Manresan Society
Annual Meeting and Dinner
Keynote Speech
Mr. Art Zinselmeyer
Assistant for Secondary Education
Jesuits of the Missouri Province
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
“Ignatian Spirituality and Its Influence on Me as a Teacher in a Jesuit School”
Introduction: I was a little nervous after saying yes to Skip’s invitation to speak here tonight. It can seem a daunting task when you are asked to share your own understanding of Ignatian Spirituality and how it applies to your own life. And as I was leaving the office this afternoon, Fr. Paul Pilgrim wishes me luck and informs me that last year’s speaker was Fr. John Padberg. What an act to follow. But Fr. Buehler said not to worry and assured me that this is a goodwill group. So, here goes – with the grace of God.
The lens through which I view St. Ignatius and Ignatian Spirituality is that of an Ignatian Educator, colored by my 36 years at SLUH as teacher, coach, administrator and by my current position on the Missouri Province Staff as the Provincial’s Assistant for Secondary and Pre-Secondary Education.
Jesuit Education is rooted in Ignatian Spirituality. Even after being a member of the SLUH faculty, I don’t think I really understood that or was aware of it for a number of years. But that connection was becoming clearer to me by the mid 80’s when Jesuit Schools were continuing their renewal and were in the process of rediscovering its roots and making intentional its connections to Ignatius and his Spiritual Exercises.
Through the retreats we have made; our spiritual reading; our conversations and discussions about Ignatius, we all have developed a favorite image of Ignatius about who he was and how he found purpose in his life. Mine is that of a pilgrim – a man on a journey who invites others (his companions) to accompany him. I have often applied this image to my working with colleagues and students as we walked our way on the path through a school year.
Ignatius is a man who answers God’s call to conversion; a man who comes to understand that God can be encountered in all of our experiences, in all of the events of our daily life; a man who firmly believes that he is called to service. And for a good bit of his life even after his conversion, he is not sure of his mission in the service of God but works at discerning God’s will for him through prayer and reflection. And he realizes early on that he will be better off to have companions on this journey with him.
Sometimes like Ignatius, as we are on our journey through life, we can only appreciate it; gain a new perspective of it; feel more confident about the better path of that journey when we take the time to reflect on it.
Our retreats, even events like this – my preparing this talk; you listening to the talk – is an opportunity for each of us to reflect on our individual journeys.
During my high school days at SLUH; my time at St. Louis University as an undergraduate and graduate student and my early years at SLUH as a faculty member, I don’t remember Jesuits intentionally sharing their spirituality with me. I certainly enjoyed being with them when they taught me, led my retreats, coached me or moderated the clubs in which I participated. I admired them for who they were and what they stood for; there were many Jesuits who took an interest in me as an individual and were so very supportive when I sought their advice or counsel. I saw these Jesuits as men willing to work hard for the Greater Glory of God (which we wrote on our assignment pages in high school and sometimes in college) but didn’t really understand how all this applied to me. I knew that I got a good education from the Jesuits and that I was hired as a teacher at SLUH to carry on the Jesuit tradition of academic excellence.
But something was changing by the beginning of the 1980’s. Jesuits began to invite more and more of us, their lay colleagues into a sharing of their mission – a sharing of Ignatius’ journey if you will. Today we use the phrase, “partnership with Jesuits in Mission.” And each of you, by your making a retreat at White House, supporting the Work of White House and being a part of the Manresa group, you are partners in the Mission with Jesuits.
In 1995, one of those watershed type of events happened to me. I was invited to make an 8-day Jesuit-Colleague Retreat, sponsored by the Missouri Province; an eight day silent retreat directed by Fr. Jim Veltrie using the Spiritual Exercises. I still have my notes and journal from that retreat and periodically reread them. I think for the first time, I experienced Ignatian Spirituality, not just with my head but with my heart and had some insights into its application to me and my work. This retreat came at a significant time for me because it gave clarity and support for my decision in changing positions at SLUH from being the Dean of Students to Academic Dean and now having more responsibility for teacher professional and spiritual formation.
Think of your own retreats. Is there one that stands out in your mind? . . . . . . . Where your finally understood something more clearly about your journey? . . . . . . . Where you understood something more clearly about your purpose in life? . . . . . . . . About who you are in the context of God’s love and His will for you?
