the end of the retreat experience. Thousands of people e-mail their experience of the graces they are receiving each week of the retreat. Anyone making the retreat can go to the sharing and read what others experience when they make the retreat. So, even if a person makes the retreat alone, the experience is one of making the retreat in the midst of a very large community.It was Loyola Press’s idea to offer the text of the Online Retreat in this book form. We are delighted that it expands the availability of this opportunity to be touched by the Exercises of Ignatius. There are many other adaptations of the Exercises available around the world. This adaptation allows a person to make the retreat with nothing else but this book and an open heart. It has the added advantage of allowing a person, with Internet access, to use the online version for additional resources and to experience the sharing part of the retreat. While making the retreat, one can make the photo for the week the photo on his or her computer desktop, as a reminder throughout that week of the graces being prayed for.Consider making this retreat with someone else or gathering a group together to make the retreat. A group could meet weekly, or even monthly, to share the graces of the retreat. Some people make the retreat with a close friend or with other members of a group, e-mailing their sharing to one another every week. Please consider contributing your reflections to the sharing available on the Web site www.onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/cmo-retreat.html.We are grateful to St. Ignatius and all the Jesuits and lay colleagues who have taught us the power of the Spiritual Exercises. We thank all the people who have made the Online Retreat around the world and all who have supported us along the way. We are especially indebted to Creighton University for its generous support for our Online Ministries. Our office is very small, and we are deeply grateful for Carol Krajicek for her ongoing help and support.Andy Alexander, SJMaureen McCann WaldronCreighton UniversityOmaha, Nebraska
A Calendar to Make the Retreat with the Liturgical Year
The retreat may be started at any time of the year. However, if a person begins the retreat in mid-September, the retreat works with the liturgical year. This is accomplished by adding optional review weeks when necessary to adapt the retreat to the timing of Easter, which is a movable feast. These review weeks occur after Weeks 15, 17, and 21.
2009Begin the retreat the week of September 13.No review weeks are needed this year.Ash Wednesday is February 17 and Easter Sunday is April 4, 2010.
2010Begin the retreat the week of September 19.Add review weeks after Week 15, Week 17, and Week 21.Ash Wednesday is March 9 and Easter Sunday is April 24, 2011.
2011Begin the retreat the week of September 18.No review weeks are needed this year.Ash Wednesday is February 22 and Easter Sunday is April 8, 2012.
2012Begin the retreat the week of September 16.Combine Weeks 20 and 21 into a single week.Ash Wednesday is February 13 and Easter Sunday is March 31, 2013.
2013Begin the retreat the week of September 15.Use review weeks after Week 15 and Week 17.Ash Wednesday is March 5 and Easter Sunday is April 20, 2014.
2014Begin the retreat the week of September 14.No review weeks are needed this year.Ash Wednesday is February 18 and Easter Sunday is April 5, 2015.
2015Begin the retreat the week of September 13.Combine Weeks 20 and 21 into a single week.Ash Wednesday is February 10 and Easter Sunday is March 27, 2016.
2016Begin the retreat the week of September 18.Use the review week after Week 15.Ash Wednesday is March 1 and Easter Sunday is April 16, 2017.
2017Begin the retreat the week of September 17.Combine Weeks 20 and 21 into a single week.Ash Wednesday is February 14 and Easter Sunday is April 1, 2018.
2018Begin the retreat the week of September 16.Use review weeks after Week 15 and Week 17.Ash Wednesday is March 6 and Easter Sunday is April 21, 2019.
2019Begin the retreat the week of September 15.Use the review week after Week 15.Ash Wednesday is February 26 and Easter Sunday is April 12, 2020.
How Do I Get Started Making the Retreat?
Each of the weeks of the retreat begins with a Guide page that lays out how to make that week of the retreat. The Guide page gives the theme of the week, particularly the grace to pray for that week. Following the weekly guide are the resources you can use with that week.
