The Turning

In his “Spiritual Exercises,” sixteenth-century Basque soldier-turned-religious-seeker Ignatius of Loyola lays out a series of meditative practices focused on the life of Christ and designed to focus a person’s external and internal energies to align with the ultimate desires of God. Following a program of preparatory reflections leading to a realization of oneself as a “loved sinner,” Ignatius poses an exercise known as the “Two Standards.”

Military man that he was, Ignatius suggests that we imagine a vast plain on which a tremendous battle is about to be waged. On one side, under one flag or standard, the terrifying troops of Satan amass. On the other, the battalions of Christ gather under the divine standard. Ignatius encourages us to put ourselves into the drama, to see the vivid details, and to let the scene play out as it will. The aim is not historical reenactment or theological rumination but present and personalized awakening to what in our life resides under each of the flags.

At the heart of the exercise we find discernment and choice, the ability to honestly distinguish what habits, desires, contexts, and forces in our lives align under each standards and to choose deliberately what is of Christ. Ignatius knew the difficulties of such a radical reorientation, no matter how earnestly (yet naively) we might participate. The rest of the exercises confirm our choices and help us contend with the inevitable external and internal oppositions, temptations, and loss of focus that accompany any real spiritual growth.

In today’s reading, Paul writes to the Christian community in Corinth to plead for such a reorientation, the same turning that Ignatius struggled with sixteen centuries later and with which we continue to engage. We can be reconciled to God. Despite hardship and difficulty, we can choose that which is of Christ.