The Jesuit Guide To (Almost) Everything - James Martin [113]
On the other hand, as Shelton points out, is the danger of excessive emotional involvement. Here the tendency is to focus too much on the friendship, focusing obsessively on the feelings that arise and analyzing every slight and comment. Clinginess smothers friendship and repels the most generous of friends. A healthy relationship is like a flame that gives off light and warms both friends: it can be extinguished for lack of attention but smothered by too much attention.
Competition is another danger. In a culture where people are often defined by what they do and how much they make, the temptation to compete can be overwhelming. Shelton asks if your friend’s success is a threat to your own sense of self-worth. If it is, maybe it’s time to consider the blessings in your own life more carefully.
Envy, I would add, is equally poisonous. You can move away from that by being grateful for the blessings in your own life (the examen can help) and by realizing that everyone’s life is a mixed bag of gifts and struggles. If you doubt that, just talk to your friends about their problems.
Shelton next calls attention to complaint-driven relationships, where getting together becomes an excuse for carping. In situations like this, the world begins to take on a dark cast. Complaining spreads like a virus through conversations until everything seems useless, and both parties end up bitter and despairing. Shelton also warns against impairing relationships, which encourage unhealthy or destructive behavior, like alcoholism or drug abuse.
In both these cases you need to ask if the friendship is healthy. If not, can you discuss the situation? Or do you have to move away from the friendship for your own health? One of my spiritual directors once asked me bluntly, “Is being with your friend good for your vocation?”
Still, an essential part of love is maintaining what you could call the difficult friendship. The story of Simon Rodrigues, one of Ignatius’s friends, will show what I mean.
A SPECIAL LOVE
One of the early Jesuit companions was a trying person. Simon Rodrigues, a Portuguese student in Paris, was one of the six friends who pronounced vows of poverty and chastity with Ignatius in Paris in 1534. After the founding of the Society of Jesus, Rodrigues was asked by Ignatius to assume the important position of overseeing all the Jesuits in Portugal.
But, as William Bangert notes in A History of the Society of Jesus, Rodrigues soon “evidenced an instability and recalcitrance that pushed Ignatius almost to the brink of dismissing him.” The man was an inveterate complainer and excessively permissive with the Jesuits under his care; as a result, the Jesuits in Portugal were increasingly in disarray.
In time, Rodrigues also became the confessor to King John III of Portugal and took up residence in the royal court—while still functioning as Jesuit provincial. Word spread that Rodrigues was scandalizing others, as he could not live without the “palaces and pomp of the world,” as one contemporary wrote.
How did Ignatius respond to his difficult friend?
Rather than angrily berating him, Ignatius wrote his old friend several letters and asked Simon to correspond more frequently so that he could help him with his problems. But Ignatius was also serious about his role as superior general; in response to the growing crisis, he relieved Rodrigues from his post in December of 1551 and sent him to Spain. Unfortunately, Rodrigues’s behavior continued to be a source of embarrassment, and Ignatius was forced to call him back to Rome.
This must have been a painful time for even someone as balanced as Ignatius: one of his most trusted confidants had failed. Ignatius may have felt let down by a friend. Or embarrassed at the trust he placed in him. Or angry at Simon’s intransigence.