Each week is differentin the graces asked for and in the material reflected upon. And one week builds upon another. The growth is progressive and step-by-step.The Retreat uses the movements of the Spiritual Exercises to help us grow in spiritual freedom and the ability to find intimacy with God in the midst of our everyday busy lives.When should I start the retreat?The retreat can be started at any time. We offer the option of making the retreat with the liturgical year, by beginning in about the middle of September each year. This is especially wonderful for people in a family or for friends, or for groups of people in a parish, making the retreat together.So, how do I do this?It’s simple. Early in the week, read the Guide page and the other resources provided for each week. They will shape what you do during the upcoming week. Usually, the invitation is to let the grace you are praying for become a part of the background of your daily life. Asking for that grace in the morning, and staying conscious of that grace throughout the day, will allow that grace, that reflection, to interact with the events, conversations, meetings, and challenges of each day. And spending a few moments each night to express our gratitude for what we have received will begin to shape each very interactive week with God—my asking and opening my heart, and God being patient and generous with me.Most of all, trust in God. God will not be outdone in generosity.Prayer to Begin Each DayLord, I so wish to prepare well for this time.I so want to make all of me ready and attentive and available to you.Please help me clarify and purify my intentions.I have so many contradictory desires.My activity seems to be so full of busynessand running after stuff that doesn’t really seem to matter or last.I know that if I give you my heartwhatever I do will follow my new heart.May all that I am today,all that I try to do today,may all my encounters, reflections,even the frustrations and failingsall place my life in your hands.Lord, my life is in your hands.Please, let this day give you praise.
Week 1Let’s Begin at the Beginning: Our Life Story
Guide: The Memories That Have Shaped UsThis is the first week of a thirty-four-week journey. We begin at the beginning—our story. Prayer is about our relationship with God. We will begin to grow in this relationship with God, in the midst of our everyday lives this week, by simply reflecting upon our own story. There may be times we will want to take a period of prayer to reflect upon our story this week. What is most important, however, is that we begin by letting this reflection become the background of our week.Did you ever get a song in your head and realize that it was there for a long time, no matter what you were doing? This is like that. Throughout our day, each day this week, we will have in mind the memories that have shaped us.Let this be the image: This week, let’s go through the photo album of our life. Let’s go back to our earliest memories. Let’s let the Lord show us our lives. What pictures are there? With each part of my life, what scenes do I remember? Who is in those scenes? Some photos will be of happy times, some will be quite sad, others will be difficult to recollect at all. They all constitute our story and the journey that has brought us to where we begin this retreat.Take it easy. Go slowly. Take a little bit each day. Being faithful to this exercise will help tremendously to prepare for the weeks ahead. Write down notes or memories or stories if you’d like.End each day, before going to bed, with a few interior words of gratitude to the One who has accompanied me through my life, even to this day of presence with me.
Some Practical Help for Getting Started This WeekThe first and most important point is to begin this journey with great hope and confidence. God is never outdone in generosity. So, if we make even a small change in our weekly pattern, that is a tremendous opening for God to work in us. One way to affirm this hope and confidence is to express it for just a brief instant, each morning, at the same time each day—as I’m finding my slippers, or as I’m brushing my teeth, or while I’m pouring that first cup of coffee—“I know you are with me today, Lord.”Each of us will have a different amount of time we will be able to give to this retreat each week. We recommend that if your time is limited, just read the guide. On another day that week, you may find you have time to return to reflect on another resource.This week’s guide offers us the opportunity to review our life stories through the photo album of our lives. Throughout these weeks, we’ll make use of the practice, habit, exercise of letting a reflection or image be part of the background of our day. All of us are aware, from time to time, that there is stuff that occupies the background of our consciousness. The song that plays in our head is a common example. This retreat invites us to practice taking advantage of this facility our brain has. Rather than have that space filled at random with stuff that just comes and goes, we will focus it more consciously. While doing all the ordinary tasks we do in our everyday lives, we will be using that background space to give a distinctive tone to our week. This won’t be a distraction to our work, or take any extra time away from our work, but it will eventually make a difference in how we experience our work. It just takes practice.Concretely, for this week, we all know the outline of our story. This isn’t new material. What is new is that I will consciously be aware that I am reviewing my life story this week. I can plan it fairly deliberately—as an example: Monday and Tuesday, I will be remembering the images of my childhood; Wednesday and Thursday, my teens and early adulthood; Friday and Saturday, the rest of my adult life. So, throughout Wednesday—as I’m finding my slippers, driving to work, walking to my first meeting, walking to the restroom, looking at that image on my monitor, walking to the parking