The Jesuit Guide To (Almost) Everything - James Martin [55]
“The funniest thing!” he said. “We were supposed to take off, and then we were delayed for an hour, and then waited another hour until they delayed us again.” Joe chuckled as he recounted the delays that led to his trip’s eventual cancellation. Afterward, he tracked down his luggage and took a long ride on the subway (the T in Boston) to get home. “So here I am!” he laughed.
Had that happened to me, I would have been boiling over in frustration. “Weren’t you angry?” I said, amazed.
“Angry? Why?” he said. “There was nothing I could do about it. Why get upset over something you can’t change?”
Equanimity in the face of stress does not make you holy. Much less does it make you a saint. But it’s a start. Detachment, freedom, and a sense of humor are signposts on the road to holiness. Joe, a man well acquainted with the way of Ignatius, knew that a healthy spirituality requires freedom, detachment, and openness. Often when you would ask this elderly priest if he wanted to do something new—say, see a controversial new movie, go to a newly opened restaurant, check out a Mass at a faraway parish—he would answer, “Why not? ”
Why not indeed? People like Joe show the fruits of friendship with God: spontaneity, openness, generosity, freedom, love. Time with Joe taught me not simply about this particular Jesuit priest but about the way God acts in the lives of men and women. Holy people teach you something about how God works, and in this way you learn about God.
Overall, learning about God—through other people’s experiences of God, through Scripture, through holy men and women—is part of nourishing your spiritual life, because learning about God is part of being in relationship with God.
BEING HONEST
“O Lord, you have searched me and known me,” says Psalm 139. Letting God come to know you is also essential—as it is in any relationship. Letting yourself be known by God means more or less the same thing it means in a friendship: speaking about your life, sharing your feelings, and revealing yourself openly.
Honesty is an important part of this process. Father Barry suggests thinking about what happens when you’re not honest in a relationship. Usually, the relationship begins to grow cold, distant, or formal. If you’re avoiding something unpleasant, the relationship devolves into one defined by nothing more than social niceties. Eventually the relationship stagnates or dies.
It’s the same with prayer. If you are saying only what you think you should say to God, rather than what you want to say, then your relationship will grow cold, distant, and formal. Honesty in prayer, as in life, is important.
Not long ago I became friendly with a Jesuit whom I greatly admired. He seemed to lead a charmed life: he was happy, optimistic, hardworking, friendly, and prayerful. For a long time I tried to figure out what his secret was. What enabled him to lead this almost perfect life?
A few years later, this same friend went through a wrenching personal crisis and turned to me, among others, for help. In a series of conversations he poured out his pain and showed a part of himself that I had previously not seen.
Happily, the crisis passed. But after he had opened up to me, I felt closer to him, and he told me that he felt closer to me. Both of us were grateful for our friendship. Though I knew he didn’t lead the perfect life, I liked him even more. His honesty changed the relationship.
How can you be honest with God in prayer? One easy way is to imagine God right in front of you. You might imagine God, or Jesus, sitting across from you in a chair, or sitting beside you on a couch— use whatever image feels most comfortable. Then speak in a familiar way, in silence or out loud, about your life.
Of course God already knows what’s going on in your life. Still, this kind of openness is an important part of the spiritual life. Once again, comparing it to a friendship is instructive. Let