Since that time my view of my own spiritual formation is much more intentional. I have realized that it does not just happen because I am around Jesuits. And in my current position, I realize that the spiritual formation of teachers and board members is not going to happen just because they teach in a Jesuit school or associated with a Jesuit school as a member of a board of trustees.
And Jesuits themselves have taken a more intentional approach to the spiritual formation of their lay colleagues by sharing their traditions and experiences of Ignatian Spirituality. And I in turn have done the same thing in my work with teachers and boards of trustees of our schools.
Each of us has come to know that the spiritual journey that we are on through life has its ups and downs; its successes and failures; its desolations and consolations. We are not perfect. We know that; God knows that; and the people who live us know that. But we believe that when we fail, we will always be forgiven by God and by those who love us and are the journey with us. In his Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius takes us through the journey of recognizing that we are sinners, but sinners who are loved by God. In your retreats at White House this is a theme of one of the early reflective presentations.
In the final part of my talk with you tonight, I want to share with you some specific insights that I have about Ignatius and Ignatian Spirituality.
The first is that Creation is a gift that should call for wonder and gratitude. A Jesuit once told me to have “an attitude of gratitude.” Ignatius was aware that all he had was gift, for which he needed to be grateful. In my work with teachers in the schools, I try to lead them to an understanding that their gift of the ministry of teaching young people is a cause of wonderment for which they should express gratitude, even on those days when it is not easy to love that adolescent in front of them who is not doing the right thing.
The second is that my imagination, my emotions, my mind are important in my relationship with God. This enables me to enter into the gospel stories to be with Jesus when he talks to the crowds or his apostles or when he directs questions to them and to us – Who are you looking for? What are you looking for? Who do you say that I am? Or our being present as Jesus makes his way on the journey to Calvary. Many of you have experienced this way of praying when you make your retreat at White House. Doesn’t that way of praying help you develop a more personal relationship with the Lord?
The third insight I want to share with you is that God can be found in all things. Ignatius has given us a vision of a world in which we are able to see God and his graces in all the things that make up the events of our daily lives. We just have to be attentive and reverent, always alert to what is “really there.” The goal is to determine the way God is working in a particular situation. A Jesuit once told me that looking for God in the ordinary events of our everyday lives, enables us to do extraordinary things. Our Jesuit schools are intentionally working with adults and young people to find God everywhere, from campus chapels to chemistry labs to co-curricular activities. Every aspect of school life offers opportunities for students and adults to encounter God at work in their school communities. This is a major theme of the New Teacher Retreat weekend that I direct each year. And certainly if we take the time, we can find examples each day of God being present to us.
The fourth insight is concerned with the process of discernment. Discernment is an outgrowth of the Ignatian vision of a God who is active in our lives and in our decision making, particularly those that involve life-changing decisions. Discernment requires listening, especially through prayer and conversation with God and with others. When I was deciding to leave SLUH after 36 years and accept my current province position, a Jesuit and my wife helped me through the discernment process. Faith not only gives us the grace to believe what we cannot see, but enables us to listen to God speaking to us so that in making a decision we believe that we have done the best we can with the pros and cons of a specific decision and then we simply surrender in trust to the One who we believe loves us and has helped us make the best decision.
The last insight that I want to share with you is that prayer must permeate our daily life - how we struggle sometime to find time to do this – don’t we? For Ignatius prayer is simply a way to communicate with God. And if any relationship is going to develop and grow, there must be communication. An Ignatian form of prayer that I try to use regularly is the Examen, whether at the beginning or end of a day. (Sometimes, I even do it when I am driving to work in the morning - not sure if that is following the exact rules of praying the Examen – but I don’t have the radio on.) The Examen is a truly wonderful gift given to us by Ignatius. In a retreat one time, a Jesuit said it may be Ignatius greatest gift to us. When I coordinate meetings and retreats for different groups in the Province, I always make an experience of the Examen an important part of the agenda. For me, the Examen is simply making reflection an integral part of our daily lives. Through the Examen we acknowledge God’s presence . . . . . . Acknowledge our need for His help to review the events of our day . . . . . . . Ask his forgiveness for our failings; . . . . . . . Thank Him for our blessings and successes during the day . . . . . . . And at the end of a day or at the beginning of new day, we tell Him that we are looking forward to continuing on the journey aware of his presence with us.
May God Bless you on your Journey. Thank you.