lot, getting supper ready, sharing a memory with a family member, or undressing before going to bed—during all those brief everyday times, I’ll have in the background the formative images that shape my story during my teen years.It’s about feelings. Each picture in my life story has feeling attached to it. I might look long and hard at that image of myself on the playground in fifth grade. Feelings come to the surface if I let them—or, the picture of myself in that relationship in my early twenties. We know there are feelings there. There are powerful feelings associated with the birth of a child, the death of a loved one, the change of jobs, terrible family crises, images that come to mind throughout my marriage, battles with people I’ve struggled with. My feelings will help me see and experience how these pictures tell my story, who I am today.It’s about God’s fidelity. This isn’t a sentimental journey. With every picture in my story, there is a grace offered to me as I look for God’s presence there. If, throughout this week, I imagine God’s having been present there with me—even when I didn’t notice or feel it at the time—that would be a tremendous grace unifying my life.It’s about gratitude. With every memory, every image and feeling, practice saying, “Thank you.” Even the painful ones. Even if I was not grateful then. Even if it involved some bad stuff I did to myself or to others. The Lord was there, loving me. Let gratitude now touch and span throughout the story of my life.It’s about a journey. This is only the beginning. We have thirty-four weeks. We will move slowly. And all we need to do is give God just a little space to transform our everyday lives, a moment at a time.
For the Journey: Expect God to WorkDo you know what’s good for you? Knowing and then doing what we know is good for us are two distinct things.I know that jogging is very good for my body and spirit, but going over to the recreation center is not only a good idea but also something I don’t always want to do.Taking vitamins is good for us, the medical profession tells us. We are just beginning to believe them, but we don’t all take them all the time. We resist those activities that do not give us immediately the feedback we desire. We might begin a diet Monday morning and Tuesday morning we step lightly on the scale hoping to find less of us there. We want results and pretty darn quick!We begin these weeks of exercising our spirits according to the pattern given by God to us through Ignatius Loyola, accompanied also by this human resistance to what is good for us.The first guide, then, is this: do not expect, look for, or demand progress. Enjoy and live the process, even though, as with physical exercise, you might not like doing it every day. As with a diet, you might have to give something up, like time, activity, or accomplishments. We allow God to give the increase, the insights, the progress. We begin expecting God to be busy laboring on our part of creation, which we have found quite unfinished as a work of art.This is the first guide along the way; don’t stop here; the journey is worth the expense. Go for it!
In These or Similar Words . . .Dear Lord,This seems easy, going back through the photo album of my life. Can I really call this prayer? I can go back to my earliest memories, of being a toddler. I wonder what connection this little child has to me?As I move through my life, into school, learning to read and expanding my world, I can notice things in this album that I don’t want to see. They are difficult memories that cause pain and I thought I had put them away permanently. Not everything in my childhood was good. Where were you in that, Lord? Were you with me as I watched the shouting, the arguing?There were good times, too. Running so freely as a kid, climbing trees, exploring the banks of the creek, and sledding down the big hill in winter. There is a freedom to those moments and I sense you in that, too.As I got older, I made choices, Lord. For some of them, I ignored you completely and tried to pretend you didn’t matter in my life. But you stayed with me so faithfully anyway. You guided my headstrong decisions into choices that helped me into a loving life and a good marriage.Thank you, Lord, for your constant presence in my life, especially today.Dear Lord,I feel a little uncomfortable. This kind of prayer is new to me and I’m a little more comfortable using someone else’s words. But I tried it yesterday and it wasn’t hard; it just didn’t always feel like prayer.I return today and I look at the places where it hurts, the memories that make me want to squirm, pull away, and try to forget again. It hasn’t always been easy in my life. Were you really with me in all of it? I feel you so strongly now, but I never thought much about you during those times.How have these difficult times shaped me into what I am today? How has your faithful guidance helped me, unseen, over the years? Please help me to see your presence in my life and to be guided by it.Scripture ReadingsLuke 12:22–34Isaiah 43:1–4Luke 11:1–13Psalm 8Psalm 139
Week 2Our Story: Exploring Its Depth
Guide: Looking Closely at Our StoriesAs we reviewed the photo album of our life stories last week, we all experienced special memories that have put us in touch with our God’s presence with us throughout our life’s journey. Our exercises this week will help us enter more deeply into our stories.One powerful way to go deeper is to ask, and explore the answers to, key questions. We are still going to be doing this in the midst of our busy lives this week, and will keep utilizing the background (see the “Some Practical Help for Getting Started This Week” section). These questions are easy to remember and are important in preparing for the weeks to come. We were all “knit together in our mother’s womb,” as Psalm 139 tells us. Various events and experiences have shaped us into the people we are today. Let’s listen for the answers that will reveal the depths of God’s movement in us this week.
