To understand prayer of detachment one has to understand the conditions under which the Society of Jesus was born, and the Carmelite and Franciscan reforms took place. They are contemporary with the Protestant Reformation and the discovery of the Americas. The Spanish had pushed the Muslims and Jews out of Spain, after 800 years of Moorish domination.
People like Ignatius, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Francis of Osuna, and Peter of Alcantara tried to bring order into chaos. Ignatius introduces the Spiritual Exercises, which he discovers by pure accident. It was truly God who led him through the process himself. Ignatius offers a chaotic world a method of prayer that brings order to the mind and soul.
Teresa and John do the same for the Carmelite family. It was never their intention to rebel or to found a new order. Their intention was to bring silence and solitude back into the Christian life so that one could be free of distraction in order to pray. This was not a novel concept, but one that they inherited from the early Carmelite hermits.
Peter of Alcantara and Francis of Osuna bring their Franciscan reform into the picture. They introduce the whole concept of recollection, which is not new either. It was a system that Francis of Assisi discovered in the Gospels. Christ would often seek silence and solitude to pray.
What we have to see here is a common thread, which should speak to us today. Our world and our Church is not very different from that of the world and Church of Ignatius, the Carmelite Reformers and the Franciscan Reformers. The truth is that the search for silence and solitude is the firs step toward contemplation. Contemplation is nothing more than being in the presence of God. Sounds easy, right?
NOOOOTTTTTTTTTTTT
Why not? Because we hate to surrender control. Ignatius understood this. He introduces the use of the imagination into prayer, it gives the pray-er a way of actively participating in prayer without interfering with the work of the Holy Spirit.
The Franciscans and Carmelites also subscribe to the use of the imagination, but they use allegory instead of thoughts. Teresa and John use royal allegory: interior castle, etc. The Franciscans use the image of the cave, because Francis had often used caves as chapels and postinia.
You have to seek silence and solitude in order to achieve the necessary discipline to pray. Otherwise, your prayer is simply words. That’s why the Rosary is such a wonderful prayer. It’s repetative, so that after a while, you’re not focussing on the words. You can let go of the words and pay attention to what the Lord allows you to experience. Something like the rosary actually helps to achieve silence. The great thing about it is that you can detach from the words. You don’t have to pay too much attention to yourself. You place yourself in God’s presence.
What Ignatius taught us is that this is a process that has steps. You don’t just jump into comtemplative prayer as if you were jumping into a swimming pool. You have to begin at the beginning. The Carmelite and Franciscan reformers taught the same thing. The difference between them is the method. One should avoid blending them, unless one is very familiar with them. Otherwise, one can become very confused and stressed.
A good place to begin is with a role model: Francis de Sales, Francis of Assisi, Benedict, Teresa, Bernard, Catherine of Siena, etc. Get to know him or her. As you do, you will learn how to begin and where to begin.
As I said, I love Francis of Assisi and Teresa of Avila. I focus on their detachment. That is not to say that Ignatius or Benedict do not teach detachement, because they do. But it takes a different form and it does not fit my personality.
What I find most attractive about Francis and Teresa are that they are both charming people, without being weak. They did not take themselves or anyone else too seriously. They had a sense of humor. They approached God with great spontaneity. Teresa even scolds God when unpleasant things happen. She tells Christ, “If this is the way that you treat your friends, no wonder you have so few.” Francis of Assisi laid aside the monastic formality and went before God where he composed poems and songs for the Lord. He would create makeshift instruments to play before the Lord. In other words, both of them were so detached from themselves that they did not think about how they sounded or what others thoought, nor did they think about what others were doing when they prayed. They could pray alone or in a great cathedral and not pay attention to anything except Christ.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