What graces, insights, special or painful memorieswere given to me last week?Did I like doing these exercises last week,and did they nurture some new desires in me?After last week’s review of my photo album,I’m attracted to . . .Where, in my life story, did I feel mosttotally known by God?Is there a part of me, my story,I have a hard time imagining God knowing?Because I have a hard time imagining Godaccepting me there?Where in my story were there crossroads?It could have gone this way or that:how was God present in the way my storycontinued from there?Am I accepting of who I am today?If not, can I hold those areas up to God?If yes, can I hold my whole self up to God,in gratitude?Are there areas I feel God is wanting to love in me? change in me? make use of for others?
Throughout this week, in every background moment, let there be expressions of gratitude for the blessings of how my life story is connecting me with God’s presence and love. Let me experience the feeling of my continuing to grow and develop. The one who formed us in our mother’s womb is still forming us this week.
Some Practical Help for Getting Started This WeekNotice what the questions are about this week. That will make them memorable. They ask us to focus on images, memories, crossroads, specific painful memories. We could say, “I already did that!” This week we are asked to recollect those special memories that came to the surface and to revisit them, so that we can use them to go deeper.Is there a desire coming out of last week? We’ll see this question often. It asks us to be attentive, to notice, even the most subtle of new attractions, even new curiosities within me. For example, I might recognize a desire in me to spend more time reflecting on a particular time in my life that I didn’t have much time to reflect on last week. Or I might just remember several important people in my life whom I haven’t contacted in a while and feel a desire to write them.Stay where you find fruit. This direction from Ignatius is very wise. If I’ve experienced fruit—consolation, some wonderful insight, a closeness to God, even a new awareness—I can trust that that gift is a signal from God: “Look deeper here, my dear friend, for I have so much more I want to give you.” Another way of looking at this is to imagine receiving a gift, all wrapped in paper and ribbon and a big bow. I can know it’s a gift, and even know who the giver is, and even say, “Thank you,” without opening it. This direction from Ignatius invites us to explore the gift and discover what it really is.Panning for gold. The image of panning for gold will be a helpful image throughout our retreat. Imagine a stream, with water rushing by all the time—a pretty good image of our busy lives. Imagine putting my pan—a sieve or screen—into the water. What happens? I get a pan full of stuff. As I shake it a bit, some of the smaller debris falls through the screen and I can look at larger stones that were in the water. And there in my pan, I discover a piece of gold. The message: I won’t get that piece of treasure by just sitting by the edge of the stream peering into the water. I have to pan for it—sort out some portion of my experience and go deeper into it. And remember, if I discover some kernel of gold, it would be very important to weigh it—write it down and perhaps share the grace with others on the sharing page on the retreat Web site.How NASA handles an image from space. Another image is that this is like the way NASA receives an image from space. When they first receive the image, it is fuzzy and one piece of a whole series of images. Then NASA gets to work to clean up the images—getting rid of the distortions that come from the long transmission. They then digitally enhance the image—basically, by filling in what is missing and thus making the image sharper. And finally, they put the various images together, and before our eyes, there is a spectacular Martian landscape.It’s still about background. Doing this retreat in everyday life will challenge us to keep using that space in the background. There’s lots of debris and noise and distortion in our busy lives. If we can purify the background and let this week’s questions flow in and out of that background all week, then we will notice a tremendous difference. Again, writing my answers down, or even saying them out loud, even in my head, will help preserve the grace.By the end of the week we will want to be holding our whole life up to God—especially the parts that are least attractive, which might seem unacceptable. It’s all about gratitude. I don’t have to be together to be grateful.Enjoy the journey. We are just beginning, starting to let God work in us. God can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine. Let’s trust it and enjoy it.
For the Journey: Watching for What God RevealsOur prayer during this retreat centers our attention on a loving God who centers affectionate attention on us. Two simple points of the nature of love help us pray during these weeks of praying with and about creation.Love urges being revealed. If we love someone, sooner or later we will want that person to know. We might send a valentine and then a box of candy and then perhaps make a phone call and then get together. All the time there is a creative, ongoing revelation that presents the beloved with the opportunity to receive the affection or not. The lover wants his or her love to be experienced and received.Love must be expressed in words and gestures that the beloved can understand. The lover must reverence the beloved so much that he or she adapts the expression of love to the way the beloved can receive it. If I love a blind person, I do not speak to them in sign language. If I love a German-speaking person, I don’t speak any other language to that person except German. The lover adapts to the person and personality of the beloved.In praying these next weeks, we watch how the loving God reveals that love through gestures of revelation. We also consider how this God adapts that same love to our ways of reception. We pray with God’s courtship of us, constantly attracting us through acts of gentle yet persistent love.We begin by considering that each of us has been and actually is now being created. God does not create us and then set us on the earth as so many abandoned milk jugs or degenerating cars. God tends to us as the beloved and labors on and around us for our soul’s purpose. God wants only this, then: that we experience infinite love being revealed within our finite experiences and our reception of that love in our lives.Our having been created tells each of us how important we are in the eyes of God, and our prayer these next weeks helps us to see our value and significance in our own eyes. In so many ways God says, “Look around and see who I have said and I say that you are.” We are in the presence of a God who cannot keep love hidden, and we are God’s best work of art.
In These or Similar Words . . .Dear Lord,Last week brought powerful, unexpected memories. When I prayed with the photo of the mother holding the child, I thought of the love you have for me, and the way you hold me close, protecting me from harm. It’s an image I sometimes struggle against because I like to be free and independent, not needy.Now as I pray with this week’s photo, I think of your individual care for me, as an individual. I look at the young girl listening to the child in her mother’s womb and I am flooded with a sense of the love and care you had for me even before I was born. The words in the Psalm move me: “You created every part of me, knitting me in my mother’s womb.” How can it be possible for you to have that much love for me—then and now?I go back to places in my photo album that I looked at last week, places where I really felt you so strongly in my life. Isn’t it odd that most of those times really are the difficult, painful ones? Why is it that I don’t turn to you in the joy and the triumphs? Is it then that I delude myself into thinking that I’m in control of my life? That I don’t need to rely on you—or anyone else?When everything is going well, I have this vision in my head that I have to be perfect for you—and I’m not perfect. So I wait to really turn to you, thinking I will somehow correct all my flaws, by myself, before I come before you to speak.But I look again at the photo album. When I’m in pain or in trouble, I fly to you for help. Later, when the pain eases, I don’t always go running back to you. You are there waiting patiently, but somehow I keep thinking that I need to be a better person before I turn to you with my life. If I can just fix this one thing about myself—if I can just make this part of me better—that’s when I will turn this all over to God. Suddenly I am aware, dear Lord, that now, in all of the things that are wrong in my life, in all of the things that I want to make better, now is when I need to turn to you.Please hold my hand and go with me to the places inside me where I am afraid. Be with me as I look at myself with all of my flaws. Stay with me when I am afraid of my anger, my sadness, and my grieving for the pain in my life. It’s the part I want to avoid the most, and yet it’s where I need your love the most.Thank you; thank you for being with me today, this week, and always. I am so grateful for your love and care. Help me to know how to repay your love.
Scripture ReadingsIsaiah 49:14–16Hosea 11:1–4Psalm 23
